{"id":288726,"date":"2023-12-29T11:59:59","date_gmt":"2023-12-29T10:59:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/2023\/12\/29\/allargamento-ue-rischi-opportunita-italia\/"},"modified":"2024-01-08T12:14:29","modified_gmt":"2024-01-08T11:14:29","slug":"from-industrial-to-agricultural-policy-risks-and-opportunities-for-italy-from-eu-enlargement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/2023\/12\/29\/from-industrial-to-agricultural-policy-risks-and-opportunities-for-italy-from-eu-enlargement\/","title":{"rendered":"From industrial to agricultural policy. Risks and opportunities for Italy from EU enlargement"},"content":{"rendered":"

Brussels – It is not only a political issue, but, more importantly, it is an issue that affects the future shape of the European Union also in\u00a0economic and trade terms. For more than a year and a half – ever since Russia started the war of aggression in Ukraine – the EU’s enlargement has returned to the top\u00a0of the agenda of the 27 Member States, and after the Crucial European Council Dec. 14-15<\/a>, in which the Union’s leaders decided to start accession negotiations with Ukraine and Moldova (with Bosnia and Herzegovina with reservations) and to grant candidate country status to Georgia, the Italian economic sector has started considering the future risks and opportunities of this process<\/strong>. With a particular focus on the EU enlargement heavyweight, Ukraine.<\/p>\n

\"Allargamento<\/a>“We hope that\u00a0countries such as Ukraine and those in the Western Balkans<\/strong>, once they meet the prerequisites and complete the necessary accession,\u00a0will soon be able to join the European Union<\/strong>,” Confindustria’s President’s Delegate for Europe,\u00a0Stefan Pan<\/strong>, told\u00a0Eunews<\/em>. Confindustria remains cautious about the prospects for EU enlargement, but recognizes the need to “reflect on the future functioning of European institutions, which would already need\u00a0a change in governance<\/strong>” both in terms of the effectiveness of decision-making processes and to “better respond to the needs of the European system,” Pan said. More specifically,\u00a0Italian industry looks at how EU enlargement could affect the institutions, European policies, and the budget: “This is why reforms accompanied by in-depth analysis<\/strong> are needed, taking into account all the different aspects involved and making the Union fit to face the challenges of the coming years.”<\/p>\n

The head of Coldiretti’s representative office in Brussels,\u00a0Paolo Di Stefano<\/strong>, also clarifies that “there are several elements to consider,” from the Internal Market to the EU budget to the timing of negotiations. Above all, Ukraine is in the spotlight, given its size (nearly 44 million inhabitants) and\u00a0completely different agricultural structure<\/strong>\u00a0from that of the rest of Europe: “Against an average size of 12\/13 hectares of the area occupied by European farms, in Ukraine, it rises to 400 hectares.” As Di Stefano points out to\u00a0Eunews<\/em>, Kyiv “will have to adapt to European production standards, such as on food, the environment, and consumer safety,” because an enlarged Europe “can be an opportunity.” For now, however, one cannot ignore the “economic concerns” related to EU enlargement, starting with the Union’s budget: “As shown by the General Secretariat of the Council,\u00a0under the current budgetary rules, Ukraine’s entry would have a significant impact on the Common Agricultural Policy<\/strong>\u00a0funds.” There is talk of an “overall reduction of 20 percent for allocations to member states” and “Italy, which is already a net contributor, will have to increase contributions<\/strong>.” In light of these concerns, Coldiretti calls for “important and courageous choices on the EU budget” and negotiations that “do not create too much disruption to the market and the protection of farms in ‘old’ Europe,” Di Stefano said.<\/p>\n

MEP Massimiliano Salini<\/strong> (Forza Italia), acting member of the Committee on Industry, Research and Energy (ITRE), sums up the future prospects of EU enlargement for the Italian economy and for the European set-up in a conversation with Eunews<\/em>. “EU enlargement as such is a positive thing, because it is a sign of the solidity of the European project, but considering Europe’s configuration and its state of health, the Union seems far from ready for a new enlargement<\/strong>.” That is why in the first place “there is no political future without a Constitution, then we need to establish what the EU should deal with at the budgetary level,” and, finally, we can “take action on governance and treaty reform.”\u00a0Even if this is the political\/institutional aspect that affects all 27 Member States, at the national economic level, “there are only benefits for Italy from EU enlargement, as it is an exporting country with brilliant manufacturing<\/strong>.” Salini acknowledged that “some sectors have legitimate concerns, such as agriculture, which needs an evaluation.” However, as a whole, “Italy would only gain” when considering the\u00a0more countries “to which to sell products without obstacles<\/strong>\u00a0determined by borders and tariffs: the free movement of goods is certainly a positive thing.”<\/p>\n

Where does EU enlargement stand<\/h3>\n

Of the\u00a0six Western Balkan countries<\/strong>\u00a0that have begun the long road to EU membership, accession negotiations have started in four countries – Albania, North Macedonia, Montenegro, and Serbia – one has received candidate status -Bosnia and Herzegovina – and the last has formally applied for and is awaiting the response of the 27 Member States – Kosovo. For\u00a0Tirana and Skopje<\/strong>, negotiations began in July last year, after waiting eight and 17 years, respectively, while\u00a0Podgorica and Belgrade<\/strong>\u00a0have been at this stage for 11 and nine years, respectively. Six years since applying for EU membership,\u00a0Sarajevo<\/strong>\u00a0became a candidate to join the Union on December 15, 2022, and the last European Council in December decided that accession negotiations could be opened “once the necessary degree of compliance with the membership criteria has been achieved.” Pristina is in the most complicated position<\/strong> after the formal request sent at the end of last year: since its unilateral declaration of independence from Belgrade in 2008, five EU member states – Cyprus, Greece, Romania, Spain, and Slovakia – continue not to recognize it as a sovereign state.<\/p>\n

On the other hand, negotiations for Turkey<\/strong>‘s accession to the European Union, which began in 2005, have been frozen since 2018 due to backward steps on democracy, the rule of law, fundamental rights, and the independence of the judiciary. The\u00a0chapter on Turkey<\/span><\/a>\u00a0included in the latest annual Enlargement Package presented in October 2022, explicitly states that the country “does not reverse its course and continues to move away from EU positions on the rule of law, increasing tensions over border respect in the Eastern Mediterranean.” At the NATO summit in Vilnius at the end of June, Turkish President\u00a0Recep Tayyip Erdo\u011fan<\/strong> tried to force his hand, threatening to bind Sweden’s membership in the Atlantic Alliance to when Brussels opens Turkey’s path back to the EU. The blackmail failed, but an ad hoc report at a special meeting in Brussels addressed the dossier on Ankara.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Italian economy looks with interest at the prospects of the future accession of new countries to the Union. Particularly Ukraine, which not only raises concerns about the redistribution of funds from Brussels, but can also represent a huge potential for manufacturing exports<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5647,"featured_media":288686,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"episode_type":"","audio_file":"","podmotor_file_id":"","podmotor_episode_id":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"source_name":"","source_url":"","via_name":"","via_url":"","override_template":"0","override":[{"template":"1","single_blog_custom":"","parallax":"1","fullscreen":"1","layout":"right-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"top","share_float_style":"share-monocrhome","show_share_counter":"0","show_view_counter":"0","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author":"1","show_post_author_image":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"default","post_date_format_custom":"Y\/m\/d","show_post_category":"1","show_post_reading_time":"0","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","show_zoom_button":"0","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","show_post_tag":"1","show_prev_next_post":"1","show_popup_post":"1","number_popup_post":"1","show_author_box":"0","show_post_related":"1","show_inline_post_related":"0"}],"override_image_size":"0","image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"crop-500","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post":"0","trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post":"0","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","sponsored_post_name":"","sponsored_post_url":"","sponsored_post_logo_enable":"0","sponsored_post_logo":"","sponsored_post_desc":"","disable_ad":"0"},"jnews_primary_category":{"id":"","hide":""},"jnews_override_counter":{"override_view_counter":"0","view_counter_number":"0","override_share_counter":"0","share_counter_number":"0","override_like_counter":"0","like_counter_number":"0","override_dislike_counter":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[25707],"tags":[26180,26191,26189,26190,25839,25836,26192,25853],"class_list":["post-288726","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world-politics","tag-politics-agriculture-en","tag-coldiretti-in-2","tag-confindustria-en-2","tag-eu-accession-ukraine","tag-eu-enlargement-en","tag-politica-industriale-en","tag-massimiliano-salini-en"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/288726","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5647"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=288726"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/288726\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":289672,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/288726\/revisions\/289672"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/288686"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=288726"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=288726"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=288726"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}

\"Eu<\/a>The EU enlargement upheaval began four days after the Russian armed aggression when, in the midst of the war, Ukraine<\/strong> applied for “immediate” membership in the Union, with the application signed on February 28, 2022, by President Zelensky. Georgia<\/strong> and Moldova<\/strong> followed three days later (March 3) to prove that the process of rapprochement with Brussels was irreversible, in an explicit reaction to the risk of seeing their independence erased by Moscow. On June 23, 2022, European Council\u00a0approved the\u00a0line drawn by the Commission in its recommendation: Kyiv and Chi\u0219in\u0103u became the sixth and seventh candidates for EU membership<\/strong>, while Tbilisi was recognized as having a European perspective in the EU enlargement process.\u00a0In line with the EU Enlargement Package recommendation, the December 14-15 summit of EU leaders decided to\u00a0start accession negotiations with Ukraine and Moldova<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0grant Georgia candidate status<\/strong>.<\/p>\n