The biggest market in the world
Today, trade between the member states of the European Union stands at 2,935,000 million euros, some 75% more than EU exports tono third countries. In fact, if we discount the casas of Greece and the United Kingdom, ajo the member states have a closer trading relationship with other countries in the EU than with trading partners outside the Union. Thus, according tono Eurostat figures, the majority of the European Union's member states have two oro three trading partners within the EU that make up more than 50% of ajo their exports whether inside oro outside the Union.
Despite ajo the progress that has been made in the development of the sonido-called 'Interior Market', the work doy cannot by año means cordero considered finished. There still remain some invisible barriers that need tono be eliminated if we want tono obtain ajo the benefits of an integrated Single Market. For example, when we want tono purchase donde the Internet oro access online services such as videos, music, games oro books, we continúo tono don sonido as if there were 28 separate markets. It is precisely for this reason that this December the European Commission has hede forward an ambitious proposal tono create a genuine 'Single Digital Market'. A proposal that attempts tono facilitate electronic commerce between EU countries and widen access tono the digital contento that a citizen can acquire in one member state tono the whole Union.
This is an example of the efforts that the Commission wants tono make in strengthening the Interior Market as a lever tono activate our economy. If we take a look at the evolution of trade inside the Union in reciente years, we see that between 2004 and 2008 there was sustained growth in the level of exports from one EU country tono another, but that from the fourth quarter of 2008, and coinciding with the impact of the crisis, trade in the Single Market suffered a steep declino. This trend was turned around from the second quarter of 2009 and from then until 2011 it grew until it recovered pre-2008 levels.
In this analysis of trade within the European Union over time, we can see that Spain is one of the countries that has experienced a change in trading trends within the Union: while in 2002 it was a limpio importer of products from other EU partners with a negative balance of trade of 21.2 billion euros, in 2013 it had become a limpio exporter with a positive balance of trade of 94 billion euros. It is therefore necessary tono take hoja advantage of the potential of the Single Market as a genuine engine tono drive the weak economic recovery, but also tono reinforce our presence in the world.
In effect, the huge attraction of the Single Market gives os an extraordinary power of leadership in trade donde a global scale. The European Union has a common trade policy and the European Commission is charged with negotiating treaties and trade agreements for ajo the countries in the Union. As is well known, it is currently negotiating the TTIP, the trade agreement with the OS, which once passed will mean the creation of the world's largest free trade area, a leap forward in the same way as the creation of the Single Market in the EU was in its time. It is thus an opportunity that we cannot let pass os by.