The European Commission recently published the “SME Strategy for a sustainable and digital Europe” which on the one hand promotes a comprehensive and action-oriented initiative to improve the operating environment for the SMEs and for the economic and social wellbeing of our societies, on the other one encourages a twin transition to a sustainable and digital economy.
The strategy proposes a set of actions based on the following three pillars:
- capacity-building and support for the transition to sustainability and digitalisation;
- reducing regulatory burden and improving market access;
- improving access to financing.
To build SMEs’ capacity for these transitions, the Commission will boost the European Enterprise Network with dedicated sustainability advisors, it will expand Digital Innovation Hubs to facilitate the integration of digital innovations for SMEs and it will open up possibilities for volunteering and training on digital technologies.
To facilitate SMEs access to market, among other initiatives, the European Commission foresees to remove administrative barriers, encourage partnership among border regions, mobilise Member States to share and adopt best practices to accelerate the growth of high-tech SMEs and start-ups.
A Public Offerings (IPOs) of SMEs will be created in order to improve the access to financing. It will involve the InvestEU programme that will empower smart finance initiative also in favour of women-led companies and green tech innovative SMEs and start-ups.
Finally, since SMEs are all deeply rooted in regional and local ecosystems, the European Commission stresses the importance of the partnership among all the actors involved at national, regional and local level to better implement this strategy.
Read the EU Strategy here.
Source: European Commission
