Conference under the name of ‘’ Croatia 2020: Steps for successful EU Presidency an Beyond ‘’ within the organization of Croatia-EU Business Council was held in May 30th, 2017. in Bruxelles.
Speakers were Croatian MEP Ivana Maletić, ambassador Goran Štefanić from the Permanent Representation of Croatia to the EU and Bruno Lopandić from the Office of the Croatian Chamber of Economy in Brussels, and moderator and organizer of the conference was Natko Vlahović.
Croatia in the preparations for the EU Presidency, in the first half of 2020, should highlight its strengths and strive to define priorities in partnership with all segments of society. The EU Presidency is an excellent opportunity to highlight innovative ideas and while defining the priorities it should take into account the strategic features of Croatian Europe with foreign policy and think about what can be used in the long-term for positioning Croatia within the EU and globally.
We certainly need to align our priorities with the European Institution's Work Program and focus on topics that will be attractive at European level, but we should be ambitious and set/impose our priorities on the agenda. For example - fishing, transport, islands, sources of drinking water, enlargement policy, development of small farmers, craftsmen and entrepreneurs, better and faster utilization of EU funds - all these are areas that are important for Croatia's development and part of our specialties and can certainly be beneficial for our Presidency of the European Union.
To recall, by the decision of the EU Council from July 2016, Croatia will take over the Presidency of the Council of the European Union for the first time on the January 1st, 2020 and will chair it by June 30th, 2020.