Koen Berden presents TTIP study and represents WTI at Ideas Lab

With him on the panel were Franck Proust (Deputy PPE, MEP), Yves Le Morvan (Invivo), Charles-Henri Weymuller (Director Trade Policy directorate, French Ministry of Finance), and Philippe Bonnecarrère (Senator UDI). 

The high-calibre audience included 70 policy makers, company heads and politicians. The study shows that 27 out of 28 EU Member States will gain economically from TTIP, but the results diverge. The eight inserts in the study also highlight some of the challenging issues: TTIP matters for SMEs and in TTIP a balance needs to be struck on protecting investments on the one hand, and retaining the right for states to regulate on the other. A short movie that was shot at this event can be found by following the link below.

The following day Dr Berden presented the TTIP study at the European Parliament in Brussels at the first Transatlantic Legislators Dialogue (TLD) meeting of the year – also broadcast via video-link to US European Parliament Liaison Office (EPLO) colleagues. Around 80 TLD and EPLO staff were in the audience. 

“The study finds that - except in the case of a few countries - TTIP is expected to lead to lower prices for products, mainly because of the effect of reducing unnecessary overlaps in regulation,” said Dr Berden. 

The insert on TTIP and the EU Internal Market by Prof. Patrick Messerlin finds that “TTIP cannot erode preference margins of an EU internal market that do not exist” and as such is not expected to significantly undermine the EU internal market. The pdf version of the presentation can be found below.

A week later on 25 February Dr Berden was invited to represent the WTI at the ‘Ideas Lab’ on international trade, organised by CEPS in Brussels. Discussions there with among others Pascal Lamy, He Dongni, Marten van den Berg, Prof. Andre Sapir, Prof. Bernard Hoekman, Jeffrey Schott, and Prof. Jacques Pelkmans focused on China (between reform and global trade leadership), Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) and how the EU should respond to the Transpacific Partnership (TPP).