Thank you very much for the invitation and opportunity to speak to you today. Again, in a time of uncertainty. Political and economic uncertainty, this time stemming directly from a referendum in the UK. And again, commentators throughout Europe contemplate the consequences of the possible next crisis. I will argue today that we should not wait for the next possible event (which may never happen) but should look at the fundamentals and continue to work on improving those. Economic outlook eurozone There is quite a...

Two major global initiatives to fight climate change at city level are merging to create an alliance of more than 7,100 cities across the world called the Global Covenant of Mayors for Climate and Energy. The Covenant of Mayors – an EU initiative launched in 2008 involving 6,800 cities and regions in 57 countries – and the Compact of Mayors – a global coalition of mayors and city officials launched in 2014 by United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon – together...

The European Central Bank (ECB) has bought €80 billion worth of public and private debt since March 2015 in order to boost growth and push interest rates down. The bond buying programme has led to the bank being criticised for overstepping its mandate, but today the German constitutional court ruled that it wasn't. ECB President Mario Draghi is expected to discuss the strategy known as quantative easing during his meeting with Parliament's economic committee today from 15.00 CET. The ECB...

On 21 June 2016, the Council agreed on a draft directive addressing tax avoidance practices commonly used by large companies. The directive is part of a January 2016 package of Commission proposals to strengthen rules against corporate tax avoidance. The package builds on 2015 OECD recommendations to address tax base erosion and profit shifting (BEPS). The directive addresses situations where corporate groups take advantage ofdisparities between national tax systems in order to reduce their overall tax liability. Corporate taxpayers may benefit from...

The Council adopted conclusions on food and nutrition security. Substantial progress has been made to improve global food security, as the global hunger index shows that the level of hunger has fallen by 27% since 2000. However the total number of people chronically undernourished is still at 795 million. The Council expresses the need to keep global food and nutrition security at the forefront of the EU development cooperation agenda and to further improve EU and member states coordination...

Which priorities are crucial to strengthening innovation and industry in Europe? This is the key question at the European conference on Industrial Technologies, which is being held in Amsterdam from 22 to 24 June. A European agenda for competitive European industry During the conference, over 160 speakers will share their vision and insights on developments in manufacturing, materials, nanotechnology, biotechnology and digitalisation in Europe. The focus will be on developing the European policy agenda for the transition to a competitive European...

The Council adopted the thematic part of the EU annual report on human rights and democracy in the world in 2015. The report underlines that 2015 has been a year of challenges for the EU and the international community at large, it describes the EU human rights approach to conflicts and crisis, how the EU addresses the main human rights and democracy challenges worldwide, and how human rights are mainstreamed throughout EU external policies, including trade and development cooperation. Read the...