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Dear AIF/ UNIFE Members,
Please mark your calendar for the following events which UNIFE will either organise, attend or have a presentation in the upcoming months
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Bucharest: Two conferences organised by the Romanian EU Council Presidency address the role of Standardisation and the Fourth Railway Package Implementation
On 7 June, the High Level Conference on Standardisation marked the end of the Joint Initiative on Standardisation and it concluded with a strong plea to the new European Commission to continue the initiative beyond 2019. Over the past 3 years the initiative had brought together stakeholders across industries to work on set of actions aimed at improving delivery and awareness of standardisation processes. As one of the signatories of the Joint Initiative, UNIFE supports its continuation as standards continue to play a crucial role for the competitiveness of the industry within the Single Market and globally.
On 11 and 12 June, the Romanian EU Council Presidency organised a workshop on the Fourth Railway Package implementation, in Bucharest. During the event, cooperation agreements with the NSAs of France, Greece and Romania were signed by ERA director Josef Doppelbauer and the respective Heads of the national agencies. As part of the Fourth Railway Package implementation bilateral cooperation agreements have to be signed between all Member States NSAs and the ERA. UNIFE welcomes the conclusion of these agreements as these are essential for a smooth transition to the new authorisation regime which took effect on the 16 of June 2019
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Dear Members,
It was a real pleasure to see so many of you and to discuss about the future of the European Supply Rail Industry during the 28th UNIFE General Assembly in Dublin. This year’s edition saw the signature of the Dublin Declaration by the UNIFE Presiding Board on the crucial importance of our industry for the sustainable development of our planet. I take this opportunity to once again thank our sponsors, Knorr-Bremse and Bombardier Transportation for their generous support and to welcome the nine new UNIFE Members: Dutch Analytics, Elcowire Rail, IVM, Konux, Leonardo, RideOnTrack, STIMIO, Triorail Bahnfunk, and WenzeL Elektronik.
Next, I would like to draw your attention on the latest developments concerning the Fourth Railway Package. On 16 June, the Technical Pillar entered into operation with the European Union Agency for Railways (ERA) becoming the European authorising entity for multi-country vehicle authorisations. The new regime now applies in Bulgaria, Finland, France, Greece, Italy, The Netherlands, Romania and Slovenia, with the remaining Member States due to join by June 2020. You can read more on this topic below.
In terms of trade issues, the eight edition of the EU-Japan Railway Industrial Dialogue will be held on 25 November in Tokyo and will bring together again European and Japanese rail stakeholders in the presence of the EU Institutions and Japan’s Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism. It will be the first time that the Industrial Dialogue is convened since the entry into force of the EU-Japan Free Trade Agreement negotiations in February 2019.
Finally, I would like to highlight our participation at the UITP Global Public Transport Summit, the International Wheelset Congress (IWC), and our visit in Canada for the APTA Conference, where we had the opportunity to present the latest views and developments of the European Supply Rail Industry on innovation and digitalization.
As most of you will go on holidays in July or August I would like to wish you a great summer vacation, and I am looking forward to get back to you with fresh news in the next issue of the UNIFE e-briefing in September.
Best regards,
Philippe Citroën
Director General
