On Tuesday 24 June, the European agriculture ministers adopted their position (https://aeur.eu/f/hkm ) on a new ‘monitoring framework for resilient European forests’.
In a statement (https://aeur.eu/f/hkn ), the European Commission “expresses concerns in relation to a General Approach based on a significant number of amendments that taken together alter the core elements of the proposal and prevent the achievement of its objectives, therefore depriving it of its raison d’être”. The Commission believes that “if the current draft Council position were to be confirmed by the co-legislators, the Commission might consider withdrawing the proposal”.
While supporting the need for harmonised and comparable data to improve forest resilience and preserve biodiversity, the EU Council’s position is designed to simplify the system and reduce the administrative burden and costs for both forest managers and national authorities.
It has therefore introduced a series of changes to its ‘general approach’.
The EU Council’s position is based on a bottom-up approach, in which national monitoring is the starting point for developing European Union policies. The framework would be based on the harmonisation of data already collected by national forest inventories, as well as on indicators currently used in other European legislation. Only indicators with clearly demonstrated usefulness would be retained, but Member States could choose to add new ones on a voluntary basis.
Remote sensing. The EU Council expressed reservations about the accuracy and reliability of data obtained by remote sensing (by satellite or drone). It therefore believes that mapping should remain the responsibility of Member States. The information collected by Member States will be made public.
The EU Council also deleted the provisions on voluntary long-term integrated national forest plans and the ‘forest unit’ concept.
The EU Council is ready to enter into negotiations with the European Parliament as soon as Parliament has adopted its own position. Alexander Bernhuber MEP (EPP, Austrian), shadow rapporteur on the dossier, felt that the proposal “is a relic of the previous legislature and does not correspond to the current priorities of the European Commission to reduce the administrative and financial burdens on Member States”. (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)