EU Must Reform Economy to Compete With China, U.S.

EU leaders last week agreed a new constitution for the union, which on May 1 expanded from 15 to 25 member states with the addition of former communist countries including Poland and the Czech Republic. ``Enlargement this year has also forced its members to confront the need for reform,'' Straw said at a forum in London hosted by Bloomberg LP. ``Now that the EU's institutions are in good shape, Europe cannot rest on its laurels. The EU needs now to focus on economic reform, if it is to meet the challenge of global competition.'' The Eurozone area GDP grew 0.5 percent last year, compared with 3.1 percent for the U.S., 9.1 percent for China and 2.2 percent for the U.K. ``If Europe's economies are to compete, we need to cut back unnecessary and outdated EU regulation, and ensure that any new regulation makes us more, not less competitive,'' Straw said. ``Europe in its original conception was about self-sufficiency, in food, in energy and then in manufacturing. Now we live in a world of global competition. Today, it's about ensuring we can meet that competition.''