Geri
After 6 years, the Türkiye-European Union (EU) High-Level Economic Dialogue (HLED) meeting will be held in Brussels on 3 April. The HLED meeting was held for the first time in 2016, 2017, and 2019, with a settlement taken in 2015. In December 2024, it was decided to re-launch the HLED mechanism at the EU General Affairs Council meeting. The second session of the meeting -the first and third of which took place in Türkiye- was held in Belgium. On the 3rd of April in Brussels, the opening speeches of the first meeting of the new period will be delivered by Mehmet Şimşek, Minister of Treasury and Finance; Valdis Dombrovskis, EU Commissioner for Economy and Productivity; and Marta Kos, EU Commissioner for Enlargement. In the first session of the meeting, the agenda items were planned as the macroeconomic outlook of Türkiye and the EU, competitiveness, and structural reforms. In the 2nd session, important Turkish and EU business world representatives will come together with ministers and commissioners. Senior executives of financial institutions such as the European Investment Bank, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, and the European Development Council Bank will also attend the meeting, where trade opportunities and joint investments will be evaluated.
‘As someone who co-chaired the first meeting in 2016, I am pleased that this platform is being revived.’ Minister Şimşek said about the summit meeting, which aims to take the cooperation between Türkiye and the EU to a new dimension. Şimşek added that roughly 42 percent of the country's exports are carried out to EU countries and Türkiye is the 5th largest trading partner of the Union, stating that developments such as protectionist trends in global trade and green transformation make this cooperation even more imperative: ‘Updating the Customs Union to cover public procurement, services and agriculture sectors, providing visa facilitation for business people and students and developing joint projects in third countries offer great opportunities for Türkiye-EU cooperation. We are ready for stronger and multidimensional cooperation with the EU with our competencies and capabilities in a wide range of fields ranging from defence to energy, agriculture to manufacturing industry.’
Kaynakça:
