President von der Leyen: Portuguese Presidency comes at a decisive time for Europe

“It is imperative that we continue our efforts to stay safe, to protect ourselves and to protect others. We are all in this together and we really have to overcome this pandemic together,” said Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission, during her visit to the Portuguese Presidency of the Council on 15 January.

Portugal took over the Presidency of  the Council of the EU on 1 January 2021, announcing it would focus on three major priorities:

• promoting Europe's recovery, leveraged by the climate and digital transitions
• implementing the social pillar of the EU as a key element for ensuring a fair and inclusive climate and digital transition
• strengthening Europe's strategic autonomy

One of the common priorities for the joint work of the Presidency and the Commission will also be the rollout of vaccination programmes across the EU. “Vaccination is the light at the end of the tunnel of this pandemic. With the two first vaccines on the market – BioNTech and Pfizer, and Moderna – we have access to enough doses of vaccine to vaccinate over 80% of the European population”, said von der Leyen. She also stressed how important it was to remain vigilant  and to increase our sequencing capacities in the EU, to be able not only to detect any new variants of the virus, but to react swiftly to them.

Speaking about Europe's economic recovery, President von der Leyen called on all Member States to swiftly ratify the much needed recovery package NextGenerationEU. She said our aim was that the money from NextGenerationEU starts flowing ‘to our people and to our companies that definitely need it now', before the end of the Portuguese Presidency.

On the occasion of this visit, President von der Leyen and Portuguese Prime Minister António Costa also announced a Social Summit that will take place in Porto on 7 May 2021. The Social Summit will focus on how to strengthen Europe's social dimension to meet the challenges of climate change and the digital transition, in order to ensure equal opportunities for all. “Europe is about people, about the workers and the small businesses. It is about opportunities for young people to find employment. It is about solidarity in times of crisis”, von der Leyen explained.

She concluded by noting the shared goal of a stronger Europe in the world, and outlined several important strands of work on that front, from reviving the transatlantic partnership, to further developing EU's relationship with Africa, and deepening our ties with India.