2023-09-19 18:47:00
“The only thing that can be accused of China and the United States is having industrial policies that consider the entire value chain and that prioritize the automotive sector,” said the general director of the national association of automobile manufacturers, José López-Tafall. «A Europa, You can blame him for not having done it.».
This was one of the messages that the employers’ association wanted to emphasize in the presentation of the study ‘New challenges for the automotive sector’, prepared by KPMG in conjunction with Anfac and the association responsible for the auxiliary industry, Sernauto.
The president of the latter, Jose Portilla, stated that the report “focuses on the need to reinforce industrial sovereignty and the relocation of critical components for the development of electrified vehicles. Without forgetting that the entire value chain must be based on the framework of a strong investment.
The need to allocate resources to enhance national productive capacity has been one of the argumentative pillars of the day, as well as accusing the institutional lethargy that has made Europe “slower in its reflexes”, in the words of the head of Automotive at KPMG , Begoña Cristeto.
«Two years ago, Europe did not consider that strategic minerals were not a priority and now they do. The same happens with semiconductor policy,” said López-Tafall. «Europe has only begun to recognize the importance of industrial policy across the value chain after the IRA arrived», he accused, referring to the Biden Government’s legislation that encourages zero-emission mobility in the country.
«For the last decade», he continued, «European industrial policy has been based on penalties and obligations for the automobile, and thus a company is not incentivized nor made competitive. “We must focus on competitiveness factors such as the circular economy or recycling.”
The day was inaugurated by the special commissioner for the Perte VEC, José María López, who stated that this mechanism “has become a fundamental instrument to promote the new industrial revolution and make Spain a focus of attraction for new investments, such as the gigafactory. of batteries in Sagunto and others that have been presented in this second call.
However, for López-Tafall, «Although we are very satisfied with the Perte, we must remember that we come from a situation of budgetary shortcomings. “They are serving to recover some lost ground thanks to an extraordinary endowment from Europe.”
Even so, from Anfac they are optimistic, “We are not afraid of China, the US or Turkey. We are the second manufacturer in Europe and we have ousted other countries that are stronger and richer than us without having the manufacturers’ headquarters.
Regarding the dumping investigation that the European Commission began on Chinese brands – the president, Ursula von der Leyen stated that the prices of their cars are kept “artificially low” – López-Tafall stated that they would not take a position until there was a firm sentence: “We do not have all the data.”
He stressed: “we should not blame others for our own problems.” Of course, “if there are rules that are anti-competitive according to international trade rules, that is what the established procedures are for,” he stated.
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