skip to main content
European Commission Logo
en English
Newsroom

News

Keeping the goals in sight for a sustainable recovery

Assessing The Sustainable Development Goals in the light of the COVID pandemic, Viveka Palm from Eurostat and Mayor of Braga Ricardo Rio told the Brussels Economic Forum that the EU should focus on UN targets as it seeks to rebuild economies.

 
More Than a Healthy Recovery: Building a Digital Democracy

Recovery from the COVID pandemic is not the only challenge facing the EU today, said Francesca Bria, President of the Italian National Innovation Fund. The extent to which citizens have switched to online activity since lockdowns began in 2020, for everything from work and school to food and medicine, gives an early glimpse of what a new, digital society could look like. Europe now has a chance to shape that new society with European values.

 
Trade in a Pandemic: Do the Old Systems Work?

A debate on Strategic Autonomy vs Protectionism heard WTO Director-general Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, discuss with European Commission Executive Vice-President Valdis Dombrovskis the role of international trade in responding to the pandemic.

 
What People Want: The value of GDP as an Indicator of Social Success

Can one judge a country’s success by the value of all goods and services it produces? The heated debate around this question was clearly demonstrated at a lively “Oxford-style” debate, in which two speakers argue opposite sides of a motion and attempt to win majority support from the audience.

 
Christine Lagarde Prepares for the Post-Pandemic Future

The speed of change brought about by the COVID pandemic, as set out by European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde, is unprecedented. “There are possibilities for our economy in 2022 which seemed at least a decade away in 2019,” Lagarde told the Brussels Economic Forum.

 
Independent, Innovative, Fast: Angela Merkel Sets Out a New Role for Europe

“For one and a half years the Coronavirus pandemic has held the world in its grip,” German Federal Chancellor Angela Merkel told the Brussels Economic Forum. “We are facing unimaginable challenges.” Moving forward, we must now “not only make Europe more resilient to crises but also create more opportunities.”

 
A New EU Economic Paradigm: Green, Digital and United

“There is now a good opportunity for the EU to become not only the queen of regulation but also strong in competitiveness,” Commissioner Paolo Gentiloni said. “In the near future we could come to define this moment as the new economic paradigm.”