In view of the inauguration of the new Commission European Conference, which will take place on Sunday, today the association of ports presented to the new EU executive what are the priorities to be addressed in order to strengthen competitiveness of European ports and therefore of the economy of the Union. Congratulating the new commissioners and stressing that he does not see Time to start a reflection on the European strategy for ports with the new Commissioner for Sustainable Transport and Tourism, Apostolos Tzitzikostas, the European Sea Ports Organisation has recalled that in order to fulfil their role, European ports will have to to cope with huge investments that a recent study of the ESPO itself has quantified in 80 billion euros in the next ten years net of private investment.

In order to successfully face this economic commitment, The European Ports Association has called on the new Commission to to maintain in force and indeed to further strengthen the Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) programme, which is specifically dedicated to EU transport infrastructure, and to better adapt it to the needs of ports and their stakeholders. "This tool - explained ESPO - is the only way effective in ensuring the completion of a transport network that serves as a continuous and well-functioning European backbone and facilitator of the European internal market and his ambitions. In addition, the association underlined, a network well-functioning transport system, including state-of-the-art ports, is essential to strengthen the decarbonisation and resilience and to improve its preparedness on the ground military".