00:00Dzień dobry, it's Wednesday 28 Januari, I'm Maeve McMahan and this is Europe Today.
00:21Your daily dose of European news and analysis live here on Euronews.
00:26Coming up, EU leaders are pumped with adrenaline and exhaustion after their successful stay
00:33in India this week.
00:34Brussels and New Delhi signed a historic deal that will cut tariffs on numerous products
00:40from steel to plastics.
00:42To enter into force, the deal must get the nod from EU member states, the European Parliament
00:46and the Indian Cabinet.
00:48But the EU will keep tariffs on beef and chicken as a gesture to European farming communities.
00:54Euronews's EU editor Maria Tadeo was one of the few European journalists on the ground
00:58in Delhi and sent us this report.
01:02Good morning, we're still in Delhi, of course, where the European Union and India yesterday
01:06signed a trade deal.
01:08The Commission says this is a monster of a deal, the mother of all trade deals, which
01:13will see tariffs cut across the board for European companies.
01:17In fact, the Commission said and told us yesterday that European exports will see tariffs cut for
01:23pretty much 96 percent of all European products entering this market.
01:28Now, is it the mother of all trade deals?
01:30In a way, it depends on how you look at it and who you ask.
01:34The one thing to keep in mind, of course, is that before this trade deal was announced,
01:39India was a very protected market for European companies with very high tariffs, in some cases
01:44more than 150 percent.
01:46Obviously, that meant that doing business in this country of more than 1.4 billion people
01:52was very difficult.
01:54Now, with this deal, the European Union says they have opened up the market and will tap into
01:59huge potential.
02:00In terms of who's the winner, that's also important.
02:04We have to look at the breakdown, the machinery's components where tariffs used to be as high
02:10as 44 percent.
02:11They will now go down to zero.
02:13The same will apply for equipment.
02:15When you look at some of the European staples like pasta, olive oil, obviously, a lot of this
02:19has to do with the brand of made in Europe.
02:22They will also go down to zero.
02:23And when you look at cars, and this is a very sensitive industry for the European economy
02:29and in particular for Germany, they will gradually go down to about 30 percent.
02:34And possibly, in some cases, some specific models to 10 percent with a quota.
02:39The Europeans insist the value and the goal of this deal was to open up the market, and
02:44they believe they have done so with this FTA.
02:48Now, on that note, yesterday, I spoke with the president of the European Council, Antonio
02:53Costa, after the deal was signed.
02:55And he also told us, beyond the trade and beyond business, this is a deal of high political
03:01importance at a time of very difficult and complex geopolitical relations.
03:06Let's take a look.
03:08President, thank you so much for joining us on this special day, in a way, for the European
03:13Union.
03:14You've said, finally, you've got this mother of all trade deals.
03:17But I wonder if the real value is, sort of the optics around it, is to send this message
03:21that when there's tariffs all over the place, that's the value of a moment like this.
03:25No, they have a great value from the economic point of view.
03:29But perhaps more important is the message that the two largest democracies in the world
03:35are sending to the international community, is that it's important, it's essential to provide
03:42predictability, to engage on cooperation instead of confrontation, and that reliable partners
03:51can work for good in the world.
03:53So you don't believe this is the end of the multilateral trade system?
03:57Many think after the tariffs before President Trump is the end.
04:00No, it's a very important way to underpin the multilateral system.
04:05We are living not in the world of blocs, but in the world, in the multipolar world.
04:10And in this multipolar world, we need to do two things.
04:14Three things.
04:15First, underpin the multilateral system.
04:18Second, uphold the international law.
04:21And finally, engage bilaterally with the different parts in the world.
04:25That's the reason because last week we signed the trade agreement with Mercosul.
04:30Now, we signed the trade agreement with India, and we continue to work in new trade agreements
04:35and new partnerships with the different subjects, with different partners around the world.
04:40And of course, President, you're a very experienced politician.
04:43And I know you're going to say you don't like to engage in hypotheticals, just reality.
04:46But this is where I got to ask, do you believe, do you get a sense really, in real terms,
04:56would we be here today in New Delhi with this agreement on the table, the Mercosul done also
05:02in the past month, if President Trump had not been elected and put forward this very aggressive
05:07title of policy?
05:08Well, we started these negotiations a lot of years ago, but of course, when you are
05:13living in the unpredictable world, you need to provide predictability to the business, to invest,
05:21to produce, to trade, and to give hope and security for the citizens.
05:27And would you say, however, don't mistake politeness for weakness?
05:31Some who look at this, very polite European Union, it means it's also a weak European Union.
05:37Would you say, don't make that, because that would be a mistake?
05:39Yes.
05:40I don't enter in this game of words.
05:43We focus on the reality, and our reality is very simple.
05:48We are one of the largest economies in the world, one of the largest democracies in the
05:53world.
05:54We have, and we have a lot of friends around the world, friends, partners, allies, and
06:00we work with everybody.
06:02And, President, I wonder if you could confirm to us, there is now talk that in the retreat
06:09that you have called for leaders to have a debate in February, so very soon, Mario Draghi
06:13will participate.
06:14Is that going to be the case, and is that your personal invitation to Mario Draghi?
06:18As you remember, last year, we start the year in February, organizing a retreat on defense.
06:26And I invited the Secretary General of NATO, Mark Root, and also the Prime Minister of United
06:31Kingdom, Keith Stammer.
06:33And it was the pivotal moment to improve and focus on our own agenda on security and defense
06:41and strengthen our relationship with NATO and the UK on security and defense.
06:45This year, we need to do on competitiveness and on our single market what we have done
06:51last year on security and defense.
06:53That's why I invited Mario Draghi and Enrico Letta to be present in the European Council
07:01to debate on us, to take stock of what we have already done with their reports and what
07:08we need to do to accelerate and to deliver, to boost competitiveness and to deep and strength
07:16our single market.
07:16And that's my last question.
07:17What do you hope to achieve?
07:19Because you talk about the retreat that happened last year that kick-started the sequence on defense.
07:23Do you worry, and is that the reason why you won Mario Draghi and Enrico Letta to be in
07:26the meeting, that this report is not being implemented fast enough?
07:30Are you concerned?
07:30What I expect from the leaders is that they give clear political guidance to the commission,
07:38to the council, as they have done last year on security and defense.
07:42And this year, on the single market and on competitiveness, we need to create a new
07:48momentum to give new impetus on this agenda. As you know, we have invested a lot on simplification,
07:56but we need to do much more to deliver and to boost effectively on competitiveness and
08:03in our single market. And if you want to underpin our effort on security and defense,
08:11we need to have a strong economic base.
08:17Maria Tadeo, our EU news editor, speaking there exclusively to the European Council
08:23President Antonio Costa in New Delhi. And back in Brussels, European lawmakers have
08:28started examining the small print of that EU-India deal that they will be asked to ratify.
08:33Our Jakub Janus also read it thoroughly, so you don't have to. Here's his summary.
08:40Do you have a spare pen? Yesterday, the EU signed a historic trade deal with India
08:46that Ursula von der Leyen calls.
08:49The mother of all deals.
08:51Why, you ask? Because with Trump in the White House and the European relations with China being
08:58complicated, Brussels needs new friends. And it needs them fast. Right now, the EU is actually
09:05India's biggest trading partner, if you count it as a bloc, trading about 100 billion euros a year.
09:12And the goal is to double that by 2032. And that's a lot of euros.
09:18If you live in Mumbai, get ready for cheaper European cars, wines and machinery.
09:25And if you live in Europe, expect cheaper electronics, textiles and medicines.
09:31And India also needs green energy and waste management. That is exactly what European companies
09:37are good at. So expect to see more European tech in Indian water plants soon.
09:43But not everyone is invited to the party. Beef, chicken, sugar and rice stay protected.
09:50And the reason is simple. After the recent Mercosul negotiations, nobody wanted to risk a riot.
09:57You could say that food fights are officially cancelled.
10:01At full potential, this creates a market of two billion people. That is almost a quarter of the
10:08world's GDP. And Brussels calls it the most ambitious deal India has ever signed. And it seems the EU needs
10:17that win. Do you remember that EU-US trade deal von der Leyen and Trump struck at his Scottish golf course
10:24last summer? It is now facing further delays. NEPs just postponed the vote on it again. So while
10:33Washington waits, Delhi trades. A new reporter has got a Hindi lesson in five minutes. So namaste.
10:46Jakob Janis, now moving on. The EU Commissioner for Defence has said that the EU answer to Elon Musk's
10:52Starlink could be up and running by 2029. Andrzej Skoubilios made the statement at the European Space
10:58Conference taking place this week here in Brussels. To hear what else is under discussion at the annual
11:04event, we can cross now over to EURI News' Sasha Vakilina, who's joined by Joseph Aschbacher. That's
11:09the Director General of the European Space Agency. Good morning, Sasha.
11:16Good morning, Maeve. Yes, indeed, we are here with the Director General of the European Space Agency,
11:21Dr. Joseph Aschbacher. Thank you very much for being here. Now, you said that the United States
11:25still spending six times more than all European actors combined. When it comes to China, this is
11:3050 percent more. How alarming is that for the European Union? It is very alarming because what
11:36on one side, and I really would like to say, Europe has excellent capabilities. Our industry is among the
11:41best in the world. Our engineers, our scientists are really top class. So this is the good news. I would say
11:47the alarming news is that the US is spending so much more, but also other countries. And this is where
11:53we see a real risk that European companies may be pushed out of the market, that we are losing
11:59market share. And this is my job as Director General of the European Space Agency to ensure that we
12:04succeed, that we are stepping up, that we elevate the future of Europe through space. How can we step
12:10up? How can we speed this up and also to challenge and to catch up with the dominance of SpaceX?
12:14Do we have our own European Elon Musk here in Europe? We have many very gifted and very
12:21talented entrepreneurs. I've just met yesterday quite a couple of them. So there really are,
12:26I would call it the little Elon musks that we have in Europe. They have the ingredients,
12:31they have the capacity, they have the technology, they have the companies. But yes, what we have to do
12:35from the public sector, that's the European Space Agency, the European Commission,
12:39to make sure that we have a framework where we can support them. We can provide the funding,
12:43the guarantee that we are buying their services and their products, which we stimulate through our
12:48framework and technology developments. Yes, we can do it, but we have to step up.
12:52Thank you very much. The Director General of the European Space Agency, Joseph Aschbacher. Thank you.
12:57Thank you so much.
12:59Thank you so much, Sasha Vakilina there. And of course, to your guest, Joseph Aschbacher.
13:04If you are interested in the European Union's role in space and everything else that's being
13:08discussed there at that conference, do visit euronews.com or download our app.
13:12But that brings this edition of Europe Today to an end. Thank you so much for tuning in. We always
13:17love having your company. Always, you can reach out to us as well if you have any comments or points
13:22or stories that you would like us to cover. Our email address is europetoday at euronews.com.
13:29Thank you so much again for tuning in. See you soon here on Euronews.
13:34We'll see you soon.
14:04KONIEC
14:34KONIEC
