Navigating the Intralogistics Transition: Why Decarbonisation and Competitiveness Must Reinforce Each Other

Ernesto Domínguez: Europe already has a strong technological position in materials handling and intralogistics. Our industry develops increasingly sophisticated systems combining mechanical engineering with automation, controls, information processing and digital technologies. The challenge is to ensure that companies can continue investing in that technological leadership while manufacturing competitively in Europe.

From FEM’s perspective, EU industrial policy should focus on three priorities. First, reduce the cumulative regulatory burden and provide a stable, predictable framework for investment. Companies should be able to devote their engineering and R&D resources to innovation rather than continuously adapting products to overlapping or inconsistent regulatory requirements.

Second, Europe needs fair competition and stronger enforcement of its Single Market and trade rules. European manufacturers cannot be expected to compete on an uneven playing field against products benefiting from distortive support abroad.

Third, Europe should continue supporting innovation, digitalisation and effective standardisation. Getting regulation and standards right is an industrial competitiveness issue as much as a technical one.

Ernesto Domínguez: For our industry, the green transition and industrial competitiveness need to reinforce each other, rather than compete for the same investment resources. Materials handling equipment itself has an important role to play in making production, warehousing and logistics more efficient and sustainable.

The concern arises when the cumulative cost and complexity of regulation absorb resources that companies would otherwise invest in innovation and decarbonisation. FEM’s recent position on CBAM illustrates this challenge very clearly. Materials handling manufacturers use significant quantities of steel and aluminium, often sourced through complex European and international supply chains. Increasing input costs and complex reporting obligations can divert operational and financial resources away from innovation and decarbonisation, with a particularly significant impact on SMEs.

The answer is therefore not to lower Europe’s climate ambition, but to make the regulatory pathway more predictable, coherent and proportionate. Policymakers need to look at the cumulative impact of requirements across the whole industrial value chain and avoid imposing conflicting obligations.

Decarbonisation ultimately requires investment. European regulation should therefore create the space and certainty for companies to make that investment, rather than unintentionally diverting capital and engineering resources away from it.

Ernesto Domínguez: This is becoming increasingly important because materials handling is a highly technical industry and seemingly small regulatory choices can have significant consequences when applied to complex equipment and integrated systems.

Effective industrial advocacy therefore needs to start much earlier in the legislative process. Policymakers need access to engineering expertise, operational experience and real-world evidence while proposals are still being developed, not only once the legislative text is close to adoption.

Standardisation provides a good example. FEM has specifically recommended that the process for drafting standardisation requests should run in parallel with legislative drafting, helping to avoid unrealistic deadlines for developing harmonised standards and allowing standards to be available when new legislation starts to apply.

The same principle should apply more broadly to policymaking. Trade associations such as FEM have an important role as a bridge between manufacturers and the European institutions: translating highly technical operational realities into evidence that policymakers can use.

That also means communications and public affairs have to work increasingly closely with technical experts. The most persuasive contribution is not simply “this regulation is burdensome”, but evidence showing where the problem occurs, what its practical consequence is, and how the policy objective could be achieved in a more workable way. For industry, the key is therefore early engagement, credible technical evidence and concrete solutions. That gives policymakers something actionable while there is still an opportunity to shape the legislation.