Dear Europeans,

 

Welcome to the website of the Portuguese Presidency of the Council of the European Union 2021.

 

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused a sanitary, economic and social crisis unprecedented since World War II. With the centralised vaccine acquisition by the European Commission and vaccination plans underway at European level on the one hand and the agreement reached by the German Presidency on the Multiannual Financial Framework and the “Next Generation EU” programme on the other, we have a joint and robust European response that will allow all Member States to overcome the pandemic and recover their economies.

 

Now is the time to make things happen. This is why the motto of our Presidency is “Time to deliver: a fair, green and digital recovery”.

 

We have three fundamental priorities:

 

1. Economic and social recovery based on the engines of the climate and digital transitions.
2. Developing the European Union Social Pillar as a basis of trust that allows us to lead digital and climate transitions leaving no one behind, a central topic of the Social Summit we will be holding in Porto in May.
3. Reinforcing the strategic autonomy of a European Union open to the world by strengthening relationships with our transatlantic partners, both with the new American administration and with Latin America, with Africa, with the Indo-Pacific area, namely through the EU-India Summit, and with our neighbours in the east, who we will be meeting in an Eastern Partnership Summit, and in the south.

 

I invite you all to learn more about our programme, the events and the other features of the Portuguese Presidency of the Council of the European Union in the first half of 2021 through this website and our social networks.

 

We are counting on the participation of all of you so that together we can reaffirm our confidence in our community of values and in a future of shared prosperity.

 

António Costa, Prime Minister of the Portuguese Republic