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On Tuesday, 14 July, AmCham EU hosted Csaba Kontor, Policy Assistant, Cabinet of European Commissioner Olivér Várhelyi, for a discussion on strengthening Europe’s competitiveness in the life sciences sector. Moderated by Katerina Valkova (Bristol Myers Squibb), Chair, Healthcare Committee, AmCham EU, the exchange explored how policy decisions can support investment through research and innovation while ensuring patients in Europe can access health innovation. Participants also discussed the importance of resilient EU-US supply chains and regulatory cooperation, as well as the need to avoid divergence and provide the scale and predictability required to sustain Europe’s position as a leading destination for life sciences investment.

Meta’s open-source Canopy Height Maps helped the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre improve its 2020 Global Forest Cover map, demonstrating how artificial intelligence can strengthen Europe’s ability to monitor forests and advance climate and biodiversity goals. Developed with the World Resources Institute, the maps use Meta’s DINO self-supervised computer vision model to estimate tree height from satellite imagery. This helped researchers apply the five-metre threshold used in many international forest definitions and better distinguish forests from other tree-covered land, including agricultural tree crops. The resulting product, available through the EU Forest Observatory, provides one of the most comprehensive open views of global forest cover. Read more on Invested in Europe.

Together with nine other associations, AmCham EU has signed a joint statement on the evaluation of the Single-Use Plastic Directive (SUPD), calling on EU institutions to avoid reopening the Directive. A revision at this stage would create uncertainty for operators and could also increase costs and deepen fragmentation across the Single Market. Several SUPD provisions are not yet in place. Data on implementation remain limited, making it too early to assess whether the Directive is meeting its objectives. The statement also underlines the need to address gaps in transposition and enforcement. It warns against overlaps with EU legislation such as the Ecodesign Regulation, the Packaging and Packaging Waste Regulation and the Circular Economy Act. Learn how the EU can support certainty and the Single Market in the joint statement.