Business related services: better performance is crucial for growth and competitiveness

Low productivity in business-related services is a serious threat to the competitiveness of European enterprises and the EU's overall potential for growth, says a Commission communication issued today. This communication sets out measures complementing the forthcoming proposal for a Directive to remove legal and administrative obstacles in the internal market for services. They aim to promote competition among service suppliers and help customers to compare prices and the nature of services offered. This, combined with better statistics to inform decision-taking, will help to make the markets more transparent. The measures include promoting service quality indicators, voluntary standards for the cross-border supply of services, and rules on reporting intangible assets such as training and software investment. Business-related services are inextricably linked to manufacturing industry, and are crucial to its competitiveness. The Commission will set up a new European Forum on business-related services to identify ways of moving forward on these different measures. The forum's work will help to shape an action plan that it will propose in the first half of 2005.

Enterprise Commissioner Erkki Liikanen said: “In today's economy, services really do matter. The service sector is a major source of jobs and new businesses. If we can get the environment right for business services this will help to boost productivity and competitiveness throughout the whole of the economy.”

More information is available at the European Union website