Towards a genuine 7th Environmental Action Programme
The stakes were high: to discuss the future European environment policy for the next ten years. The European conference that has just come to an end was therefore of great importance.
Europe Environment Policy: What’s next?...
Organised by Minister Evelyne Huytebroeck, Brussels Minister for the Environment, Energy and Urban Renewal and her administration Brussels Environment, within the framework of the Belgian presidency of the European Union, she brought together 400 participants including the European Commissioner for the Environment, Janez Potocnik, the Vice-President of the European Parliament, Isabelle Durant, the German, Danish, Hungarian, Polish and Slovenian ministers of the environment, top-level experts, and numerous lay persons.
The stakes were high: to discuss the future European environment policy for the next ten years. The European conference that has just come to an end was therefore of great importance. Organised by Minister Evelyne Huytebroeck, Brussels Minister for the Environment, Energy and Urban Renewal and her administration Brussels Environment, within the framework of the Belgian presidency of the European Union, she brought together 400 participants including the European Commissioner for the Environment, Janez Potocnik, the Vice-President of the European Parliament, Isabelle Durant, the German, Danish, Hungarian, Polish and Slovenian ministers of the environment, top-level experts, and numerous lay persons.
The conference agreed on the need for the European Union to adopt a genuine 7th Environmental Action Programme, to succeed the 6th Programme which will end in 2012. By involving the Parliament and the European Council, as well as the whole of civil society, the preparation of this future programme is a major environmental stake in participative democracy, guiding the policy for the next decade.
And yet, it is the subject of serious controversy, highlighting the very importance of it. The European Commission would like to wait for the assessment results of the 6th EAP before opting for a new environmental action programme. The Commission also considers that the proposal it will present in 2011 on the efficiency of resources, within the framework of the Europe 2020 Strategy, already contains an important step towards an environmental programme. However, even though some environmental aspects are present in this strategy, it is nevertheless primarily of a socio-economic nature. A real environment policy exceeds the economic dimension, by including aspects such as health, protecting the environment for future generations, changing behaviour, and specific environmental subjects such as sources of diffuse pollution, etc. Therefore, a specific environment programme is required.
The large majority of member states and nearly all the environmental players (NGO, politicians, etc.) would like to go further and create a genuine 7th programme.
What should the programme contain?
The programme should:
- constitute a global framework for the environment policy for the next ten years;
- establish clear links with the other European strategies, such as the Europe 2020 Strategy, the Sustainable Development Strategy and other transversal policies (such as the environment-health action plan);
- contain objectives in terms of figures for all sectors of the environment.
But that’s not all. It must also include:
- Reflection, a better definition of the instruments (regarding control, assessment and sanctions) of the European environment policy and the development of good governance tools:
- Regarding the statutory process (simple, univocal and restrictive rules supplemented by economic instruments (price policy, CO2 taxation));
- Regarding the assessment of the results (indicators beyond the GDP such as the ecological footprint and impact assessments with guarantees of independence);
- Regarding concrete implementation (of better-formulated rules first of all, followed by international mechanisms for aid, control and sanctions).
- A new global approach linked to more sustainable lifestyles (methods of consumption, production and trade) taking into account the shortage of energy and material resources: pushing for eco-technologies and energy efficiency, but also changes in behaviour and adapting our way of life.
During the next Environment Council on 20th December, comments on and recommendations for the improvement of environment policy instruments shall be discussed between all the European Union’s environment ministers.
