Assessing the Economic Positions of the European Union Countries in the Context of Transforming Foreign Economic Relations and Implementing a New Industrial Strategy for Europe

The paper examines the current state of the EU countries, evaluates key indicators applied in the trade and economic area that indicate the countries’ share in world markets and identifies problems and contradictions that affect the development prospects of an integration group. The theoretical and methodological basis of the research includes the historical-logical and dialectical principles and contradictions, as well as the method of scientific abstraction. The process-system approach, used in an in-depth analysis of the key economic indicators of the EU members, was of particular importance in justifying the need to reduce economic inequality between the EU countries. The paper calculates the relative share of integration group countries in world exports and imports. Based on this data, the forecast of the relative share of Germany in world exports until 2025 was calculated, and the implementation scenarios were indicated (with a low and high degree of probability). Besides, for almost every country, the coverage ratio of imports of goods to exports was calculated, and a forecast was made for this indicator for individual countries of Central and Eastern Europe and the Southern region of the European Union. Following the identified problems and contradictions in the EU countries, the authors concluded that the existing economic inequality between the EU countries does not allow certain countries of Central and Eastern Europe and the Southern region of the EU to strengthen their positions within and beyond the European market. Currently, the EU countries are implementing a New Industrial Strategy for Europe based on plans to achieve net-zero greenhouse gas emissions, net-zero environmental pollution, and digital leadership. Thus, the paper presents the main elements of the mentioned strategy, specifies the strengths of the EU in the areas of industrial development, and identifies the main opportunities that the EU might receive after the implementation of this strategy. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023.