In its opinion on 'Additional considerations on the euro area economic policy 2024', the EESC urges closer coordination of national budgetary policies and considers instruments like NextGenerationEU essential for future stability.
The EESC recommends including similar tools in the EU’s future financial frameworks to ensure resilience and fiscal sustainability.
The Committee calls for the completion of the Capital Markets Union to prevent investors from migrating to global markets, prioritising financial market stability and consumer protection, and highlights the need to fully implement the Banking Union by addressing regulatory disparities across Member States, creating a common deposit insurance scheme, and mobilising financial resources for European infrastructure projects.
Public Procurement was better framed in successive EU regulations and, with a view to more accessible and transparent access to it, the procedures were formulated in a more supportive manner. Its importance will continue to increase, both at a national level in the Member States and at a more local level.
Several challenges remain Particularly at the national level, the size and volume play to the advantage of larger companies that can rely on experience and expertise when drawing up files. At a more local level, there are opportunities for MSMEs and, even more specifically, for companies in the social economy. These opportunities require active attention and guidance from both the requesting and offering parties.
In this opinion, the EESC is calling on the Commission to launch a comprehensive European Action Plan on Rare Diseases (APRD) with SMART targets that can be achieved by 2030 to enable the diagnosis of rare disease patients within one year. Such plan should be accompanied by the allocation of appropriate budgetary resources and identify common and measurable goals to help define and implement national plans and strategies for RD, encourage Member States and continue cooperation at EU level.
Member States should facilitate inclusive engagement, openness and transparency with civil society in all areas of RWM. Available funding should be used to increase the capacity of civil society groups, particularly local communities close to nuclear installations, to participate independently in projects and studies to assess participation and transparency practices in RWM. Member States shall assume all their responsibilities so as not to leave future generations with the burden of processing nuclear waste, whatever its nature, lifespan and hazard level. The development of shared solutions, including but not limited to multinational radioactive waste repositories, could be of interest to some EU Member States, particularly countries with small or medium-sized inventories.
In this opinion, the EESC calls for a general European strategy for geothermal energy development in order to harness the potential of geothermal energy. Geothermal energy production has extremely low greenhouse gas emissions, thus reducing the continent’s dependence on fossil fuels and facilitating its decarbonisation, thereby making a significant contribution to achieving the EU’s 2050 climate neutrality goals.
Climate change is a matter of urgency and demands a green shift in our economies. To achieve the EU's climate targets, a profound modernisation of the capital stock is needed. This entails a massive expansion of public investments. The need for an EU-level investment fund to finance the green transition is also a matter of economic strength and sustainable competitiveness. One central element of closing the financing gap is an investment friendly reform of the EU fiscal rules. While the reform process is still ongoing and is supposed to be finished by the end of this legislature, it is already clear that the fiscal space for public investments at national level will not significantly increase with the reform.
The EESC supports fostering joint programmes among higher education institutions within and beyond European University Alliance projects, ensuring quality assurance and including all relevant stakeholdersin their implementation. It emphasises the need for broad collaboration among stakeholders to effectively implement the initiatives, particularly highlighting the fundamental values of student and staff participation following the Bologna Process. The EESC calls for the involvement of relevant labour market stakeholders in defining study programmes that have particular relevance to the labour market. It emphasises the need for adequate resources to implement these initiatives effectively.
