International trade – a key driver for the engineering industry

Orgalime welcomes the European Commission’s Communication ‘Trade for all - Towards a more responsible trade and investment policy’ [COM(2015) 497 final] as it places trade at the top of its political priorities.

Orgalime supports the Commission’s plan to advance the agenda of trade liberalisation, through the multilateral, as well as the bilateral and plurilateral paths. Given the importance to Europe of our industry’s exports (a third of the manufactured exports of the European Union), we stress the need for trade agreements to have a stronger focus on the needs of the engineering industry.

We welcome the Commission’s proposals to re-energise multilateral negotiations and to restore the centrality of the WTO as a trade negotiation forum.  Concerning bilateral negotiations, the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) is of particular importance to the European engineering industries.

Finally, Orgalime appreciates the focus on SMEs in the forthcoming trade agenda, as greater participation of SMEs in free trade agreements would result in the creation of growth and jobs.