Author: Resuf Ahmed
Look at these two figures below. Can you see the difference?
| Figure 1 |
No, it’s not the eyes of “Big Brother” watching you. But this two nonagon (9 sided polygon) reflect the progress of European Union on Socio-economic benchmarks for 8 years. These Benchmarks are part of the European Union agenda of “Europe 2020”. Let’s see what is it about and what do these two figures reflect.
A little bit of history
Before “Europe 2020”, there was “Lisbon Agenda”. Lisbon Agenda was an action and development plan devised in 2000, for the economy of the European Union between 2000 and 2010. A pivotal role in its formulation was played by the Portuguese economist Maria João Rodrigues.
Its aim was to make the EU "the most competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world capable of sustainable economic growth with more and better jobs and greater social cohesion", by 2010. It was set out by the European Council in Lisbon in March 2000.
By 2010, most of the goals of Lisbon Strategy were not achieved. Spain's prime minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero pointed out that the non-binding character of the Lisbon Strategy contributed to the failure, and this lesson needed to be taken into account by the new Europe 2020 strategy.
An official appraisal of the Lisbon Strategy took place in March 2010 at a European Summit, where the new Europe 2020 strategy was also launched.
EUROPE 2020
The Europe 2020 strategy is the EU's agenda for growth and jobs for the current decade. It emphasizes smart, sustainable and inclusive growth in order to improve Europe's competitiveness and productivity and underpin a sustainable social market economy.
To reach this objective, the EU has adopted targets to be reached by 2020 in five areas:
- Employment
- Research & Development
- Climate change & energy
- Education
- Poverty and social exclusion
The key targets to be reached by 2020.
The headline targets related to the strategy's key objectives at the EU level cover:
- Employment:
> 75% of the population aged 20 to 64 years to be employed;
- Research & Development:
> 3% of GDP to be invested in the R&D sector;
- Climate change & energy:
> Greenhouse Gas Emissions to be reduced by 20% compared to 1990;
> Share of renewable energy sources in final energy consumption to be increased to 20%;
> Energy efficiency to be improved by 20%;
- Education:
> Share of early school leavers to be reduced under 10%;
> At least 40% of 30 to 34 years old to have completed tertiary or equivalent education;
- Poverty and social exclusion:
> At least 20 million people fewer at risk of poverty or social exclusion.
CURRENT SITUATION
Now let’s get back to the two figures we have in the beginning.
The Green Line represents the base year (which is 2008). The Red Line represents the target which is set as the agenda for the Europe 2020 strategy. The Blue Line reflects the aggregate situation of 28 European Union Countries. In Figure 2, the blue line coincides with the green line, as green line is the base.
| Figure 2 |
Figure 3, represents the situation in 2016. We can see that substantial progress has been made both in the area of climate change and energy (through the reduction in greenhouse gas emissions and energy consumption combined with an increase in the use of renewable energy sources).
Positive developments are also visible in the area of education (through the increase in the rate of tertiary educational attainment and the reduction in the number of early leavers from education and training).
Progress has been more limited for R&D expenditure as well as for employment, with promising recent developments for the latter. In contrast, the distance to the poverty target is still significant.
| Figure 3. |
as
*To see the visualization of the year from 2008 to 2016. Go to this link.
Figure 4, presents the changes in different benchmark over the period of 9 years from 2008 to 2017.
The employment rate for the aged 20-64, the employment rate in 2008 is 70.3%. We all are aware of the shock of 2008 Financial Crisis, it can be clearly seen as employment rate falls by approximately 2 %. Till 2013. It took 7 years for the employment rate to rise to the initial base level of 2008. Since 2014, its keep on rising by approximately 1% every year, if the trend continues then it will reach the set target of 75%.
There is not much improvement in the Research & Development aspect where the target is that 3% of GDP should be invested in the R&D sector. Poverty target is also not actualized significantly.
In Education the target has been achieved, the target was that share of early school leavers to be reduced under 10%. In 2017 it is 10.6% (compared to 14.7% in 2008). It is almost certain that by 2020, the share will be below 10%. The second target was that at least 40% of 30 to 34 years old to have completed tertiary or equivalent education. In 2017, the figure stands at 39.9%. So the target has been already achieved in 3 years’ advance.
| Figure 4*zoom in the figure to see the data. |
LATEST RESULT FROM DIFFERENT COUNTRIES
We can see the latest result in different countries with different indicators.
For Employment, the countries who have performed poorly include Ireland(69-71%), Croatia(62.9%), and Italy (68%). Countries like Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Germany, Estonia, France, Cyprus, the Netherland, Hungary, Portugal, Slovenia, Finland, and Sweden have already achieved the targets and rest of them on are on the track to achieve them.
For Research and Development, countries that are performing extremely poor is Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Greece, Croatia, Cyprus, Latvia, and Slovakia. They didn’t even meet the 50% of the target which is 1.5% of the GDP to be invested in R&D sector. Rest of the countries have achieved the target or on the right path to achieve them very soon.
In terms of reducing the Greenhouse gas emissions by 20% compared to 1990, countries like Bulgaria, Estonia, Croatia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, and Slovakia have in fact increased the emission as compared to 1990. Rest of the countries are doing relatively well while some of them have already achieved the targets.
Increasing the share of the renewable energy in final energy consumption to 20%. Most of the countries are doing well and have achieved or on the track to achieve the target with the exception of relatively smaller countries like Luxembourg, etc. and eastern European countries of Slovakia, Czech Republic, and Hungary.
In terms of Education, most of the countries are succeeding in the process of achieving the targets but the process is relatively slower in Czech, Greece, Spain, Italy, Latvia, Hungary, Malta and Romania, and it will be highly likely that they can achieve the target in the set time period.
For the indicator of Poverty and Social Exclusion, the targets vary in each country. But on a general level, the majority of the countries have failed to achieve the set target.
| Figure 5. *zoom in the figure to see the data. |
CONCLUSION
Is Europe 2020 a success? We will have to wait on for the answer. The next European Election is in May 2019 and “Europe 2020” is going to be the major part of the political discourse. But it is relatively more successful than Lisbon Strategy which was a complete failure. 40% (2 out of 5) of the major strategy have already been achieved which is Education and Climate Change & Energy. In my opinion, Europe 2020 is much more of a failed project than a successful one, but the improvements in Education and Environment is something to be happy and hopeful about the outcome of this project.
REFERENCES
1. http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/europe-2020-indicators
2. http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/cache/Euro_2020/E2020_EN.html
3. https://ec.europa.eu/info/business-economy-euro/economic-and-fiscal-policy-coordination/eu-economic-governance-monitoring-prevention-correction/european-semester/framework/european-semester-why-and-how_en
4. http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/documents/3217494/7566774/KS-EZ-16-001-EN-N.pdf/ac04885c-cfff-4f9c-9f30-c9337ba929aa
5. http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/documents/4411192/4411431/Europe_2020_Targets.pdf
6. http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/europe-2020-indicators/visualisations
7. https://www.ecb.europa.eu/pub/pdf/scpwps/ecbwp1517.pdf?bb75d6e2f370a7f5d438208dd7b53e0a
8. "Do Europeans want a dynamic economy?". The Economist.
9. "The failure of the Lisbon strategy". voxeu.org
10. European Union Parliament Website Lisbon European Council 23 and 24 March Presidency Conclusion
