In the Strategic Foresight Report 2023, the European Commission has set some priority indications that look first and foremost at sustainability and the well-being of citizens
Nello Strategic Foresight Report 2023 an important message clearly emerges: there cannot be a sustainable transition, or more precisely the transition towards sustainability, without considering people at the center of choices in economic, digital and environmental matters. The European Union firmly believes in it and puts it black and white in the 2023 Strategic Forecast Report, immediately bringing human value to attention. This is confirmed by the title chosen for the Strategic Foresight Report 2023, published by the EU Commission: “Sustainability and well-being of citizens as the fulcrum of Europe’s open strategic autonomy”.
The basic idea is that, while engaged in a profound transition, which contemplates the green transition and the digital transition, aimed at achieving climate neutrality, the European Union must arrive at a new economic model, capable of recognizing the links between the environmental, social and economic dimensions of sustainability.
We can read a certain affinity with the ESG objectives pursued by companies. However, in the case of the EU the scope is considerably broader, directly or indirectly involving almost 750 million inhabitants.
To ensure that the sustainable transition is based on the well-being of the individual and society, the report lists ten areas: they range from the need for a new European social contract to attention to civil protection strategies, duly strengthened for effective action preventive and aimed at climate resilience.
In any case, what the report intends to put in the foreground is the anthropocentric value. He makes it clear from the introduction: for this sustainable transformation to be achieved, we read,
“It is essential to recognize the links between the environmental, social and economic dimensions of sustainability. This will allow Europe to pursue a forward-looking geopolitical strategy that effectively exploits its main strengths, namelysocial market economyone of a kind, and the fact that it constitutes the largest trading bloc in the world.”
Takeaway
The Strategic Foresight Report 2023 drawn up by the European Commission is a vision document that serves to frame critical issues and priorities to face the future adequately. The one presented this year focuses on sustainability and citizens’ well-being. In the document, the aim of a just transition towards sustainability takes into account the need for a fair green and digital transition, which includes the necessary investments, but which takes into account the need to bridge disparities in the population and in individual states. The EU Commission, in addition to presenting the scenario in which we are moving, at a geopolitical, economic, social and environmental level, indicates ten areas of intervention so that the transition towards sustainability places the individual at the centre.
Strategic Foresight Report 2023: the basis for a long-term EU discussion and vision
The Strategic Foresight Report 2023 is a document that sets out a long-term vision, in this specific case that of the European Union. It consists of an exploration of the future to support the development of appropriate EU policies.
“It’s about using collective intelligence in a structured and systematic way to help better develop possible transition pathways, prepare the EU to withstand shocks and shape the desired future.”
Presented last July, the EU Commission’s report will serve as an information tool for the discussion of European leaders at the informal European Council in Granada, in October 2023. The following month the same Commission will organize, together with the European Parliament, the annual conference on European Strategic and Policy Analysis System (ESPAS). It will be an opportunity to “test and discuss the underlying findings of the 2024 inter-institutional global trends report, jointly developed by the EU institutions, and to reflect on the way forward. This year’s edition captures the results of the previous ones, dedicated to the themes of resilience (2020), the EU’s autonomy of action (2021), and the combination of the green and digital transition.
Sustainable, green and digital transition: investments in the field and priorities
The European Union on the sustainable transition has ambitious plans and huge investments and is moving on from the digital and green transition.
For the green transition (which includes the energy transition, but also an important green transformation on the industrial, construction and transport levels) it is estimated that more than 620 billion euros per year of investments will be needed to achieve the objectives set by Green Deal and Repower EU. Furthermore, the EU intends to dedicate €578 billion, around a third of its budget, to climate action in the period 2021-2027.
To try to implement the digital transition, investments of 125 billion euros per year will be needed.
But the allocations, however large, will not be sufficient without the necessary economic considerations (the involvement of private as well as public capital), social, environmental and geopolitical considerations are needed.
There are many factors to consider: the situation in Ukraine, health crises (the Covid-19 pandemic), the prospects of a globalization still to be reconfigured, the unknowns generated by the climate crisis are considered on a par with issues relating to the European population. Hence some considerations that emerge in the report. Among these it should be remembered that:
“The primary attention that has been paid to economic factors without duly taking into account the quality of growth and employment has encouraged unsustainable production practices and forms of consumption. Yet environmental resources, which are not infinite, constitute the very foundations of economic activity: for example, 72% of the 4.2 million businesses in the euro area are heavily dependent on at least one service connected to nature”.
Even the consideration of GDP itself, which remains the most important indicator of a country’s economic results, can no longer be considered a complete parameter for measuring progress, “as it does not fully reflect the important environmental and social challenges of our time”.
Between the need for investments and social equity
To implement a sustainable transition, investments will be needed, not only economic, but also in the training of skills that must go hand in hand with technological evolution and the need to count on adequate profiles. This must be done so that the transition is understood in its advantages by everyone.
The Strategic Foresight Report 2023 does not fail to underline this, placing economic and social disparities not only in the population but also in the various States as critical issues. We will also need intergenerational equity, rights at work, the possibility of healthcare and the ability to live in healthy living environments. There is a clear realization that inequalities are deeply linked to a decline in trust in national and EU institutions and in liberal democracy more broadly.
The ten priority interventions indicated in the Strategic Foresight Report 2023
Having established the necessary premises, the document illustrates the main sectors and priorities for intervention. He identifies ten. The first concerns the need to define a new European social contract suitable for a sustainable future. We need suitable living and working conditions to allow everyone to live with dignity, while also being able to count on adequate welfare policies.
Furthermore, it is necessary leverage the single market to promote a net zero emissions economy. In this case it is necessary to highlight what is necessary to achieve this objective, from raw materials (critical materials and rare earths, for example, but not only) to tools, without forgetting the right support for research and development of the necessary technologies.
As a third priority for intervention, the report highlights the need to strengthen the interconnections between the EU’s internal and external policiesalso to promote the EU’s offering and narrative on the global stage.
The European Commission is also aware that this is necessary support changes in production and consumption towards sustainability with reforms and investments aimed at decarbonising the economy, so as not to impact biodiversity and to minimize the ecological footprint of consumption. In this regard, greater awareness among citizens is also needed, possible through adequate communication and cultural dissemination action.
The economic discussion is never marginal: for this reason the need to progress towards an “investment Europe”increasing private financial flows to support strategic investments for transitions.
A sustainable transition also requires adapt public budgets for sustainability purposesas well as of further focus strategic and economic indicators on sustainable and inclusive well-being.
Just as everyone needs to be able to enjoy it, we need to ensure that everyone can contribute effectively to the transition towards sustainability.
Infine, serve strengthen democracyincluding with greater active involvement of citizens and placing generational equity at the center of the decision-making process, e Integrating civil protection with “civil prevention”strengthening EU preparedness and response tools.
The Strategic Foresight Report 2023 does not fail to report, as a worthy gloss, one purpose above all:
“The transition towards sustainability is based on a triple promise: a healthy planet and a prosperous environment, economic growth decoupled from the use of resources and environmental degradation; the guarantee that no person and no place will be left behind.
For Europe to deliver on its promises, it is essential that sustainability is placed at the heart of the EU’s open strategic autonomy.”
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