The European Recovery Plan is “a golden opportunity” to mobilise resources for a green recovery, including at sea, nine NGOs, including BirdLife Europe, Seas At Risk, Oceana Europe and WWF, highlighted on Monday 8 June in a joint report entitled ‘Turning the Tide on EU Seas with a Green Recovery’.
According to these NGOs, at a time when marine ecosystems are already on the brink, the European Union continues to invest in incentives to the fisheries sector that are environmentally damaging.
Calling on the EU to redirect these resources towards a more sustainable management of Europe’s seas, the report’s authors say it is crucial that the European Recovery Plan and funding programmes, such as the European Maritime and Fisheries Fund (EMFF), “enable the EU to tackle our long-term environmental crisis”.
Among the specific investment opportunities explored in the report, the NGOs recommend, inter alia: (1) to invest in the active restoration of marine ecosystems; (2) to ensure transparent, responsible and more selective fishing activities by developing electronic remote monitoring; (3) to stop the pollution of plastics at the source by investing in the reuse and rental sectors.
To consult the report: https://bit.ly/3dKRyzh (Original version in French by Damien Genicot)