The Three Seas Initiative is about connectivity and scale on a North-South axis with more than a dozen countries that did not have such ties during the Iron Curtain period. Discussions at the 2024 Three Seas Summit and Business Forum in Vilnius underlined the importance of strengthening connections, not just north to south, or east to west, but across the EU, across Europe more broadly, and even internationally. Stronger connectivity will help ensure security, prosperity and sustainability and should therefore be a political imperative for the next EU term.
As CEO Ben Butters said during the Three Seas Business Forum on Energy Transformation, the EU’s 2019-2024 mandate does not include enough of such unified policy-making, a major consequence of which has been an increase in regulatory requirements undermining Europe competitiveness and lead to the gradual deindustrialization of our continent. This must change and therefore the next five years must be about ‘Back to Business’, as our European election manifesto reiterates. Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine has added momentum and purpose to the Three Seas Initiative and its efforts to develop critical infrastructure projects in transport, energy and digital networks. The EU is a key player in this region, which accounts for a third of its geographical area and is growing economically at almost twice the rate of the Union as a whole. The Three Seas region can also act as a source of inspiration and innovation when it comes to cross-border cooperation and investment. With geopolitical instability rising and other major global economies scrambling, EU member states – east, south, north and west – must work together more closely and effectively than ever before to leverage their competitive advantages, pool resources and address challenges. Eurochambres, together with several other business organizations, signed a letter on 5 April calling on President Ursula von der Leyen and EU member states to promote the implementation of electronic declaration for posted workers – a crucial initiative for companies involved in cross-border trade.
The network of chambers strongly encourages Member States to put in place the necessary infrastructure systems that allow such a multilingual common electronic declaration to be recognized across the EU, in addition to allowing short-term exceptions or limiting the number of documents that service providers make available during their posting period. This initiative will ease the obligations of businesses when notifying posted workers and reduce the administrative burden and overall cost of providing services in another Member State.
