European Union News

The Communication will be an input for the European Council in June and aims to propose a shared commitment for employment around three priorities: maintaining employment and promoting mobility; upgrading skills and matching labour market needs; increasing access to employment.

Notice has been published in the Official Journal of the European on June 3rd 2009 of the launch of a Call for Proposals under sub-Action 4.4 of the ‘Youth in Action’ Programme, aiming to support projects encouraging creativity and innovation in the youth sector. Interested applicants can submit their proposals by September 30th 2009 to the Education, Audiovisual and Culture Executive Agency.

Social protection expenditure in 2006 within European Union 27 Member states accounted for 26.9% of GDP. This ratio was 27.1% in 2005 and 2004 and 27.2% in 2003. The data delivered by Eurostat last report show important disparities between Member states, which reflect important differences in terms of living standards.

Reaching the 2020 renewable energy targets is expected to lead to around 2.8 million jobs in the renewable energy sector and generate a total value added of around 1.1% of GDP. This is the main conclusion of a European Commission's study on the impact of renewable energy policy on economic growth and employment in the European Union (Employ-RES) which is already available in the Internet. Energy Commissioner Andris Piebalgs said: "This shows that benefits of renewables in terms of security of supply and fighting climate change can go hand in hand with economic benefits".

A new report from the Joint Research Centre (JRC) says that man-made global greenhouse gas emissions increased by 15% between 2000 and 2005, a sharp increase in the expected rate of growth. It also shows that global annual emissions of greenhouse gases increased from 24 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalents in 1970 to 33 billion tonnes in 1990 and 41 billion tonnes in 2005.

The Council took note in its last meeting in May 2009, of information provided by the German delegation concerning the “Google Books Project” (scanning of books in US libraries for establishing a database on the basis of digital copies) and its possible legal implications as regards copyright matters. Commission was asked to elaborate an assessment and to report back in due course.

The Competitiveness Council (Internal market, Industry and Research), held in Brussels on May 28th 2009, emphasized the key role of industry for the European economy and the need to continue to react promptly to the present economic recession with a coherent and coordinated set of short-, medium- and long-term initiatives. Ministers also highlighted the fact that SMEs are the backbone of the European economy, and that they should be respected and considered when setting up framework conditions for European industry.

Jan Fischer, Prime Minister of the Czech Republic, his Slovak counterpart Robert Fico and EU Commissioner Vladimír Špidla participated in the fourth plenary session of the European Nuclear Energy Forum (ENEF) in the Czech capital Prague. 250 high-ranking participants from all relevant stakeholders are discussing risks, opportunities and transparency issues of nuclear energy.

European citizens seem to be mobilising for the 4-7 June European elections, says a TNS Opinion survey commissioned by the European Parliament. The numbers saying that they plan to vote is clearly up on previous surveys, even though doubts remain as to whether they will in fact do so. Interest in the elections also seems stronger.

Commission has published in the Official Journal of the European Union on May 30th 2009, an invitation to interested parties to present their comments on certain measures planned by French government in favour of the port sector. Interested parties may submit their opinions within one month of this publication.

The emissions inventory compiled by the European Environment Agency for 2007, the latest year for which complete data is available, shows that EU-15 emissions dropped by 1.6% from 2006 while the economy grew by 2.7 %. The reduction takes EU-15 emissions to 5.0% below their levels in the base year (1990 in most cases). This puts the EU-15 well on track to meet its Kyoto Protocol target of reducing emissions in the 2008-2012 period to an average of 8% below the base year level.

The report covers both 2006 and 2007 due to the limited activities under Sapard during in particular 2006, the completion of the programmes of the eight new Member States and problems encountered with the implementation of Sapard in Bulgaria  and Romania, which started in 2007. Implementation in Bulgaria and Romania will be further dealt with in the Sapard annual report 2008, which is under preparation.