The EU Commissioner for Environment, Janez Potočnik, and Federal Environment Minister Barbara Hendricks reiterated their commitment to an ambitious EU environmental policy at their meeting in Berlin on 6 March 2014. They expressed their conviction that environmental protection and climate action provide the essential foundation for sustainable economic development and wellbeing in Europe.
"Living well, within the limits of our planet" is the guiding principle of the 7th EU Environment Action Programme, which Commissioner Potočnik and Minister Hendricks presented. The programme establishes the framework for the environment and climate policies of the EU up to the year 2020. The programme had been tabled by the European Commission and was adopted by the European Parliament and the member states at the end of 2013.
"The Environment Action Programme is aimed at reconciling prosperity and health in Europe with the principle of sustainability. In detail the plan is to phase out environmentally harmful subsidies, bring about a shift in taxation away from a labour-based system to one focusing on environmental pollution, improve implementation of EU environmental provisions in the member states, facilitate access to courts in environment cases and develop a system that identifies environment-related expenditure in the EU budget.
Environment Commissioner Potočnik declared: "Environmental protection and climate action are per se indispensable, but they are also a prerequisite for long-term economic growth and the wellbeing of our societies. I will maintain a close cooperation with Germany and the other member states, with the European Parliament, regional and local authorities, industry and NGOs to help the 7th Environment Action Programme get started. The new Action Programme indicates a way forward towards a Europe that will allow its citizens to live in a safe and healthy natural environment, where economic progress is based on sustainable and environmentally sound economic action and where ecological resilience is a reality."
Environment Minister Barbara Hendricks added: "Wellbeing is inconceivable without environmental protection. In Europe we are ready to take the lead in environmental protection. With the new Environment Action Programme, Europe is affirming its active role in environmental politics. I consider climate action to be a key element in this respect. The climate and energy objectives for 2030 tabled by the Commission are a sound basis. However, in some issues such as emissions trading we have to be more ambitious. I also consider it to be very important that we place a focus on the sustainability of our cities, because it is there that the success or failure of our environmental policies will be decided."
Since the beginning of the 70s general environment action programmes have set out the areas on which the EU would concentrate in its environmental policies. The seventh Programme covers the period between 2014 and 2020 and lists nine priority targets such as the transition towards a resource efficient, environmentally sound and competitive low carbon economy, effective action against environmental health risks and improved implementation of EU environmental provisions.