Businesses demand EU action to boost growth

A leading business group urged European Union leaders on Friday to liberalise economic rules and increase research spending to boost growth in the bloc and prevent it from falling further behind the United States. To drive its point home, the Eurochambres group of European chambers of commerce issued a damning report, which said the US economy was nearly 20 years ahead of the 25-nation EU.
EU businesses expect the bloc's summit on March 22-23 to relaunch the stalled pro-growth programme of economic reforms known as the Lisbon agenda.
"We expect the summit to support strongly the priorities of growth and jobs. The summit must show real political dedication to achieving 3 percent growth per annum to create additional 10 million jobs over the coming 5 years," said Eurochambres Secretary General Arnaldo Abruzzini.
"Prime Ministers should take personal responsibility for delivering on Lisbon," he added in a statement.
The EU should complete its single market, where capital and workforce move freely, refrain from passing new laws that put more burden on business and secure ample funds for research and development, the Eurochambres said.
The bloc should also seek to conclude the Doha round of trade liberalisation talks under the World Trade Organisation.
The Lisbon agenda, agreed in 2000, is aimed at turning the EU into the world's most competitive economic area by 2010.
But the results are miserable half way through, economists and politicians say, mainly because labour costs remain high and many countries have resisted opening up their markets to competition and de-regulating their economies.
The EU's unemployment rate is around 9 percent, compared with 5.5 percent in the US, while the country's economy grew four times faster in the fourth quarter of 2004 than the EU's.
The Eurochambres reports said the employment rate the EU achieved EU in 2003 was attained by the US in 1978.
The EU's spending on research and development is the same as the US in 1979, the bloc's economic output per head in 2003 level matched the US level in 1985 and the EU's level of productivity in 2003 was achieved by the US in 1989.
"Even the most optimistic assumptions show it will take the EU decades to catch up and this only if there is considerable EU improvement," commented Abruzzini.