On 25 and 26 September, ministers in charge of competitiveness met in Brussels to hold a meeting of the Competitiveness Council. The main area discussed was, in line with the priorities of the Italian Presidency of the Council, the industrial competitiveness. As a conclusion of the debate, the Council tasked the European Commission to take industrial competitiveness into account in all of its future proposals (so-called mainstreaming of industrial competitiveness) and to come up with specific proposals dealing with industrial competitiveness. Also, impact assessments of various Commission proposals should duly evaluate also the proposal´s impact on industrial competitiveness. As part of impact assessments, all relevant stakeholders should have their say on the proposal.

Also, as the midterm evaluation of the Europe 2020 strategy draws near, the Competitiveness Council discussed also this topic. The ministers agreed that the midterm review is a good opportunity to boost industrial competitiveness and to promote economic growth in general. In order to do so, the ministers plan to better align the financial markets with the real economy and to ameliorate EU´s economic governance. The Italian presidency will discuss this topic in more Council configurations. As a result of these discussions, a report will be drafted for the European Council on Europe 2020 strategy to be presented in December. The Commission, which started the public consultation on the review process in May, will use the report to improve the strategy´s implementation, the measures of which are to be presented in early 2015.

The ministers discussed also the single market for research, investment plan for Europe or the unitary patent protection system implementation.

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