Defensa y Seguridad

On March 16th, the Commission published its proposal on the Net-Zero Industry Act (‘NZIA’). This needs to be understood side-by-side with a reform of the relevant State aid rules, published by the Commission on March 10th – notably an update of the Temporary Crisis Framework and a revision of the State aid General Block Exemption Regulation. Taken together, this package of measures is intended to be the EU’s reaction to the US Inflation Reduction Act (‘IRA’), as well as China’s perceived continued strategic investment push into ‘Green Deal’ technologies.

The US dollar has held the unrivalled position of the world’s dominant currency since the Second World War. Although the euro has established itself as the second most important currency in the international monetary system, it lags way behind the USD, and does not reflect the dominant position of the EU in global markets. Although the role of the renminbi is even less developed, China is working hard to change that. A possible game-changer, which could lead to more currency diversification, is the rapid development of private and public digital currencies. On this, China is in the vanguard. Why is the euro not more widely used? The main reason is that the economic and monetary union remains incomplete. The unfinished banking union, patchy progress towards a capital markets union and the absence of a central fiscal capacity all make it difficult for the euro to challenge the USD. Other factors include the limited supply of high-quality euro-denominated assets, and the fragmentation of the EU and euro area’s voice in international financial institutions. In recent years EU leaders have on several occasions called for a strengthening of the international role of the euro. It has also been pushed by the Commission and supported by the ECB. But the overall objective has remained rather general, with little consideration of why (economic and/or political reasons?) and even less to the how (what policy implications might this entail?).

This report provides an overview of the key activities and achievements of EFSA over the past year, as well as the challenges the Authority has faced in fulfilling its mission to help ensure food safety in the EU and beyond. Marking EFSA’s 20th anniversary, 2022 also saw some new beginnings. With the easing of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, staff gradually returned to the office, and measures were adopted to support hybrid working. Based on the lessons learnt during the previous two years of mostly remote operations, the Authority has assessed how this experience can be used to make EFSA’s ways of working more fit for future challenges.

Road transport is the main contributor to transport emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the European Union (EU), with passenger cars and light commercial vehicles (LCVs) accounting for almost 15% of the total emissions. In order to gradually decarbonise the fleet, the EU has established fleet-wide CO2 targets for annually registered vehicles, assigning manufacturer specific targets based on their average vehicle mass. From 2025, new EU fleet-wide targets will be established applying a percentage reduction to a reference 2021 EU fleetwide target. This value is calculated from the vehicles’ CO2 emissions for 2020 and the mass and registration figures of 2021. In 2025, the reduction will be 15% for both passenger cars and LCVs, while for 2030 it will increase to 55% and 50%, respectively, following the recent adoption of the more ambitious targets. This report provides the robust method used to calculate the EU fleet-wide targets in 2025 and 2030 and the parameters that will define the manufacturers’ specific target line from 2025 onwards. The EU fleet-wide targets calculated for 2025 are 93.6 g/km for passenger cars and 153.9 g/km for LCVs. For 2030, the EU fleet-wide targets will be reduced to 49.5 g/km for passenger cars and 90.6 g/km for LCVs. The slope of the target line for 2025 will be -0.0144 g/(km∙ kg) for passenger cars and 0.0848 g/(km∙ kg) for LCVs, while for 2030 the slope will be – 0.0076 g/(km∙ kg) and 0.0499 g/(km∙ kg), respectively. An indicative 2025 average test mass of 1,609.6 kg for cars and 2,163.0 kg for LCVs, was calculated.

Halving food waste by 2030 is an ambitious target of the Sustainable Development Goals, echoed by the Farm to Fork Strategy within the European Green Deal. This report offers a comprehensive evaluation of the economy-wide implications for different food waste reduction targets. The study utilizes the further adapted computable general equilibrium model MAGNET and employs a range of sustainability indicators to analyse the economic, social, and environmental impacts associated with the reduction of food waste. A bottom-up analysis based on life cycle assessment is conducted as an additional approach to assess the environmental implications of achieving the food waste reduction targets. The results show that despite income reductions in the food chain as a consequence of the declining demand, positive effects in other economic areas offset these losses. Additionally, food waste reduction is expected to yield substantial environmental benefits, as well as increase food affordability and financial savings for households.

The European Commission Learning Lab on Investing in Quality Education and Training aims at developing an evaluation culture in education. It offers EU Member States (MS) tools, resources and expertise to build robust evidence on what really works in education and training in order to facilitate the design of effective policy interventions that are adapted to different contexts.