The European Commission’s president-elect, Ursula von der Leyen, has designated Apostolos Tzitzikostas as the new Commissioner for Sustainable Transport and Tourism. This role carries significant weight in the EU’s environmental and economic strategies, reflecting the EU’s prioritisation of sustainable mobility and tourism resilience in its policy agenda.
Tzitzikostas’s mandate, as delineated in the official mission letter, encompasses several critical areas:
- Completion of the Trans-European Transport Corridor
- Investment and strengthening of the Single Market for transport services
- Establishing an ambitious plan for a high-speed rail network across EU capitals
- Create a new proposal for Single Digital Booking and Ticketing Regulations
- New work on a Sustainable Transport Investment Plan
- Speeding up new EV charging infrastructure
- Putting forward a new strategy for cleaning corporate fleets
- Building a new EU industrial action plan for the automotive sector
- New industrial maritime strategy
- Addressing challenges with the Single European Sky initiative
- Publishing a process report on the European Declaration on Cycling
- Promotion of new technology, such as Hyperloop
- Introduce a new EU Port Strategy, focusing on security and competitiveness.
Pundits have, however, found several areas missing from Tzitzikostas’s mandate:
- No obligation to promote e-fuels for aviation and/or maritime use.
- No mention of non-co2 emissions reporting initiatives
- No explicit mention of hydrogen technologies
Tzitzikostas is required to work in close cooperation with other Commissioners, particularly the Executive Vice-President for the European Green Deal and the Executive Vice-President for Cohesion and Reforms. The degree of policy coherence across different EU initiatives will reflect the success of this collaborative approach.
The appointment of Tzitzikostas as the new Commissioner for Sustainable Transport and Tourism is a pivotal moment for EU policies in these sectors. He will be tasked with navigating the delicate balance between ambitious environmental targets and the pressing need for economic recovery in the post-pandemic era. The success of his tenure will be gauged by the tangible progress made in sustainable mobility adoption, tourism sector resilience, and the EU’s overall journey towards climate neutrality.
As Tzitzikostas assumes this role, stakeholders across the transport and tourism sectors will scrutinise his policy decisions. The initiatives emerging from his office are likely to have far-reaching implications for EU mobility patterns, tourism trends, and the broader European economy in the coming years.
Image: © European Union/ Philippe Buisson. European Committee of the Regions.
