The Italian G7 starts from the industry, the government is looking for agreements on chips and aid for Africa
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A new working group among the big seven to secure the chip supply chain. Greater coordination of space strategies. A cooperation program aimed at countries in the Global South centered on digital infrastructure and skills. These are the elements that the Meloni government would like to include in the final communiqué of the first act of its presidency G7the reunion ministerial on the topics of Industry, Technology and Digital which will be held Thursday and Friday between Verona and Trento. On the eve of the appointment, negotiations between the Sherpas on the text came to a head, which as always will have to be refined to reconcile the different sensitivities and agendas. On artificial intelligence for example, another central theme of the two days, there is a distance between Europe, which is more decisive in regulating, and the softer approach of the United States and Japan. While on the program for the Global South, in exchange for support for the Italian proposal, Washington would like the coordination hub on its territory.
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Habeck and Vestager present, no US minister
“There are differences within the G7, but we are convinced they can be overcome by finding points of convergence,” the Business Minister said yesterday when presenting the summit Adolfo Ursowho will lead Thursday’s work centered on the industrial part of Verona, and then pass the baton on Friday to the Undersecretary for Innovation Alessio Butti for the part on digital and AI, in Trento. The global context could not be more complex, including wars, challenges between liberal democracies and authoritarian regimes, the need to govern the great digital and energy transitions, the specter of a Trump victory with his isolationist agenda. While waiting to understand what concrete results the Italian G7 will produce, for the Meloni government it represents an opportunity to promote the international image of the country, and strengthen your own.
Urso vindicated the decision of Italy, a manufacturing power, to restore after seven years a G7 ministerial dedicated to Industry – rather than including it as in the last summits under the label of “Trade” – and to have involved the B7 in the work, that is, the representation of the companies of the seven countries, of which our Confindustria has entrusted the leadership to Emma Marcegaglia. Not all the foreign leaders present at this first meeting will be of the highest level: for example, the United States will not be there Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo, nor other members of Biden’s cabinet, but Raimondo’s advisor for technology and economic growth Zoë Baird and the head of the State Department for cyberspace Nathaniel Fick. Japan sends two vice ministers, while the German ministers will be present (Habeck, Economy and Vice-Chancellor), France (Ferrari, digital), England (Donelan, Innovation) and Canada (Champagne, Innovation and Industry), as well as the Vice-President of the Commission and Head of Competition Margrethe Vestager. Among the countries outside the G7, Italy has invited South Korea, the Emirates and Ukraine.
The government’s objectives: chips and support for the Global South
The three topics on the agenda of the summit represent the government’s technological-industrial priorities for the entire G7, which will culminate in mid-June with the meeting of heads of state and government in Puglia. The first is the security of industrial supply chains and networks, where Italy will try – in the name of defending the international order from the Chinese challenge – to promote greater coordination between the seven: on semiconductors, where a working group should be created, but also in a “strong” industrial field tricolor like aerospace. The second is the development of Global South, where the government would like to promote a program within the United Nations to bridge the digital gaps – in infrastructure and skills – of the developing countries gathered in the G77 group, most of which are African. A way to strengthen, at least indirectly, his own Mattei Plan, which so far has had limited impact outside national borders. Although obviously it will not be mentioned in the final press release.
Butti: “More researchers and national champions, with our plan AI will speak Italian”
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What rules for AI?
Finally, the AI, where the government finds itself inheriting the principles and codes of conduct defined by the previous Japanese presidency with the “Hiroshima Code”, which focus heavily on self-regulation by companies. Here it is not clear what progress there will be, also given the different sensitivity of the countries regarding the nature and harshness of the rules. It is likely that the final statement, beyond the references to ethical and anthropocentric development, will focus more on the need to encourage the adoption of AI tools by companies. That we look not only at the rules, but also at the opportunities, is also the request that will come out of the B7 companies, worried about the risk of fragmentation within the advanced world: “There is the perception of a divergence between states United States and Europe in terms of competitiveness, investment attraction and also regulation of AI – he said Emma Marcegaglia anticipating the message that businesses will bring to leaders – while the goal is to seek convergence in the advanced world. If Europe does not change its policies, the risk is that investments will go where regulation is minimal and there is freedom to innovate.” A message very in tune with Urso’s positions, and with the approach taken so far within the G7. Less so with those of Butti, who defended the need for binding rules and defined the European AI Act as an excellent law.
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