The European Free Trade Association (EFTA) Parliamentary Committee is a forum for parliamentarians from the four member states, while the EFTA Consultative Committee brings together representatives of the countries' trade unions and employers' organisations. Both committees are advisory bodies to EFTA. Their mandate is to monitor developments in EFTA's current free trade negotiations and its relations with the European Union. The advisory bodies form a key channel for dialogue and consultation on social, economic and political aspects of EFTA's free trade agreements and the functioning of the European Economic Area.
The Parliamentary Committee, the Consultative Committee and EFTA ministers will hold their annual talks in Schaan in the Principality of Liechtenstein. There they will discuss EFTA's ongoing free trade processes with the Mercosur bloc, India, Singapore and other partner countries, as well as trade and economic measures that the EFTA states could take to support Ukraine.
The two advisory bodies will also meet with Dumitru Alaiba, the deputy prime minister and economy minister of the Republic of Moldova, to acknowledge the recent conclusion of negotiations on a comprehensive free trade agreement between EFTA and the Republic of Moldova. The agreement is to be signed on the sidelines of the ministerial meeting in Schaan. The EFTA Parliamentary Committee will also meet with Singapore's Minister-in-charge of Trade Relations, S Iswaran, to discuss the state of negotiations on a digital economy agreement between EFTA and Singapore.
The EFTA/EU Delegation represents the Swiss Federal Assembly on the EFTA Parliamentary Committee. Delegation president Benedikt Würth (The Centre, SG), vice president Thomas Aeschi (SVP, ZG) and National Council members Hans-Peter Portmann (FDP, ZH) and Nicolas Walder (Greens, GE) will attend the meeting in Schaan.