Brussels, 21/11/2013 (Agence Europe) - The LIFE programme for environment and climate action will have a budget of €3.1 billion for 2014-2020. On Thursday 21 November in Strasbourg, the European Parliament adopted the programme's budget (as negotiated with the Council) by an overwhelming majority (568 for, 20 against, with 21 abstentions). The exact amount of the financial envelope remained for the most part unknown, given that it was subject to the agreement on the EU's multiannual budget on the previous day.
Jutta Haug (S&D, Germany) MEP and rapporteur, was delighted and explained that, “LIFE is a small-scale European financial instrument but performs extremely well and is popular. €3.1 billion is less than Parliament had requested but it is more than the current 2.2 billion budget. Moreover, the programme will have new missions to accomplish and will have to meet new challenges: a different sub-programme for climate action, new jointly funded 'integrated projects' and more challenges in the area of resource efficiency”.
During the negotiations with the Council, Parliament guaranteed higher co-financing rates for projects promoting the environment and biodiversity.
In the future, projects that are eligible for co-funding will only be selected on the basis of their quality and potential and no longer on the basis of the system in which some of the funds allocated were done so on an exclusively member state basis. This kind of member state funding will be replaced by specific measures to enhance the capacity of the different countries and regions that have difficulty accessing funds, in an effort to help them improve the quality of their projects. “Integrated projects” aim to combine environmental and climate issues and solutions to them in other policies and will allow for European funding to be granted jointly so as to meet important challenges in the application of legislation on water, waste, air quality and environmental protection. Specific funds will be available to help prepare and set up these projects.
Sandrine Bélier (Greens/EFA, France) affirmed that, “at the very moment that Mr Barroso is announcing that he is seeking to reduce European environmental policy, this programme represents less than 1% of the EU's budget but it is more necessary than ever. There was even a question of getting rid of it but thanks to the action of the European Parliament, we were able to keep this essential tool for European environmental policy coherency”. (AN/trans.fl)