Negotiators from the European Parliament, led by César Luena (S&D, Spanish), the Spanish Presidency of the Council and the European Commission met in Strasbourg on Thursday 5 October for a second round of inconclusive inter-institutional negotiations (trilogue) on the proposal for a regulation on nature restoration.
This second ‘trilogue’ enabled the three institutions to make some progress on this future ‘European Green Deal’ legislation, which aims to impose binding restoration targets for each ecosystem - forests, agricultural land, marine, freshwater and urban ecosystems - with a view to restoring at least 20% of the EU’s land and marine areas by 2030 and all the ecosystems to be restored by 2050 (see EUROPE 12977/17).
“The paradox is that the negotiators from the S&D, Greens/EFA and The Left groups consider the Council’s text to be better than that of the Parliament. Those who voted against are defending the Parliament’s position”, commented Jutta Paulus (Greens/EFA, German) ahead of the trilogue.
The most difficult issues were discussed with a view to guiding future work, but the respective positions of the Council (see EUROPE 13205/12) and Parliament (see EUROPE 13221/1, 13227/18) are still far apart.
The European Commission, which has long maintained that it is ready to play its good offices to reach a solution acceptable to all on this extremely sensitive issue, “was asked to come up with bridge solutions”, according to a source close to the matter. On this basis, discussions will continue at technical level.
The expected solution proposals concern the following points:
- restoration targets for terrestrial, coastal and freshwater ecosystems (Article 4) and for marine ecosystems (Article 5);
- the restoration objectives for agricultural ecosystems, which Parliament deleted (Article 9), but which the Council does not intend to abandon;
- funding from the EU’s Multiannual Financial Framework/CAP;
- the ‘emergency brake’, i.e. the possibility of postponing the objectives in the event of exceptional socio-economic consequences, such as the negative impact on food prices, food production, renewable energy or social housing, as requested by the European Parliament;
- the principle of non-deterioration of habitats.
However, agreement was reached on the global objective (article 1), with reference to food security, on the obligation to reverse the decline in pollinators (article 8) and on the planting of 3 billion trees (article 10 a).
Agreement is within reach on the restoration of forest systems (article 10), but the dead wood indicators still need to be discussed in greater depth.
The next trilogue - the third - will take place on the evening of 7 November, “at the finish”, the ambition being that it will be the last. This timetable would enable the European Parliament’s Committee on Environment (ENVI) to vote within the month, with a view to a plenary session vote in December. (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)