EN    EN EN 
EN    EN  COMMISSION OF THE E UROPEAN COMMUNITIES 
Brussels, 10.6.2009 
SEC(2009) 703 
COMMISSION STAFF WORKING DOCUMENT 
Accompanying the 
 
COMMUNICATION FROM THE COMMISSION  
TO THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT , THE COUNCIL, THE EUROPEAN 
ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL COMMI TTEE AND THE COMMITTEE OF THE 
REGIONS 
 
concerning the 
 
European Union Strategy for the Baltic Sea Region 
  
Impact Assessment Summary  
   
{COM(2009) 248 final} 
{SEC(2009) 702} 
EN 2   EN Introduction 
The European Council Presidency Conclusions of 14 December 2007 indicated that “without 
prejudice to the integrated maritime policy, th e European Council invites the Commission to 
present an EU strategy for the Baltic Sea region at the latest by June 2009. This strategy 
should inter alia help to address the urgent environmental challenges related to the Baltic 
Sea." The same Council Conclusions endorsed th e integrated Maritime Policy for the EU, 
emphasizing that "it should take particular account of the different specificities of Member States and specific maritime regions which s hould call for increased  cooperation, including 
islands, archipelagos and outermost regions as well as of the international dimension." The 
EU Strategy for the Baltic Sea Region therefore constitutes a first example of an integrated 
maritime strategy at a sea-basin level.  
The geographical area covered by  the strategy is the macro -region around the Baltic Sea. 
Overall, it concerns eight Member States (Sweden, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, 
Poland, Germany and Denmark). Three non-Member  States (Russian Federation, Norway and 
Belarus) may also have an interest in th e strategy. The Northern Dimension framework 
provides the basis for external cooperation with  third countries in the Baltic Sea region.
 
The Baltic Sea Region (BSR) is a highly heter ogenous area in economic, environmental and 
cultural terms, yet its members share many co mmon resources and dem onstrate considerable 
interdependence. This means that actions in on e area can very quickly have consequences for 
other parts or the w hole of the region.  
• The environmental challenges  identified in the region are eutrophication, marine 
biodiversity, hazardous substances, pollution from ships, climate change. There is a 
relatively solid consensus in the BSR to work collectively to address the specific problems 
of the Baltic Sea through HELCOM. However,  HELCOM suffers from weak capacity to 
implement and enforce measures. Furthermore,  many of the sectoral  interests such as 
fishing, agriculture, industry and the maritime s ector, whose activities drive the state of the 
environment, are not involved. It  is unlikely that this problem can be solved without a 
more integrated approach to the problems of the environment and a stronger political 
commitment to implement HELCOM actions. 
• The prosperity challenges are linked to in ternal market and trade with neighbouring 
countries, innovation, entrepreneurship, SMEs and human resources, ag riculture, forestry 
and fisheries. Cross border structures to ad dress challenges linked to the single market, 
innovation and labour markets are less developed than  in other areas. This reflects in part 
the strong role of the national and EU level in addressing the problems. However, for a 
number of issues, there is a strong desire by stakeholders to strengthen links across the 
region, in particular to addr ess strong differences in econo mic performance between the 
East and West. There is an argument fo r increasing cooperatio n at the level of 
implementation of EU policies, such as the internal market. 
• The accessibility and attractiveness challenges are linked to energy security, energy market 
integration and energy efficiency, internal a nd external transport li nks, attractiveness for 
citizens and tourists. In the case of energy and transport networks, whil e there are strategic 
frameworks for identifying prioritie s, there is a lack of political will to ensure that national 
decisions correspond to shared needs, accompanie d by lack of coordination at the level of 
implementation, and non-alignmen t of national and EU funds. 
EN 3   EN • The safety and security challenges have been  identified as cross border crime, maritime 
safety and security, major emergencies at sea and on land. There are many initiatives in 
this field at national, regional and EU level. However, this leads to sectoral and geographic 
fragmentation in some areas. HELCOM is resp onsible for certain issues linked to major 
maritime accidents. 
The key problem in the region is not a lack of existing initiatives or governance structures. It 
is rather the failure of largely fragmented  existing governance structures to provide a 
sufficiently robust framework in which the priority  issues of the BSR can be addressed in an 
integrated manner, which addresse s potential policy conflicts a nd trade-offs between sectors. 
Collective action must therefore provide a framework in which stakeholders can make a step change in taking the actions necessary to r ealise the region’s full economic, environmental 
and social potential. 
In the context of the Baltic Sea Strategy, no le gislative action by the Union is proposed. The 
strategy takes place exclusively within the context of existing EU legislation and relates to 
voluntary commitments undertaken by Member St ates. The strategy and action plan have 
been brought forward at the requ est of the Member States a nd third countries concerned.  
The general objective  of the strategy is therefore to ad dress macro-regional challenges faced 
by the region in order to strengthen the region 's ability to exploit its socio-economic and 
environmental potential so that it becomes a more  environmentally sustai nable and prosperous 
place, benefiting from increased accessibility and attractiveness, and ensuring higher 
standards of safety and security for its citizens.
  
The specific objective  is to develop a framework for th e individual challenges and address 
deficiencies in governance structures  to ensure that a range of st rategic actions (in the form of 
an action plan) to deal with the challenges are im plemented in the most efficient, effective and 
coherent way. To achieve this it will be ne cessary to achieve three objectives: improved 
coordination and coherence; stre ngthened institutional capability to ensure implementation of 
actions; improved visibility and accountability. 
There are many options for improving the capacity to address strategic challenges. However, 
stakeholders signalled in the public consulta tion that existing governance structures should 
remain in place. Four options have been examined: 
1. No further EU  action to enhance cooperation between countries and regions. 
2. No additional structure : The change compared with the current situation would be 
that a strategy and action plan would be established, but within the context of 
existing structures. 
3. Reliance on an existing institution . This option would entail strengthening one 
intergovernmental body to take decisions a nd coordinate the im plementation of the 
action plan. The only organisation which is sufficiently cross-sectoral and includes 
all relevant MS at the government level is the Council of the Baltic Sea States (CBSS). 
4. Community approach, General Affairs Council and Commission : This would see the 
strategy being led and implemented in line  with a normal Community approach in 
which political responsibility is taken by th e Council of Ministers, normally meeting 
EN 4   EN in the General Affairs Council, while co-o rdination, monitoring and reporting are the 
responsibility of the Commission. 
The following table summarises the advantages and disadvantages of each option based on 
their ability to deliver the specifi c objectives which were identified. 
Table 1. Evaluation of govern ance options’ effectiveness 
Governance option 
No additional structure Reliance on ex isting institution Community approach Governance 
challenge 
MS to implement Strategy 
& Action Plan Existing IGO to implement 
Strategy & Action Plan General Affairs Council (policy); 
Commission (co-ordination and 
monitoring) 
Specific objective 1: strengthened institutional capability to ensure implementation of actions 
Weak, consensual 
decision-making No improvement Non-EU membership weakens 
decision-making Improved through legitimate 
high level decision-making 
mechanism 
Lack of capability 
to enforce 
implementation No improvement No improvement, IGOs do not 
have enforcement capability Peer pressure only enforcement 
mechanism, progress measured 
against adopted action plan 
Lack of capability 
to implement 
decisions Can implement, but no 
improvement in 
coordination Not improved, CBSS does not 
have implemen ting capacity High level participation increases 
likelihood of implementation 
Specific objective 2: improved coordination and coherence 
Duplication of 
effort No improvement in 
existing approaches to 
coordination Improved, although not clear 
how organization would 
coordinate organizations 
including representation at same 
level Addressed through higher level 
coordination, responsibilities 
clarified in action plan 
Fragmentation of policies Improved as each MS 
would have same strategy 
to follow No mandate for integrated 
approach to EU action plan Addressed through higher level 
coordination, integrated 
approach identified in action plan 
No mandate to take 
decisions with 
significant impacts 
outside narrow 
focus of 
organization No improvement Addressed by assigning general 
responsibility of implementation 
of collective action to 
organization: but this would 
require change in nature. Addressed through higher level 
coordination 
Unclear responsibilities Improved: Member States 
are responsible but lack 
coordination structure Not improved – no mandate to 
effect change in other 
organisations  Addressed through identification 
of roles in action plan 
Specific objective 3: improved visibility and accountability 
Low level of accountability No improvement Problematic, as membership 
includes both EU and third 
countries for EU strategy Improved: Member States are 
responsible, however, peer 
pressure only enforcement 
mechanism, progress measured 
against adopted action plan 
Low level of visibility Improved through 
existence of strategy Improved through existence of 
strategy Improved through existence of 
strategy and higher political level 
Analysis suggests that the best option is a Community approach. It offers good scope to 
improve the quality of governance within the BS R, particularly since it provides the best 
opportunity for a monitoring. It also ensures a robust peer review process. In addition, the 
Community approach is the only approach wh ich would ensure coordi nation of policies both 
at the Community level and the level of the BSR, as the General Affairs Council has the 
advantage of being able to di scuss both issues related to the BSR and Community issues. 
Therefore this approach would be the only one which is able to fully address issues (e.g. 
agriculture and fisheries) where there is signi ficant Community competence in an integrated 
manner while maintaining coherence with EU po licies. This option would also ensure close 
EN 5   EN coordination with the Northern Dimension, and would not require prior coordination on the 
EU position outside the strategy as in the other options.  
The additional resources require d will depend on the ambition of the strategy. At a first level, 
the strategy will require a capacity to involve stakeholders in  the delivery of the strategy. At a 
second level, it will require a small secretar iat capable of producing annual reports on the 
basis of a meta-monitoring and managing high le vel working groups to prepare assessments 
of progress. This would only be possible by using an exis ting BSR institution or in a 
community approach. At a third level, a more de veloped secretariat would be able to maintain 
contact with EU institutions to ensure an inte grated and coherent approach to EU policies, 
particularly those areas where there is a strong EU competence.  This would only be possible 
within the context of a community approach.  
Overall it is expected that benefits will accrue fr om an integrated approach to the challenges 
faced by the BSR from stronger cooperation and common learning. An integrated approach is 
expected to increase coherence among policies in the region, and cont ribute towards the 
general objective. An increase in overall effici ency is expected through increased coherence, 
addressing fragmentation and dupli cation of efforts. In genera l it is expected that the 
administrative costs of additiona l coordination will be small compared to existing levels of 
administrative activity. No additional legi slation is proposed, no additional reporting 
requirement is put forward and no additiona l decision-making mechanism is introduced.  
In its implementation, it will be important to  ensure that the strategy does not lead to 
increased organisational complex ity. In this respect, the involvement of the EU level through 
its institutions, and in particular the Council and the Commission can play an important role 
in disciplining and structuring the implementation of the action plan, to ensure consistency 
with Community policies and avoid fragmentation of initiatives. 
There should be an opportunity to update the stra tegy regularly in light of the effectiveness 
and efficiency of the governance structure in delivering collective action, and in light of the 
adequacy of the targets. The inclusion of a sunset clause in the strategy could provide 
incentives for countries and stakeholders  to implement and further develop it.