Environment ministers adopted today (June 17) biodiversity legislation intended to reverse decades of ecosystem degradation, after years of difficult negotiations between the co-legislators, with Austria clearing a long-standing deadlock with its last-minute change of heart, allowing the minimum threshold for the law to pass.
Ministers gathering in Luxembourg today were meant to adopt the biodiversity law without further debate, but a lack of consensus threatening to block it has prompted the Belgium Presidency, almost ending its term in the rotating Council Presidency, to give lawmakers the possibility to exchange views in a last-bid attempt to save the Nature Restoration Law, which was rejected by Belgium (the country opted to abstain), Finland, Hungary, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland and Sweden.
“I have expressed Austria’s concerns several times previously. Its unavoidable that we have to amend national provisions,” said Austrian climate minister Leonor Gewessler, referring to the lack of uniformity between the country’s federal states, notably the Carinthia region’s position.
“This law is pivotal to combat climate change. We need to ensure legal certainty for people using soil and land. We asked member states to give the possibility to work on various points on how to implement it,” Gewessler added.
EU countries rejecting the law cited concerns linked to the farming sector, environmental and sustainability standards and implementation costs.
“We are far from satisfied, we cannot accept that we are increasing the economic and administrative burden on the agricultural sector,” said Italian vice-minister Vannia Gava.
Despite recognising the need to reverse biodiversity damage, Finland mainly rejected the law’s implementation costs.
“If the law is to be passed today, I stress that we all need to work hard to ensure a cost-effective and balanced implementation and hope the European Commission will work accordingly,” said Kai Mykkänen, Finnish environment minister.
Proposed by the Commission in June 2022, the Nature Restoration Law was provisionally agreed with the EU Council last November after months of highly politicised negotiations, and requires action to improve biodiversity across 20% of all EU land and sea by 2030 and the incremental restoration of all degraded ecosystems by 2050, alongside other measures such as opening up 25,000km of free-flowing rivers and planting at least three billion new trees.
“Let’s put ideology behind us and get to work all together. The time for political and ideological discussion is over now let’s get on with the job,” said Virginijus Sinkevičius, commissioner for the environment, oceans and fisheries.
