The European Union’s key competitiveness initiative will be announced next week, four EU officials told POLITICO of the strategy delayed after European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen was hospitalized with pneumonia.
The so-called Competitiveness Compass was due to be unveiled on Wednesday but was postponed, initially without a fresh date, after von der Leyen was taken ill. The Commission only confirmed late last week that von der Leyen had been hospitalized and is now recovering at her home in Germany.
It’s now scheduled to be adopted at the next commissioners’ meeting on Jan. 22, according to two Commission officials and two diplomats from EU member countries. They spoke on condition of anonymity because planning details aren’t yet public. One Commission official said that the text had not yet been approved to be shared for comments.
eviously reported that the delay was caused by von der Leyen’s absence as she was meant to present the initiative.
The initiative aims to set the economic strategy underpinning the Commission’s work until 2029. It is the keystone for a series of initiatives the Commission has scheduled for the next few months, including the Clean Industrial Deal due in February.
Drawing from reports from Mario Draghi and Enrico Letta on how to boost the EU’s economy, the initiative aims to tackle the EU’s innovation gap with global rivals, ensure the bloc’s economic security and make progress on decarbonizing EU industry. The Commission’s secretariat-general will lead the work.
