News and analysis on trade policy in Europe
Saturday, April 26, 2025
The European Commission’s post-COVID-19 ‘recovery plan’ released today amidst strong media attention focuses mainly on financial and budget issues. But the governance of trade and global value chains is also a significant dimension of how Brussels sees a way out of the pandemic-induced slump. The European Commission adjusted its 2020 …
The European Commission confirmed that it was allowing the temporary export licensing regime for personal protective equipment to lapse. The measure expired yesterday. It was introduced mid March 2020 in response to member states’ unilateral decisions to stop exports of masks, googles, gloves and protective wear including within the EU’s …
Today’s mainstream media will mainly focus on the budgetary dimension of a political agreement reached between Germany and France today on policies to help the European Union’s economic recovery from the COVID-19 crisis.
The chair of the European Parliament’s international trade committee is asking the European Union to look into some intellectual property rules in its trade policies and agreements with the view of making any future COVID-19 vaccine accessible to the largest numbers in the shortest possible period of time. In a …
There is continued movement around the issue of restrictions on exports of medical products in the World Trade Organization. LDCs call on WTO members not to restrict medical, food exports Benin, on behalf of the group of Least Developed Countries in the World Trade Organization, requested that other members of …
Which way will the already battered trading system go? The COVID-19 pandemic has seen trade restrictions on medical products spread like wildfire as governments seek to maximise availability of scarce goods to their peoples and their medical teams in a beggar-thy-neighbour fashion. As of early May, a group of researchers …
The European Union is restricting the scope of its current export prohibition of personal protective equipment to third countries – but not as much as the European Commission initially desired. The measure introduced last March for a period of six weeks required business to seek export authorisations from their national …
Today the international trade committee gathered formally for a two-hour online session for the first time since the COVID-19 related lockdowns. This was an opportunity for an exchange with trade commissioner Phil Hogan. A selection of items discussed therein. EU export restrictions on PPE: the Commission is going ahead with …
Trade ministers of the European Union’s member states gathered online for the first time since the COVID-19 lockdown in Brussels to discuss amongst themselves and with the European Commission the most pressing trade issues raised by the pandemic. The meeting was informal. It is being held against the background of …
The European Commission released a ‘roadmap’ to guide member states and EU institutions in managing a phased exit from the COVID-19 lockdowns in Europe today. Will the Commission’s approach work? Some perspective on the ‘border’ dimension of the crisis. The general approach taken by the Commission in its guidelines is …
