Mr President, almost eight years have gone by since the appearance, in June 1993, of the Community regulation allowing voluntary participation by companies in a Community eco-management and audit scheme. This regulation, known by its acronym EMAS, opened up the use of market mechanisms in order for organisations to make a voluntary commitment to adopting a more pro-active approach to improving their environmental performance. Its success depended largely on the concept thriving that the environment can and should be part of business strategies as another factor which, as well as environmental safety, provides added value for the business itself. It represents a considerable change in mentality for the business world to consider respect for the environment more as a factor of competitiveness and progress, rather than as an annoying legal obligation, in many cases at heavy financial cost and with a questionable degree of appreciation of the effort on the part of consumers. This revised and updated regulation makes an important contribution to a modern environmental policy, in accordance with the principles of sustainable development, important for real improvement in the environmental behaviour of companies and also for the recognition of this improvement by others, particularly by consumers. During these eight years of practical application we have learnt various lessons. The first is its use as a market tool. Almost 3 100 industrial establishments across Europe have participated in this system, which is growing in numbers at a pace of nearly 50% per year. Despite this significant development, there is still potential for progress. The new regulation therefore incorporates several considerations facilitating participation by European companies in this environmental improvement system. It is worth highlighting the extension of the scope of application to all types of organisations, including the service sector, and the possibility of incorporating public administration, establishing incentives and special consideration by public administrations for certified companies when awarding public contracts, encouraging participation among small- and medium-sized enterprises, coordination between the European system and other international environmental certification systems. In this last aspect there has been considerable simplification and unification of nomenclature and requirements, which will provide significant clarification of the role that EMAS should play in the European context. Another of the lessons that we have learnt is the need to maintain and even increase the credibility of the system. This text has stepped up measures to ensure its quality and credibility, as well as public access to information. The role of the environmental statement is increasing, as is the work of the environmental verifiers, who have to check that organisations are complying with the requirements of this regulation. These requirements have also been strengthened by Parliament’s amendments, of which the following stand out: the obligation to comply with environmental legislation by participating companies, establishing more demanding standards for the qualification and training of the environmental verifiers who accredit the companies, public reports on the environmental performance of companies, with absolute credibility for third parties, greater involvement of the interested parties in the process of monitoring the environmental performance of companies and, in particular, of employees and users, extension of environmental responsibility, which goes beyond the company’s facilities, to include indicators of the performance of products and services, in line with the approach of the new environmental directives, and also an increase in the role of the coordinating bodies with the aim of facilitating the homogenous application of the system in the various Member States. In order to arrive at the results that I have just mentioned, I have to say that the conciliation procedure was extremely positive and interesting. We arrived at it with 24 amendments, of which only 4 were accepted without change and 3 were withdrawn in the course of the negotiations. 20 amendments were accepted on the basis of compromise formulations, which gives an idea of the intensity and the success of the negotiations. I would therefore like to thank the experts from Parliament, the Commission and the Council for the work that they did during that period, and the members of the Conciliation Committee for being willing to make a decided effort to strengthen this directive. I think that the European Parliament can consider the final result of the conciliation to be very satisfactory, given that the large majority of its amendments have been incorporated fully or in revised form into the joint text, and I therefore propose that it be approved tomorrow in Parliament at third reading.

Political group: PPE-DE