Renzi urges Europe to stop 'hesitating' over trade deal with US

Matteo Renzi, Italy's prime minister, chided fellow European leaders for "hesitating" and "stuttering" on negotiations over a sweeping trade agreement with the US as he delivered a sharply-worded call for a deal to be reached by the end of the year.

"It's not possible that the United States of America is closing agreements with the Far East [the Trans-Pacific Partnership], and Europe is hesitating and stuttering over TTIP," he said, referring to the so-called Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership.

"Failing to close the deal by the end of the year - and this will be the last chance because of the US elections next year - would be a gigantic own-goal for our continent," he said, speaking at a conference organised by the European University Institute in Florence, the renaissance city where Mr Renzi was born and served as mayor.

His comments reflect the mounting frustration with the slow progress of the negotiations, which began nearly two years ago, among European countries such as Italy that are among the staunchest backers of a trade agreement with the US.

Italy is one of the more heavily export-driven economies in Europe - from advanced manufacturing to luxury goods and food and wine - and is hoping to capitalise on the slide in the value of the euro to reboot its sluggish economy.

The EU and the US have been sparring recently on genetically-modified crops (GMOs) and a special provision that would allow investors to seek redress against violations of the deal in international tribunals, known as the Investor State Dispute Settlement (ISDS). Even optimists on the status of the talks are sceptical that an agreement could be sealed this year.

Mr Renzi said Italy had its own battles to fight in the trade talks, mainly over the protection of intellectual property and trademarks such as "Made in Italy" brands and geographic indicator labels in food and wine.

But he said: "If we look at Florence and many other Italian cities, we realise that what made us grow and become big was not a petty provincial retrenchment."

<

The tabular content relating to this article is not available to view. Apologies in advance for the inconvenience caused.

As well as a greater push for TTIP, Mr Renzi singled out the need for European countries to be much more aggressive diplomatically in trying to find solutions to the wave of migrants trying to reach European shores by boat from war-torn African and Middle Eastern nations - and in many cases dying along the way.

"We give the impression that we are a continent that can manage emergencies, for better or worse, but we don't have a strategy," he said. "We cannot afford to be only chasing emergencies," he said, referring to other recent crises such as the financial crisis, the war in Ukraine, and the Ebola emergency.

Mr Renzi's view was not only gloomy, however. He noted that progress had been made over the past year in that more budgetary flexibility had been granted by the EU to countries such as Italy suffering from tight public finances.

He also said that anti-euro sentiment had waned significantly - at least in Italy - compared with European elections of last year, and would not be as contested a topic in the upcoming regional elections in Italy at the end of the month. "The approach to Europe has changed," he said.

© The Financial Times Limited 2015. All rights reserved.
FT and Financial Times are trademarks of the Financial Times Ltd.
Not to be redistributed, copied or modified in any way.
Euro2day.gr is solely responsible for providing this translation and the Financial Times Limited does not accept any liability for the accuracy or quality of the translation