Changes from report parliamentary committee draft to plenary report

Removed7. Warns that measures that weaken business competitiveness, such as overregulation, discourage investment and innovation and undermine the EU’s economic resilience and security objectives;

AddedII. Prevention through diversification, innovation and competitiveness

Removed8. Stresses that a fully functioning single market is a pillar of economic security; underlines that deeper integration is essential for Europe’s long-term competitiveness and security;

Added8. Emphasises that economic security must not be interpreted as economic isolation; reaffirms that openness to sustainable trade and investment, combined with measures aimed at addressing unfair competition and the diversification of partners, suppliers, energy imports and transport routes, is one of the EU’s primary means of reducing structural vulnerability to external shocks and disruptions in critical sectors and to coercive practices; emphasises that strengthening the EU’s resilience and economic security should be an explicit objective of any EU trade or investment partnership; stresses that fostering demand for EU-produced alternatives and creating EU-based sectoral ecosystems are key to credibly building the EU’s economic security;

RemovedIII. Managing and mitigating identified risks

Added9. Emphasises that the openness of the EU’s market must be grounded in the principles of reciprocity, reliability and non-coercion, and that it cannot be unconditional where fundamental security interests are at stake; stresses that the EU has considerable economic strengths, in particular its EUR 18 trillion single market with its 450 million consumers, its leadership in high-tech manufacturing and services, its high standards and norms, and its high-quality educational institutions and research and development (R&D) programmes; underlines that these strengths should be leveraged in the face of external coercion, specifically in areas where European goods or technologies are indispensable in global markets;

Removed9. Acknowledges that certain economic exposures, by virtue of their scale, concentration, strategic importance or irreversibility, may require targeted mitigating measures; underlines that, in such cases, measures may legitimately include restrictions on market access, economic activity or investment flows from third countries in order to safeguard the EU’s essential interests;

Added10. Warns that a micro- and macroeconomic environment that weakens business competitiveness, including such features as internal market barriers, unnecessary administrative burdens, regulatory uncertainty, high energy prices, overly complex permitting procedures and underinvestment, discourages innovation and undermines the EU’s economic resilience and security objectives;

Removed10. Stresses that such measures should be proportionate and tailored to the severity and persistence of the risk, be based on clearly defined risk thresholds, objective and verifiable criteria and prior impact assessments, and be subject to continuous monitoring and review;

Added11. Stresses that the EU’s economic security cannot be substantially strengthened as long as the European economy is overly dependent on imports of fossil fuels or renewable technologies; considers that the pursuit of stable and predictable decarbonisation policies aimed at achieving net zero and ending fossil fuel imports contributes to strengthening economic security and boosting the EU’s competitiveness; underlines that substantially increased and accelerated investment in electrification and in a circular economy is fundamental to reducing the EU’s strategic dependencies on external actors; encourages the Commission to adopt strong and broad demand-side policies to boost demand for European low-carbon strategic goods central to the energy transition, such as green steel, batteries, renewable energies and semiconductors; further calls on the Commission to ensure that the green transition does not replicate the same structural logic of dependency in a different form, and, to this end, to prioritise EU-level production capacity, strategic stockpiling and robust diversification of sourcing for the critical raw materials and clean technology components on which the transition depends;

Removed11. Emphasises that existing EU instruments designed to address structural vulnerabilities, market distortions and non-market behaviour should be deployed coherently and decisively, and that fragmented, hesitant or inconsistent use of such instruments undermines their deterrent effect;

Added12. Stresses that a fully functioning and integrated single market is a cornerstone of economic security; underlines that deeper integration and the removal of barriers to a truly harmonised market for goods, services and capital are essential for the EU’s long-term socio-economic model, competitiveness and security; considers that the scaling-up of investment in education, innovation and R&D is an essential component of the long-term strategy to protect the EU’s economic security;

Removed12. Considers that the development of additional tools should be avoided unless a clear and demonstrable gap in the effectiveness of existing EU instruments has been identified; calls for streamlining existing and future legislation and initiatives relevant to economic security;

Added13. Deplores the EU’s excessive dependency on third countries for the supply of critical raw materials, recognising that such reliance exposes the EU to significant geopolitical, economic and supply-chain vulnerabilities; considers, therefore, that strengthening domestic resilience, including through strategic projects in domestic mining and processing, enhanced recycling capacities, improved resource efficiency, and the full implementation of a circular economy model constitutes a sustainable and strategic solution; calls for an ambitious circular economy act; calls for the stimulation of investment in critical innovative circular technology and for the protection of such investment;

Added14. Underlines that protecting citizens from the materialisation of external economic shocks – including disruptions to supply chains, energy price surges and the consequences of economic coercion – is a core objective of economic security policy; calls on the Commission and the Member States to ensure that the social impact of economic security measures is systematically assessed and that such measures do not disproportionately affect the most vulnerable;

Added15. Recalls that trade policy is a strategic component of the EU’s power and should be used proactively to protect the EU’s security interests and strategic autonomy; stresses the need to move beyond a predominantly defensive approach and to combine and deploy existing instruments in a more strategic and forward-looking manner, including by leveraging economic interdependencies in ways that enhance the EU’s geopolitical position;

Added16. Recalls that the effectiveness of the EU’s trade and economic security agenda depends on the consistent application of trade rules and essential clauses in trade, partnership and association agreements; calls, in this regard, on the Commission to strengthen its efforts to ensure full and effective compliance with its own commitments and obligations, especially in view of policy coherence for development;

Added17. Calls on the Commission to finalise ongoing negotiations and actively pursue a strategic and ambitious approach to trade agreements and sectoral partnerships with reliable partners as a central element of its diversification strategy; considers that the diversification of third-country suppliers and export markets should be based on and guided by a clear assessment of the EU’s structural vulnerabilities; stresses the need for traditional comprehensive free trade agreements to be complemented, as a matter of priority, with new, more agile and targeted forms of trade and investment partnerships that explicitly aim to de-risk imports and exports through the development of secure and resilient supply chains in certain high-risk sectors; underlines that such partnerships should include binding commitments and require the full involvement of Parliament and transparency with regard to Parliament throughout the negotiations, as well as Parliament’s consent in the ratification process;

Added18. Underlines the strategic importance of the modernised EU-Mercosur Association Agreement for the EU’s economic security; stresses that the agreement will contribute to diversifying access to critical raw materials and reinforcing resilient value chains;

Added19. Highlights the strategic relevance of advancing economic and trade engagement with India, an increasingly important manufacturing and technology hub with a growing role in digital services and the supply of critical raw materials;

Added20. Stresses the importance of accelerating ongoing negotiations for free trade agreements with partners such as the Philippines and Thailand and finalising the trade agreement with Indonesia, in view of their growing role in the production of critical minerals, electronics and clean technology components; underlines that predictable trade frameworks are necessary to address export restrictions and supply concentration risks and to anchor the EU more firmly in Indo-Pacific industrial value chains;

Added21. Welcomes the finalisation of trade negotiations with Australia, a reliable and like-minded partner; stresses the importance of this rules-based partnership in contributing to stability of supply and diversification of supply chains, given Australia’s significant reserves of critical raw materials and its production of mining and processing technologies; welcomes further collaboration on addressing common economic security challenges, particularly given Australia’s first-hand experience in responding to economic coercion;

Added22. Calls for the establishment of a structured EU-UK economic security dialogue to enhance coordination on trade, investment screening and supply chain resilience; supports closer cooperation under the EU-UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement to anticipate disruptions in strategic sectors;

Added23. Supports the call of the EU Indo-Pacific Strategy for deeper cooperation with Asian partners on economic security, including through enhanced partnerships with members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations and through closer interaction with partners participating in the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership;

Added24. Urges the Member States to ratify the outstanding free trade agreements;

Added25. Calls on the Commission to propose a renewed and comprehensive trade and investment dialogue with developing countries and regions, on the basis of mutually beneficial partnerships that go beyond expanding market access or extracting natural resources; emphasises the importance of fostering local and regional value creation under trade agreements and sectoral partnerships by developing clean and sustainable value chains while promoting inclusive and sustainable development and ensuring the protection of environmental standards and labour rights;

Added26. Notes that the EU currently depends on China for around 98 % of its supply of rare earths and over 90 % of its magnesium imports, that domestic recycling rates for rare earths remain below 1 %, and that over 60 % of global lithium refining capacity and over 85 % of rare earth processing capacity are concentrated in a single third country, leaving the EU far from meeting the targets set in the Critical Raw Materials Act; highlights the importance of the agreements concluded with like-minded countries in this area and the need to continue negotiating new partnerships to enhance the resilience of EU supply chains;

Added27. Stresses that the EU’s trade policy should have as a strategic objective the diversification of supply sources of critical raw materials given their crucial role in the green and digital transitions and in defence; notes that while the Critical Raw Materials Act is an important step towards strengthening the EU’s resilience, it remains insufficient to address key vulnerabilities, particularly the continued concentration of refining and processing capacities in a limited number of third countries; underlines that the act relies on non-binding benchmarks at EU level and that the availability of dedicated funding and effective implementation capacity remains limited;

Added28. Welcomes the RESourceEU initiative to boost funding for strategic domestic mining, processing capacity and recycling; underlines, however, that these promotion measures need to be combined with protection and partnership measures in order to successfully de-risk the critical raw materials value chain by 2030; reiterates that the long-term business case for and the viability of investments in trusted critical raw materials value chains should therefore be accompanied by price floors and offtake guarantees in strong cooperation with like-minded countries, thereby counteracting the risk of a third country abusing its monopoly positions to undercut vulnerable competitors; stresses that the RESourceEU initiative must become an effective instrument to accelerate the achievement of the 2030 targets set in the Critical Raw Materials Act; underlines that unless there is rapid mobilisation of coordinated financial support for extraction, processing and recycling projects, the EU will not be in a position to meet its benchmarks within the established time frame;

Added29. Underlines that the EU’s critical raw materials diplomacy should extend beyond extraction and access to primary resources and should systematically address processing, refining and downstream activities, where strategic vulnerabilities and concentration risks remain particularly acute;

AddedIII. Monitoring, managing and mitigating identified risks

Added30. Concludes that reinforcing the EU’s economic security is key to safeguarding the EU’s economic and political sovereignty, the integrity of the single market, the resilience of supply chains, the economic viability of EU companies and the livelihoods of EU citizens, including with respect to quality jobs; underlines that a comprehensive and integrated economic security approach should be aimed not only at reducing external dependencies, but also at building strategic autonomy in critical raw materials, technology, energy, transport, finance and digital infrastructure; therefore calls on the Commission to mainstream economic security across all industrial policies, including sectoral legislation and supply chain risk assessments, to ensure a consistent approach;

Added31. Acknowledges that certain critical economic exposures, by virtue of their scale, concentration, strategic importance or irreversibility, require targeted, urgent and decisive mitigating measures; underlines that, in such cases, measures may legitimately include restrictions on, or the prohibition of, market access, economic activity or investment flows from third countries in order to safeguard the EU’s essential interests and public order; reiterates that access to the single market is the EU’s greatest leverage point and calls on the Commission and the Member States to make use of reverse dependencies to pressure third countries to remove illegitimate export restrictions imposed on the EU;

Added32. Encourages the Commission to propose more measures to prevent or limit economic security risks; supports, in that regard, the Commission’s proposal to require EU operators to diversify suppliers in specific high-risk sectors; considers that this should be expanded in future to also require operators to diversify the country or region of supply;

Added33. Stresses the need to develop effective tools aimed at the early monitoring, identification and assessment of economic security risks along value chains in high-risk areas to allow the proactive mapping of existing and potential strategic dependencies; underlines that the Member States and the private sector are fundamental partners in identifying and assessing dependencies; supports the Commission’s proposal to establish an economic security intelligence hub to consolidate available information; calls on the Commission to develop tools aimed at sharing economic intelligence with international partners in order to anticipate third-country actions that weaponise dependencies against the EU;

Added34. Calls on the Commission to establish an annual economic security scoreboard to systematically assess progress towards the goals set in the Economic Security Strategy; underlines that such a mechanism should include clear and measurable indicators showing, among other things, the reduction of critical dependencies by sector, the number of trade defence instruments identified as relevant for economic security, and the increase in the number of alternative suppliers; stresses that transparent and regular reporting is essential to ensure accountability and informed policy adjustment;

Added35. Stresses that such measures should be proportionate and tailored to the severity and persistence of the risk, be based on clearly defined risk thresholds, objective and verifiable criteria and prior assessments, and be subject to continuous monitoring and review;

Added36. Emphasises that, as proposed by the Commission in the joint communication of 3 December 2025, existing EU instruments designed to address structural vulnerabilities, market distortions and non-market behaviour should be modernised, where necessary, and deployed more strategically and decisively, and that fragmented, hesitant or inconsistent use of such instruments undermines their effectiveness, including their deterrent effect; urges the Commission to shorten the timeline for trade defence investigations and to follow the example of various countries in making greater use of existing threat-of-injury provisions and provisional measures, both of which are legally permissible but underutilised, to prevent irreparable damage to EU industry;

Added37. Stresses that although economic security cannot, in the long term, be achieved through general autarkic or protectionist measures, it is currently urgently necessary to take targeted measures to stop the wave of deindustrialisation and protect strategic sectors in the EU from unfair competition from cheap third-country imports in sectors such as steel, chemicals, pharmaceuticals, renewable energy and green goods; calls on the Commission to develop an action plan to protect the EU strategic sectors at greatest risk from global overcapacity;

Added38. Considers that the simultaneous expansion of industrial capacity across multiple strategic sectors by certain major third-country economies, notably China, constitutes a systemic competitive challenge that cannot be adequately addressed through sector-by-sector responses; considers that systemic risks of this nature require systemic responses, targeting the structural conditions that generate overcapacity at scale rather than managing their consequences in individual markets;

Added39. Welcomes the Commission proposal of 7 October 2025 for a regulation addressing the negative trade-related effects of global overcapacity on the Union steel market as an acknowledgement of the strategic importance of maintaining a viable European steel sector; underlines that the loss of European steel production capacity would constitute an irreversible risk to economic security; notes, however, that the problem of overcapacity is not limited to steel and aluminium but also affects many other sectors, such as chemicals, and products derived from steel and aluminium; is concerned that trade defence investigations are too slow, resource-intensive and product-specific to adequately address the economy-wide distortions occasioned by overcapacity; believes that the EU should equip itself with appropriate instruments to monitor and address systemic overcapacity throughout the value chain;

IV. Trade policy instruments, enforcement and deterrence

Change 5

Changed13.40. Stresses that deterrence isand competitiveness are weakened where enforcement action is delayed, inconsistent or perceived as uncertain; calls, therefore, on the Commission to ensure timely decision-making, clear activation criteria and predictable consequences once the presence or threat of economic security risks or unfair practices has been established;

Change 6

Removed14. Underlines that the systematic enforcement of current trade rules constitutes the EU’s primary and most proportionate response to non-compliance;

Added41. Stresses that the effective enforcement of EU trade policy and the expanding economic security dimension require adequate administrative and technical resources; calls on the Commission to ensure that its Directorate-General for Trade and Economic Security has sufficient staffing, expertise and resources to effectively enforce trade defence instruments and implement the EU’s economic security strategy; emphasises that in the current geoeconomic context, the EU’s economic security capabilities should be boosted;

Removed15. Emphasises that where enforcement and engagement fail to change behaviour, the EU’s response should follow a gradual, proportionate and reversible escalation approach, allowing pressure to be increased in a controlled manner while maintaining legal certainty and credible options for de-escalation;

Added42. Underlines that the systematic enforcement of current trade rules constitutes the EU’s primary and proportionate response to non-compliance and a prerequisite for any credible economic security strategy; regrets, however, that the enforcement of current rules falls short of fully addressing the problem; therefore calls on the Commission to introduce higher anti-dumping duties, similar to those applied by comparable partners, to counter trade diversion and dumping on the EU market; further calls on the Commission to include environmental, energy and labour costs when calculating the dumping margin of third-country exporters and to shift away from the ‘lesser duty’ rule, which is not required by the World Trade Organization (WTO);

Removed16. Calls on the Commission to ensure that the application of enforcement, trade defence and anti-coercion instruments is coordinated within a coherent operational framework, in coordination with the Member States and economic operators;

Added43. Notes that anti-dumping and anti-subsidy proceedings are too narrowly targeted, too resource-intensive and too slow to address the scale and structural nature of the competitive challenges and overcapacity now facing EU industry;

Removed17. Insists on the crucial role of Parliament, and in particular the Committee on International Trade, in the democratic scrutiny of economic security-related measures with trade and investment implications, including at all stages of their design, implementation and review in order to ensure transparency, accountability and informed parliamentary oversight;

Added44. Underlines that the EU’s resilience objectives – encompassing the ability to manage ecological, economic and social transitions in a sustainable, equitable and democratic manner, as well as the preservation of human, animal and plant health and of natural resources – are firmly entrenched in primary and secondary EU law; considers that this legal framework provides a robust and largely untapped basis for invoking the general exceptions provided for in Article XX of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade; calls on the Commission to make fuller and more systematic use of Article XX exceptions where EU measures pursuing these legitimate policy objectives are challenged within the framework of the WTO;

Added45. Calls on the Commission to propose changes to existing tools to allow more active, strategic and coordinated use and to propose new tools where a clear and demonstrable gap in the effectiveness of existing EU instruments has been identified; calls for the streamlining of existing and future legislation and initiatives relevant to economic security;

Added46. Underlines that the credibility of the EU’s response to economic coercion depends first and foremost on its willingness to identify and formally characterise coercive practices in a timely manner, thus initiating the process that underpins both deterrence and negotiating leverage; considers the Anti-Coercion Instrument to be the most appropriate tool to leverage the EU’s strengths in this regard; stresses that the instrument should be triggered in the face of coercion or threats thereof and that all avenues for de-escalation should be explored, with countermeasures being imposed as a last resort;

Added47. Calls on the Commission to urgently strengthen the EU’s deterrent capacity; urges the Commission to develop a proactive strategy to respond to threats targeting the EU’s economic sovereignty, including its underlying critical infrastructure; emphasises that such a strategy must be able to quickly and effectively deter foreign actors from acting on their threats by making use of the full arsenal of the EU’s toolbox of countermeasures;

Added48. Emphasises that where enforcement and engagement fail to change behaviour, the EU’s response should follow a gradual, commensurate and reversible escalation approach, allowing pressure to be increased in a controlled manner while maintaining legal certainty and credible options for de-escalation; urges the Commission to respond more decisively in this regard, recalling that measures that fail to alter injurious and coercive behaviour risk undermining the credibility and leverage of the EU’s trade policy, incurring a high initial political cost for intervention but without restoring a level playing field;

Added49. Calls on the Commission to ensure that the application of enforcement, trade defence and anti-coercion instruments is coordinated within a coherent operational framework, in coordination with the Member States and economic operators; further calls on the Commission to explore the development of a mechanism for EU-level burden-sharing to help distribute the costs of national responses to economic coercion, ensuring political cohesion and economic resilience in the face of escalating trade tensions;

Added50. Underlines that European public funding power is a core strength of the EU; considers that no EU public money should be spent unless it demonstrably strengthens the EU’s sovereignty and resilience; calls on the Commission to leverage this strength and establish a funding suspension tool to allow the rapid restriction of access to EU funding in situations where third countries take measures that undermine the EU’s economic security;

Added51. Stresses the need to ensure secure and uninterrupted access to critical components, raw materials and enabling technologies used in defence-related production; underlines that supply chain vulnerabilities in dual-use sectors may directly affect the EU’s operational readiness and economic resilience;

Added52. Emphasises that the increasing linkages between civilian innovation and defence applications require a common approach to screening, export control and investment oversight in dual-use sectors in order to prevent unintended transfers of sensitive technologies while preserving the EU’s competitiveness;

Added53. Highlights the structural limitations in the EU’s dual-use export control framework, particularly its reliance on slow-moving multilateral regimes, its limited capacity to anticipate and respond to emerging and rapidly evolving technologies, and its fragmented implementation across Member States;