Ms Giovanna Maletta (SIPRI) opened the presentation by giving details of EU member states’ military
expenditure, arms production and arms transfers during the previous decade. According to data retrieved
from the SIPRI Military Expenditure Database, in the period 2008-2017 EU member states’ military
expenditure has fallen.1 More specifically, defence spending by EU member states decreased from EUR 240
billion in 2008 to EUR 229.5 billion in 2017. In the same period, EU member states’ share of global military
spending fell from 17 % to 15 %.
At the same time, these data reveal that this trend is changing and that
already in the period between 2013-2017 EU member states’ military spending increased by 7 %. In
addition, in 2017 the largest spenders in the EU (France, Germany, Italy and the United Kingdom) were
among the 15 list countries with the largest military expenditure in the world, accounting for 10 % of the
global total. Nonetheless, the speaker also highlighted the presence of a considerable gap between thebiggest EU countries spenders and those countries and the largest spenders (United States, China, Saudi
Arabia, Russia and India), which all allocated more than EUR 54 billion in 2017.
In order to understand the context in which the review of the Common Position will take place, the speaker
also gave an overview of how the EU defence industry performed in recent years.
According to data
provided by the European Commission, the EU defence industry registered a EUR 97.3 billion turnover in
2014 and employed 500 000 people.2 In terms of structure and composition, the defence industry is
dominated by a group of leading companies, followed by a larger group of about 1350 Small-Medium
Enterprises (SMEs). These companies are dispersed throughout the EU but are mostly concentrated in
France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Sweden and United Kingdom. According to the SIPRI Arms Industry
Database, between 2008-2016 an average of 25 EU-based defence companies were among the 100 largest
defence companies in terms of total arms sales.3 They were mostly based in France, Germany, Italy and
United Kingdom. The EU-based companies that are among the 100 largest defence companies have seen
their share of global arms sales fall from almost 31 % in 2008 to 24 % in 2016. Nevertheless, EU member
states continued to be major players in the field of global arms export. According to the SIPRI Arms Transfer
Database in the period going from 2008 (since the EU Common Position was adopted) to 2017, EU Member
States accounted for an average of 28 % of the global volume of arms transfers.4 Also in this case a group
of leading countries (France, Germany, Italy, Spain and United Kingdom) particularly contributed to this
trend and accounted for about 23 % of the global total since 2008.
Although EU member states decided to retain their prerogatives over every aspect of the implementation
of their arms export policies, through the adoption of the EU Common Position they have committed ‘to
promote convergence’ in this field.52 Nevertheless, evidence suggests that major improvements are
needed to achieve this goal. Such an approach could take into account the following
proposals and suggested outcomes: Peer review, A more comprehensive EU annual report on arms exports, Improved national reports, Further improvement of information-exchange mechanisms, Broader review of the eight criteria and user’s guide, Reduce procedural and enforcement divergences, where appropriate, Allocate appropriate resources for effective implementation and enforcement, Stronger involvement of EU institutions in providing and verifying information, Creating closer connections with other parts of the EU export control regime.
