{"id":465659,"date":"2026-09-22T12:37:20","date_gmt":"2026-09-22T10:37:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/2026\/09\/22\/sefcovic-nel-negoziato-con-pechino-e-in-gioco-il-futuro-delleconomia-ue\/"},"modified":"2026-09-22T13:07:37","modified_gmt":"2026-09-22T11:07:37","slug":"sefcovic-the-future-of-the-eu-economy-is-at-stake-in-the-negotiations-with-beijing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/2026\/09\/22\/sefcovic-the-future-of-the-eu-economy-is-at-stake-in-the-negotiations-with-beijing\/","title":{"rendered":"\u0160ef\u010dovi\u010d: &#8220;The future of the EU economy is at stake in the negotiations with Beijing&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Brussels \u2013 The dialogue with China on economic relations goes beyond the trade balance and concerns the future of the European economy as a whole. The European Commissioner for Trade, <strong>Maro\u0161 \u0160ef\u010dovi\u010d<\/strong>, is clear on the debate surrounding relations with Beijing and, at a press briefing today (22 September) in Brussels on the agreement reached to proceed with a free trade agreement with the Philippines, he found the time to answer some questions from journalists on the work currently underway to rebalance trade with the Asian giant. There is one central issue that the President of the Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, also highlighted in her State of the Union address: results are needed.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Brussels\u2019 objective remains unchanged, and according to \u0160ef\u010dovi\u010d it is \u201cessential to recognise that our discussion on trade relations with China goes far beyond the traditional debate on the trade balance\u201d because \u201cit is clear that, given the scale of the deficit, the speed at which it is growing and the impact it has on key economic and industrial sectors of the European Union, we are talking about the future of our economy, the future of our industry and, I would add, the future of the European social model,\u201d he explained. The issue is, therefore, \u201chighly political\u201d and <strong>the EU has<\/strong> \u201c<strong>a need for progress and agreements at a political level.\u201d<\/strong> Therefore, \u201c<strong>it will be very important for me to confirm the validity of our communication, by demonstrating that it works and that it delivers concrete results.<\/strong>\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The current phase of EU relations with Beijing is \u201cunprecedented in terms of the intensity of bilateral contacts.\u201d The Commissioner will visit China on 8 and 9 October, and efforts are now focused on the second session of the Trade and Investment Consultation Mechanism (TIC), scheduled for early October. \u201cNaturally, we want to make the most of every single day to prepare as thoroughly as possible,\u201d he noted, recalling the video conference he held last week with the Minister of Commerce, Wang Wentao \u2013 a call that represents \u201ca very important step\u201d as it allowed them to \u201ctake stock of the teams\u2019 work\u201d and provide \u201cguidance to our teams on how to make the most of the remaining two weeks\u201d, he explained. Now, the Director-General of the European Commission\u2019s DG Trade and her team \u201care on their way to Beijing\u201d and, according to \u0160ef\u010dovi\u010d, this \u201cstep will also further advance our discussions.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Therefore, there is ongoing dialogue, and the focus of the Commissioner\u2019s visit will be, on the one hand, on the measures to be implemented \u201cto rebalance trade with China\u201d and \u201cto manage, on both sides, Chinese exports to the European Union in the future\u201d, and, on the other, the \u201cissue of European access to the Chinese market,\u201d \u201cto boost trade volumes and facilitate overall access for European economic operators to the Chinese market.\u201d In addition to these two issues, there will also be the matter of export controls, for example on rare earths.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>For the time being, the Commissioner is trying to see the glass as half full. \u201c<strong>What I can say is that we believe there is a genuine commitment on the part of our Chinese counterparts<\/strong>, and certainly on our part.\u201d But he is not naive. The dialogue must \u201c<strong>move from rhetoric to concrete results<\/strong>, because that is clearly what would be expected of me on my return. And I need a credible outcome,\u201d he reiterated. And \u201cthis is where we are focusing our energies, in the hope of bringing positive news back to Europe,\u201d he concluded.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Commissioner is due to visit the country on 8 and 9 October: \u201cWe need a political breakthrough; I expect concrete results from Beijing\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7874,"featured_media":465635,"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":{"format":"standard","override":[{"template":"1","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_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","post_calculate_word_method":"str_word_count","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","show_comment_section":"1","number_popup_post":"1","show_author_box":"0","show_post_related":"1","show_inline_post_related":"0"}],"image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"crop-500","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","disable_ad":"0","subtitle":""},"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_override_counter":{"view_counter_number":"0","share_counter_number":"0","like_counter_number":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[25705],"tags":[35802,25916,26279,26454,30590,35803,27597,33394],"class_list":["post-465659","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","tag-bilancia-pagamenti","tag-cina-en","tag-trade-en","tag-economy-2-en","tag-terre-rare-en","tag-scambi","tag-sefcovic-en","tag-ue"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/465659","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\/7874"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=465659"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/465659\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":465660,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/465659\/revisions\/465660"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/465635"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=465659"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=465659"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=465659"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}