31. 12. 90 Official Journal of the European Communities No C 332/23 
Opinion on the proposal for a Council Decision adopting a specific research and technological 
development (R&TD) programme in the field of the environment (1990-1994) 
(90/C 332/04) 
On 6 June 1990 the Council decided to consult the Economic and Social Committee under 
Article 130Q(2) of the Treaty establishing the European Economic Community, on the 
abovementioned proposal. 
The Section for Protection of the Environnement, Public Health and Consumer Affairs, 
which was responsible for preparing the Committee's work on the subject, adopted its 
Opinion on 4 September 1990 (Rapporteur: Mr Vercellino). 
At its 279th plenary session (meeting of 19 September 1990), the Economic and Social 
Committee adopted the following Opinion. 
1. Introduction 
1.1. The proposed five-year programme is part of 
the third research and development (R&D) framework 
programme (*) and will complement the STEP (environ­
mental protection) and EPOCH (climatology and natu­
ral hazards) programmes which are running from 1989 
to 1992, with budgets of ECU 75 million and ECU 40 
million respectively. 
1.2. The new programme, which restructures STEP 
and EPOCH and introduces new research lines, will 
have a much larger budget totalling ECU 414 million, 
of wich ECU 154 million are to be spent on Joint 
Research Center (JRC) activities and ECU 2,6 million 
on the centralized dissemination and exploitation of 
results. This will leave ECU 257,4 million for specific 
research projects. 
2. General comments 
2.1. The Committee has examined the draft pro­
gramme closely and with great interest, evaluating its 
lay-out, research proposals and priorities in the light 
of: 
— the new developments and growing problems which 
have emerged in this field since the STEP and 
EPOCH programmes were formulated (the present 
programme is in effect an updated and more 
ambitious continuation of the two), 
— the conclusions, new commitments and time sched­
ules drawn up at the second Conference on the 
Montreal Protocol held in London recently, and in 
anticipation of the forthcoming conference on glo­
bal climatic change, to be held before the end of 
1992, 
(*) Council Decision of 23 April 1990, OJ No L 117, 8. 5. 1990. — the Community's growing commitment to environ­
mental issues, demonstrated, for instance by its 
intention to set up a European Environmental Agen­
cy in the near future, 
— the impact of the Single European Market on the 
Community environment (2), 
— the alarming state of the environment in East Euro­
pean countries, according to initial reports. 
2.2. Against this background the Committee rates 
the new programme very highly and fully supports its 
lines of research and objectives, subject to the following 
comments and suggestions. 
2.3. The Committee particularly welcomes the inno­
vative use of applied research to ensure swift and effec­
tive preventive and remedial action which is rigorously 
programmed, but which does not underestimate or 
neglect national problems and measures or the concerns 
of economic and social inrerest groups. 
2.4. The Committee also congratulates the Com­
mission for taking full account of the standards and 
codes of practice which have evolved both in Europe 
(at the Bergen Conference, also attended by representa­
tives of employers, unions, environmental non-gou-
vernmental organizations (NGO), scientists and youth 
associations) and internationally (at the international 
conference in London): 
— We can and must join forces to combat environmen­
tal problems. 
(2) See the own-initiative Opinion currently being drawn up 
by the Committee on environmental policy and the Single 
European Market (CES 325/90 fin.). 
No C 332/24 Official Journal of the European Communities 31. 12. 90 
— International action on a much wider scale is needed 
to ensure that our common environment is not 
endangered. 
— Lack of certainty is no excuse for lack of action: 
when scientists are not one hundred per cent certain, 
action should be taken on the basis of a responsible 
evaluation of the best data available. 
— The industrialized countries should assist develop­
ing countries in acquiring and implementing the 
technology needed to ensure that past mistakes do 
not recur. 
— A multilateral fund could be set up to finance the 
transfer of 'human-friendly' technologies to the 
third world over the next three years. 
2.5. Finally, the Committee endorses the rationale 
and lay-out of the programme because its objectives, 
structures and implementing instruments take on board 
virtually all the recommendations made by the Commit­
tee and the European Parliament when the STEP and 
EPOCH programmes were introduced. 
2.6. In its Opinion on the two programmesC1), the 
Committee recommended that they be closely coordi­
nated by means of a joint committee, deplored the 
meagre resources allocated and insisted that funding be 
increased under the next programme. 
3. Main features of the new programme 
3.1. The new programme is not just a rehash of 
previous programmes: it is innovative, covers much 
more ground and is much better funded; it provides for 
coordination at Community. European and inter­
national level; its research proposals are practical and 
geared to protecting the environment and improving 
the quality of life. 
3.2. The Committee is pleased to note that the Com­
mission has responded to the three requests it made in 
its above Opinion for: 
— a significant increase in research and preventive 
measures to protect the environment, 
— greater Community participation in, and a swifter 
response to, international programmes and action 
on the environment, including the Global Change 
programme, designed to study the multiple changes in the environment and how they interact, and to 
take prompt action to bring these changes under 
control, 
— to strengthen the competitiveness of Community 
firms in the international marketplace. 
3.3. The other major innovation welcomed by the 
Committee in the introduction of a new research area, 
namely the economic and social aspects of environmen­
tal issues. The Committee, which represents the Com­
munity's economic and social interest groups, has been 
asking the Commission to promote such research for 
quite some time. 
3.4. In its Opinions on the STEP and EPOCH pro­
grammes and on the framework programme (2), (point 
4), the Committee emphasized the need to incorporate 
social research not in the final stages of the programmes 
and in the evaluation, but from the very start, when 
drawing up individual programmes and assigning pri­
orities to the various research topics. 
4. Comments on the four main research areas 
4.1. The Committee approves of the way in which 
the programme focusses on a series of highly relevant 
objectives for enhancing the quality of life, taking 
account of the various risk factors and introducing 
instruments for preventive and remedial action. The 
nature and transfrontalier impact of the greenhouse 
effect, rising sea-levels, desertification and the destruc­
tion of forests, particularly tropical forests, are issues 
of international public concern ans require the closest 
possible coordination of the research undertaken by 
individual countries so as to concentrate resources and 
avoid duplication. 
4.2. The Committee's main general criticism, which 
applies to all four research areas, but particularly to 
the fourth one (integrated research projects), is that the 
objectives for immediate or priority action are not 
defined in sufficient detail. 
This is particularly the case as regards: 
— health-related objectives and action in response to 
environmental and climatic change, 
(!) OJ No C 139, 5. 6. 1989. (2) OJ No C S6, 7. 3. 1990. 
31. 12. 90 Official Journal of the European Communities No C 332/25 
— research priorities (these topics should not be the 
exclusive domain of the fourth research area) with 
regard to chemicals which are either in use or which 
are to be substituted. 
4.3. The Committee also notes that no provision is 
made for research (which is admittedly costly) into 
another vital area: possible increases in the incidence 
ans spread of diseases and viruses as a result of sudden 
or prolonged environmental and climatic change, such 
as drought ant the greenhouse effect. 
The Committee therefore recommends drawing up a 
series of urgent objectives and allocating the necessary 
financial resources so that research can commence as 
soon as possible, starting with the worst-affected 
regions. 
4.4. The first research area, 'participation in global 
change programmes', incorporates elements from the 
STEP programme and the various climatology pro­
gramme. Its main research lines are: natural and man-
made climatic change, climate change impacts, strato­
spheric ozone, tropospheric physics and chemistry, 
biogeochemical cycles and ecosystem dynamics. 
4.5. The Commission correctly proposes allocating 
the highest proportion of funding (35-45%) to this 
research area on the grounds that research into the 
interaction between human activities and the natural 
environment is a top priotity, and the Community can 
play an important international role here. 
4.6. The aim of the second research area, 'technol­
ogies and engineering for the future', is to stimulate 
technological innovation at pre-competitive level and 
provide a back-up for the activities of the future Euro­
pean Environmental Agency. Research should be prop­
erly targetted, with priority going to projects which 
developed new technologies making for a favourable 
environmental equilibrium. 
4.7. The second area includes a field previously 
covered by the STEP programme, 'protection and con­
servation of the European cultural heritage', where 
the aim is to quantify the causes and mechanisms of 
deterioration of monuments and to develop new 
methods and programmmes of condition assessment, 
treatment and restoration. 
4.8. The second area (to receive between 20% ans 
25 % of resources) is the most directly concerned with 
technological and industrial applications and the devel­
opment of techniques for evaluating and monitoring 
the activities of the future European Environmental 
Agency. The provision for coordination with the 
EUREKA programme is therefore appropriate here. 
4.9. The Committee has already endorsed the third research area ('economic and social aspects of environ­
mental issues'), which is to receive 5-10%of resources. 
4.10 The Committee would reiterate that the econ­
omic and social groups concerned should participate 
fully in deciding on specific lines of action and the 
ground to be covered, particularly at the stage when 
Community environment acquires economic and fiscal 
powers, in addition to regulatory ones. 
4.11. Environment policy cannot be fully integrated 
without reference to issues which are prominent on 
today's agenda, such as how to incorporate environ­
mental parameters into economic methodology, cost-
risk-benefit analysis and the concept of 'sustainable 
development'. Research into procedures and methods 
of evaluating environmental impact is also essential, 
as this is a key component of environment-friendly 
development. 
4.12. Whilst the transnational, interdisciplinary 
approach of the fourth research area ('integrated 
research projects') is to be welcomed, it has to ne 
pointed out that it embraces, without any indication of 
priority or interface, a number of extremely important 
programmes which are already in progress, including 
the programmes on natural hazards, technological haz­
ards and desertification in the Mediterranean area. 
4.13. Research priorities need to be better defined 
and ranked, in the light of experience, particularly 
now that the Community is introducing environment 
instruments at regional level, such as ENVIREG and 
MEDSPA, which could put research findings to good 
use. 
4.14. Consideration should be given to the possibility 
of including the two polar subprogrammes (drilling of 
deep ice cores and the arctic campaigns to measures the 
ozone layer) in the fourth research area, transferring 
their budget appropriations. 
5. Detailed comments on coordination, procedures and 
financing 
5.1. The Committee sees that the procedural and 
other arrangements laid down in the proposal have 
been inspired by the new organizational philosophy of 
the third framework programme and are basically the 
same for all the specific programmes in the various 
No C 332/26 Official Journal of the European Communities 31. 12. 90 
research areas. The Committee would refer back to the 
general comments in its Opinion on the framework 
programme, particularly as regards the danger of 
efficiency and duplication in research as a result of 
new programmes overlapping with existing ones. The 
Commission must ensure that the transition phase is 
well-coordinated and that results are carefully evalu­
ated. 
5.2 As it has said on a number of occasions, the 
Committee would like to be involved in the evaluation 
of programme results and to be specifically referred to 
in Article 5 as one of the recipients of the report on 
results. 
5.3. As regards the level of funding, the Committee 
notes that resources to be spent directly on the JRC 
ans on the centralized dissemination and exploitation 
of results must first be subtracted from the total amount 
Done at Brussels, 19 September 1990. available for research. The Committee has consistently 
stressed the importance of better acces to and dissemi­
nation of results, and wonders whether centralizing 
resources is the best way of achieving this: it might be 
better for the programme to earmark funds specifically 
to produce more detailled, up-to-date information. The 
'accompanying measures' set out in Annex III could 
perhaps be used for this purpose, but the exact amount 
would need to be specified. The same applies to training 
schemes, which are not allocated a separate heading. 
5.4. With respect to the 'exceptional procedures' 
introduced by the new framework programme in the 
light of experience in other countries, the Committee 
welcomes this element of elasticity, making the pro­
gramme readily adaptable to new developments in 
research, but at the same time would point out that the 
new programme and its mechanisms must be used 
with externe care and transparency, and require sound 
management and proper monitoring. 
The Chairman 
of the Economic and Social Committee 
Alberto MASPRONE