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DRAFT REPORT (2025/2112(INI))

On opportunities and challenges presented by a comprehensive artificial intelligence strategy for EU trade

INTA-PR-784156

Committee on International Trade · Rapporteur: Brando Benifei

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✦ In short · AI summary of this text, generated 4 Sept 2026

Written by a language model from the full text only; every figure comes from the text. The paragraph links open the paragraph a statement rests on — check the text itself before relying on it.

This draft report on an EU AI strategy for trade calls for integrating AI into trade policy to boost competitiveness, enforce rules, and secure critical inputs while projecting EU values globally. It urges the Commission to use AI for trade facilitation, customs enforcement, and services competitiveness, and to address labour and development impacts. It calls for promoting EU AI governance in digital trade rules and multilateral forums, and for strengthening economic security by diversifying supply chains and using trade tools.

Committee position. The rapporteur proposes a resolution calling for an integrated EU trade strategy on AI, covering deployment, enforcement, services competitiveness, digital trade governance, and economic security.

Key points

  1. Calls on the Commission to integrate AI advisory services into Access2Markets and the Single Entry Point to help SMEs navigate trade rules.
  2. Urges making paperless trade the norm, investing in AI-enabled logistics, and using AI to enhance customs enforcement and data sharing.
  3. Stresses that trade negotiations must secure market access and prevent unfair competition from AI-enabled productivity gains in strategic sectors.
  4. Warns AI is eroding EU advantage in services; urges mobilising investment and partnerships to attract capital and talent.
  5. Calls for analysing AI's impact on workers in free trade agreement assessments and addressing skills gaps.
  6. Asks the Commission to use digital inclusion provisions and Global Gateway to support AI adoption in the Global South.
  7. Calls for projecting EU's human-centric AI approach through digital partnerships and international forums, and for regulator cooperation.
  8. Reaffirms GDPR as primary for personal data transfers and calls for digital trade rules to facilitate non-personal flows and protect regulatory autonomy.
  9. Urges integrating digital trade rules into WTO and using standards to prevent regulatory divergence becoming trade barriers.
  10. Calls for accelerating Chips Act and AI factories, and diversifying semiconductor and compute supply via trade agreements.
  11. Calls for graduated sovereignty frameworks for cloud services, prioritising EU providers for critical services while keeping non-discriminatory access for like-minded providers.
  12. Urges coordinating economic security tools to prevent weaponisation of AI dependencies and strengthen enforcement.

Who is affected

  • EU small and medium-sized enterprises exporting goods and services.
  • EU customs and border authorities.
  • EU workers in sectors affected by AI-driven automation and services trade.
  • Partners in the Global South.
  • EU and non-EU cloud and AI infrastructure providers.

Figures and deadlines

  • six percent of global investment in AI startups in the first half of 2024