SMEs are defined as enterprises with fewer than 250 employees and a have a turnover of less than €50 million. According to the report drafted by Cristiana Muscardini (UEN, IT), there are 23 million SMEs in the European Union, but only 8% export goods outside their national borders. The House, therefore, stresses that the role of SMEs and their interests need to be taken into greater account in the WTO system.
MEPs call on the Commission and Member States to review their priorities at multilateral level by promoting the removal of tariff and non-tariff barriers and to foster international trade through appropriate measures to simplify and harmonise standards. The international trade system should also be made less onerous for SMEs, they say.
Reform of trade defence instruments would have failed
MEPs welcome the Commission's decision to withdraw the proposals for reform of the trade defence instruments. These reforms would not only have failed to enhance the external competitiveness of European industry but would have caused further serious damage to those Community industrial sectors jeopardised by foreign products illegally subsidised or unduly favoured by dumping practices.
The Trade Defence Instrument (TDI) system must continue to be a quasi-judicial procedure, based on objective and factual assessments, in order to provide for predictability and legal certainty, says the report.
MEPs consider that the internationalisation of SMEs is a primary objective of trade policy and should constitute a cornerstone of the European Small Business Act, and stress the need to improve access to finance, for SMEs, especially to micro-credit.
Preventing and combating counterfeiting
MEPs call on the Commission and Member States to commit themselves with renewed vigour to preventing and combating counterfeiting. SMEs should be encouraged to make use of instruments, such as patents, in order to secure their know-how and protect themselves against copying and counterfeiting.
The report points out that facilitating access to international markets for SMEs can contribute to creating new jobs, protecting and adding value to existing jobs, safeguarding and exchanging know how and specific features of EU and giving Member States a guarantee of solid and lasting economic growth.
Therefore, MEPs believe that the Commission should aim to conclude free-trade agreements or other trade agreements that are favourable to the European economy as a whole and to SMEs in particular.
With regard to public tenders, EU SMEs should have the same level of advantages and possibilities as those offered to SMEs in the main industrialised countries (including the United States, Canada and Japan), says the report, adding that "public procurement should be a key chapter in all bilateral and regional trade negotiations undertaken by the European Union, with a view to opening up public procurement markets on a balanced basis".
International register of geographical indications to be established
Finally, the House supports the establishment of an international multilateral register of geographical indications enabling SMEs to protect their own geographical indications in a simple and economical manner. MEPs consider that the list of protected geographical indications should be supplemented and extended to all EU products which, by their nature or place or method of production, provide EU SMEs with a "comparative advantage" over similar products from third countries.
