Remarks by Commissioner Urpilainen at the press conference on the Joint Communication on Building sustainable international partnerships as a Team Europe

Europe Africa

BRUSSELS, 02 October 2024 / PRN Africa / -- ?Today, the College has adopted the [Joint] Communication on ‘Building sustainable international partnerships as a Team Europe'. This Communication takes stock of the progress made in the field of International Partnerships during this mandate.

The Communication summarises how International Partnerships have contributed towards this Commission's political priorities, notably the priority of ‘A stronger Europe in the world'.

First, a couple of words on the context and the paradigm shift in the European Union's model of cooperation.

At the beginning of this mandate, this Commission set out to move away from the donor-recipient model towards equal partnerships. We recognised that our partner countries in the Global South want to be more than subjects of aid. But also, that the challenges we face are shared, with common interests at stake.

Over the past five years, we have been hit by multiple global crises, which have come on top of climate change, but also regional instability and mounting geopolitical tensions. The crises have underlined our interconnectedness and increased further the financing gap to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals. Of course, all this has made the shift become even more urgent.

Resilience has really become the key word. The new paradigm is built on mutually beneficial partnerships that enforce both the partners' resilience and Europe's resilience.

One important aspect of this shift is Team Europe. This approach, which brings together the European Union institutions, the European Union Member States, the European development finance institutions and – more and more – also the European private sector, has become our method of delivery of external action.

It was first deployed during the pandemic when it became clear that we can be much more impactful by pooling resources and know-how. Team Europe enables us to increase the scale and visibility of our actions.

Then there is Global Gateway. Our strategy launched in 2021, to mobilise up to €300 billion in sustainable investments in infrastructure and human development by the year 2027. Global Gateway embodies the new way of doing international cooperation.

It is the European Union's positive offer to partner countries in a very contested international environment. It aims to advance sustainable development and mutual priorities, like fair green and digital twin transitions, as well as boosting the strategic autonomy of our partners as well as the European Union.

We deliver Global Gateway as Team Europe. Cooperation with the private sector also has a central role. We use public resources to facilitate an enabling environment for investment, growth, and local value addition.

Today's Communication offers tangible examples of Global Gateway implementation in International Partnerships regions in its main thematic sectors.

Between 2021 and 2023, Team Europe mobilised investments worth €179 billion in support of Global Gateway projects. And this figure includes Africa, Asia, the Pacific, Latin America, the Caribbean and the European Union's immediate neighbourhood. This means that we have already delivered more than half of our target of €300 billion.

Out of the €179 billion, €50 billion were supported by the Commission through the European Fund for Sustainable Development Plus (EFSD+) and €129 billion were mobilised by the European Union Member States, the European Investment Bank (EIB) and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) alone.

But not everything we do is Global Gateway. The Communication covers also:

Engagement in fragile contexts, where the primary objective is to address root causes of fragility and support the basic needs and livelihoods of populations.

Migration, where we have scaled up work to provide a comprehensive response to address root causes. The external dimension is an essential component of the Pact on Migration and Asylum. In line with the Pact, we have increased engagement with origin and transit countries.

Multilateral engagement. Many of the Commissioners were in the United Nations General Assembly last week in New York. The European Union has championed multilateralism, been at the forefront of the 2030 Agenda implementation, and supported the legitimate request from partner countries to reform multilateral structures and international financial architecture. We have signed a new framework agreement – the Samoa agreement – for cooperation with African, Caribbean, and Pacific partners.

And we have also contributed to a range of global funds on health, education, and climate.

Finally, combatting inequality and empowering women and young people has been a crosscutting priority. In this regard, I look forward to hosting the High-Level Global Gateway event on Youth in Brussels next week!

So, dear colleagues, these are just some of the significant examples of our action over the past five years.

I will leave my responsibility soon with the conviction that we have laid a strong foundation for a future that will be more sustainable and resilient for both the European Union and our partner countries.

Thank you very much.

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SOURCE European Commission