The Council meeting will take place on 28 and 29 May in the Justus Lipsius building in Brussels. It will be chaired by Mr Vladimír Tošovský, Minister of Industry and Trade and Ms Miroslava Kopicová, Minister of Education, Youth and Sports, of the Czech Republic.
Thursday morning, starting at 10.00, the Council will hold a policy debate with a view to adopting conclusions on an integrated approach to a competitive and sustainable industrial policy in the EU.
Afterwards, the Council will conduct a policy debate on the implementation of the Small Business Act
for Europe.
It is also expected to adopt conclusions on the Better Regulation initiative.
An assessment of the current economic situation and relevant national recovery measures will be addressed at the working lunch. The afternoon session will be devoted to the examination of the project for creating a Community patent and a unified patent litigation system.
On Friday at 9.00 will take place the 6th "Space Council" meeting (a joint meeting of the EU Ministers with responsibility for space and the European Space Agency), which is expected to deal with the contribution of the space industry to the economic recovery and the implementation of the GMES (Global monitoring for environment and security) programme.
On Friday, as from 12.00, research ministers will hold a debate with a view to reaching a political agreement on a
draft regulation for the establishment of a legal framework for European research infrastructures.
A number of conclusions will be submitted for adoption concerning the development of the European Research Area, the
regional dimension of European research infrastructures and the evaluation methods for increasing effectiveness of
the research frameworkpr ogrammes.
The Presidency will give press conferences at the end of each session:
- on Thursday at +/- 17.15 and
- on Friday after the "Space Council" at +/- 11.15, and after the research items at .+/- 16.30.
Press conferences and public events can be followed by video streaming.
Read more information about the program and its background: 
background_note_competitiveness.pdf
(171.93 KB)
