Debate: Nature restoration
Date: TUESDAY, 11 JULY 2023
Speaker: Virginijus Sinkevičius
Language: EN

Honourable Members, in the past weeks, we have seen an intense debate on our proposal because the questions they are complex, because these issues are crucial for our collective future and because the stakes are high. Proof of this is the unprecedented mobilisation for this law from citizens and in particular, the youth with around 1 million signatures collected in support of the law from hundreds of businesses in renewable energy, food and other sectors, including some of Europe’s biggest corporations. From farmers and foresters concerned about the impacts of biodiversity on their land and production. From over 6000 scientists from civil society organisations across the EU as well as from international organisations such as IUCN and UNEP. That debate showed very clearly that there is very broad consensus that we need to restore nature and that we can constructively discuss and find solutions on how.  The consequences of the climate and biodiversity crisis are becoming increasingly visible also here in the European Union. They already affect nearly every citizen and every sector of the economy, and they are among the biggest threats to the long term resilience of Europe’s food security. In order to ensure the long term food security and resilience of our farmlands, forests, our seas, we must improve their biodiversity conditions. And some of these ecosystems are already severely threatened by the growing impacts of climate change in almost all parts of Europe. With drought fires degraded soils that risk food production and livelihoods, especially in rural areas. Science is crystal clear. Far too much of Europe’s nature has now been degraded or destroyed, so it’s vital to reverse that trend. And time is running out. Some 80 % of EU habitat types are now in bad or poor condition. Half of the global GDP depends on nature, and 75 % of our crops depend on pollination. The European Central Bank found that 72 % of the euro area firms, about 3 million, are highly exposed to nature related services, such as timber, clean water, pollination, sand or healthy soils, and depended on at least one of them, sometimes more. 75 % of bank loans are to firms that depend on ecosystem services, so financial institutions are clearly exposed as well. The unsustainable use of natural resources already costs thousands of lives and billions of euros. Between 1980 and 2021, weather and climate related damages amounted to an estimated EUR 560 billion and the severe droughts experienced in the EU in August last year led to losses in agricultural production, averaging between 5 and 10 % for crops like grain, maize, sunflower and soybeans.  Droughts, floods and forest fires have become part of new reality. While they are driven by climate change, the degradation of ecosystems and their weakened resilience due to biodiversity loss accelerates and intensifies the impacts of these events. These are figures. But even more important are the people behind these figures. Reversing this trend by restoring degraded nature must therefore be our shared responsibility.  It’s my sincere hope that the openness shown by the Commission with the non-paper, that the Council’s general approach, as well as the proposal presented last week by the Commission to complete the nature pillar of the European Green Deal, that all these elements can facilitate today’s discussion, that they reassure those who felt that the Commission’s initial position was too far reaching and they remain still convinced to those who would have expected even higher ambition for the nature restoration.  The Green Deal is a highly pragmatic approach to solving the climate and biodiversity crisis. Climate solutions without nature solutions are half measures. Let me give you a couple of examples. Making soils healthy, it’s not good just for farmers, foresters and habitat. It’s also essential for ensuring the soils can store carbon. Carbon rich soils, in turn, store water and mitigate the consequences of flash storms. Dead soils do none of that. Boosting innovation. New business models like carbon farming and promotion of technological developments, such as for new genomic techniques, are key parts of the Commission’s nature package. All proposals are interlinked and actually strengthen each other. They all contribute and assist to achieve the goals of the other proposals on the table with the Nature Restoration Law in the centre. The more we do on nature, the less tough we will have to be on climate action. Nature is our best ally in fighting climate change, and if we don’t take proper measures to let it thrive, we will be ditching our best chance to achieve climate neutrality.  Honourable members, citizens, businesses, scientists, farmers, foresters, cities, our international partners, they all expect us to act to address the climate-related challenges they face, which are aggravated by the bad and deteriorating state of our natural ecosystems. This very Parliament in June 2021 called for a strong Nature Restoration Law, including binding targets. And together with the Council, Parliament and the Commission signed a declaration only six months ago on 22 December 2022, confirming that nature restoration was a joint priority for 2023. Today I am reconfirming to this House that the Commission remains 100 % committed to turn this proposal into law, to showing the necessary flexibility and to supporting the co-legislators in their search for compromise. The Council has already engaged in this process and I am convinced that with a constructive approach, a compromise is possible also within this House. In order to uphold the European Union’s international commitments under both the Paris Agreement and the Montreal Biodiversity Framework to ensure a transition to sustainable economy and deliver on the EU climate law and adapt to climate change. We need to urgently restore and strengthen the resilience of natural ecosystems across the EU.  I know that many of you share this urgency. I therefore trust. That you will seize this opportunity and take responsibility to engage constructively so that tomorrow this House can adopt a mandate for trialogue negotiations, which would also allow us to reach a final agreement on the proposal in time for Cop 28 and the next biodiversity Cop 16, and to see the entry into force of the nature restoration law before the end of this political term.  This is not about restoring nature for the sake of nature. It’s about ensuring a habitable environment where the well-being of current and future generations is ensured, where the land and seas continue having the capacity to provide us the goods and services that our lives and our economy fully depend on. It is about our lives. It’s about us and those who come after us.