On July 1st, 2020, Germany took over the position as the presidency of the council of the EU. That statement may confuse some people at first. No, Germany is not the president of Europe, and no, they did not take the position over by force. What happens is that every 6 months in the European Union, a new country takes over the presidency of Europe to ensure that each country has the opportunity to be represented. There’s not one president of the council, but rather it is run by the national government of the current country in power. The presidency works very closely with the two countries that succeed them. In this case, the two succeeding countries are Portugal and Slovenia. They work together as a trio to put forth an agenda with long term goals outside of their individual agendas.

So, now that Germany holds the presidency position, what is their plan for Europe? Obviously with the current climate of what’s going on in today’s world, overcoming and bouncing back from COVID-19 was at the top of their list. Highlights of their goals include:

What is great for business owners is the fact that they are placing a large emphasis on protecting and strengthening small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). SMEs are the backbone of the European economy and Germany recognizes that. Germany plans on hosting a conference in November where SME owners can come together and discuss ideas on how to make life better for their businesses. This will be very beneficial to business owners in Europe. They also plan on increasing competitiveness for SMEs which will lead to further innovation. This comes around the same time the United States signed the USMCA, which places a large emphasis on uplifting SMEs as well. We wrote an article on that recently, that article can be found here.

Even though Germany has taken over during a stressful time, they seem well prepared for these next 6 months. Good luck to the German presidency!

This article was inspired by our Morning Musing video on this same topic, to watch it, click here!

The entire program for the German presidency can be found here.

Picture credit: euractiv.com

   

Best regards
und viele Grüße aus Charlotte
Reinhard von Hennigs
www.bridgehouse.law