Lisbon agenda and entrepreneurship top industry ministers' agenda

EU industry ministers will meet on 11 March 2004 to put the final touches to their contribution to the Spring European Council, to be held in Brussels at the end of the month. The debates will focus on key areas such as the EU's progress on the Lisbon agenda, entrepreneurship and chemicals legislation.

The following items are on the agenda:

• Lisbon Strategy: Policy debate on the Competitiveness Council's contribution to the Spring Summit, identifying the priorities to get the EU back on track in terms of competitiveness and growth (see and LinksDossier: Lisbon Strategy)
• Entrepreneurship: Adoption of conclusions based on the Commission's new Action Plan on Entrepreneurship and the report on the implementation of the European Charter for Small Enterprises, aiming to promote small and medium sized companies (see LinksDossier: Entrepreneurship)
• REACH: Consideration of the progress reports on the EU's new chemicals registration and authorisation system (see LinksDossier: Chemicals)
• Community Patent: A new attempt at reaching political agreement on the proposed creation of a Community Patent which would be legally valid throughout the EU (see . At the last meeting in November 2003, no agreement could be reached due to diverging national views on translations of patent claims. The presidency is optimistic that it can broker a deal through a new compromise article it has introduced.
• Services: Conclusions on the Commission's Communication on business-related services and a public debate on the new draft directive on services in the internal market. This proposal, which was presented by the Commission on 13 January 2004, aims at simplifying regulation for the provision of cross-border services.

Other items on the agenda include a regulation on consumer protection, a regulation on shipbuilding, European space policy, basic research and intellectual property rights (see