Eurocommissaris Dimas toetst Roemeense milieuwetgeving aan Europese normen (en)

European Institute of Romania

Romania, 11 April 2006

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Thank you very much for inviting me to speak to you today about Challenges in the Environmental Sphere. I am particularly happy to be here to address you at this important time in Romania's preparations for membership of the EU.

I would like to address three issues today:

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  The remaining environmental challenges for Romania as it prepares for EU accession;
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  The need for Romania to look beyond accession by preparing now for the ongoing requirements of membership;

and

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  The global environmental threats we will need to tackle in the years ahead with Romania's help as an EU member.

As you know, on 16 May the European Commission is due to publish its new Monitoring Report on the progress Romania and Bulgaria have made towards accession.

Since the reports are still under preparation I cannot prejudge their findings. However, I would like to emphasise that it is our firm belief that Romania is continuing to make progress and has shown determination to undertake the remaining reforms that are needed.

As Commissioner for Environment, I have to say that I am very much looking forward to Romania's accession, not least because your natural assets will enrich the EU's environmental capital immensely.

For instance, with Romania's membership the bear population of the EU will roughly double, and the numbers of other large carnivores like the wolf and lynx will also substantially increase. The EU's biological diversity will also be expanded with the addition of two new biogeographic regions, the Black Sea and the Steppic regions, to the seven regions we already have.

I very much welcome the fact that Romania has speeded up its work to identify the sites that will become part of our Natura 2000 network of protected areas. However, I would point out that there really is a need to mobilise all possible resources in order for Romania to meet its commitment of completing this task by the time of accession. This is a massive exercise that other Member States have not found easy.

Let me make clear at this point that I do not for one moment underestimate the challenge - in terms of cost and of administrative effort - of incorporating EU environment law into national legislation. The same goes for the very important task of integrating environmental considerations into other policy areas. I recognise that these are major undertakings involving many different pieces of legislation and thousands of pages of legal texts.

Romania has made real progress over the past year, especially in terms of putting in place the necessary administrative arrangements. As regards Industrial Pollution Prevention and Control which has been highlighted as one of the 14 most problematic areas in last year's Commission report, major efforts have been undertaken to involve industrial operators and raise their awareness of their new obligations. I very much welcome this, but of course this momentum needs to be maintained.

In some other areas, however, more progress is urgently required to prepare for accession. This is not just a dry legalistic requirement: the practical effect of such progress is a cleaner and healthier environment for the people of Romania. This is one of the many benefits of EU enlargement.

Let me just mention two areas where further advances need to be made.

Work must continue on establishing the rules to ensure open and transparent decision-making on environmental matters, in line with the Aarhus Convention and our directives on environmental impact assessment.

And improvements are needed in waste management. I am thinking in particular of overall strategic planning, clarification of the responsibilities of different authorities, the finalisation of regional waste management plans and proper enforcement of legislation.

Putting in place a well functioning national infrastructure for waste management, or for clean drinking water, or for waste water treatment, requires heavy investment that will have to be spread over a period of time.

This leads me to my second point. Though accession will be a historic milestone marking the end of a long process of preparation, it will also mark the beginning of a new era: when Romania is expected to maintain compliance with its EU obligations on an ongoing basis.

This means, for instance, that where Romania has negotiated extra time to implement some of the most costly environmental legislation, it needs to be sure of completing in good time the investments needed to meet those extended deadlines.

So my message is a very simple one: the time for Romania to start planning and implementing this investment programme is now. The deadline of 2018 for bringing your urban waste water treatment up to the EU standards, for example, may seem a long way off but it would be dangerous to underestimate the scale of this challenge.

So I would respectfully urge the Romanian authorities to give serious consideration as soon as possible to evaluating the investment that will be required in all areas of the environment, in order to reach full compliance by the agreed deadlines.

It seems to me that what is needed is an investment strategy that is comprehensive and realistic. It must address the allocation of national resources, private sector involvement and cooperation with international financial institutions.

The EU's structural and cohesion funds will of course be a major source of financing for these investments. A strategic view therefore needs to be taken on where to use EU funding and where other financing sources would be more appropriate.

Of course, ensuring that implementation deadlines for certain directives are met by the time the agreed transition periods expire is only one of the many obligations of EU membership.

It is also vital that accession countries continue on a day-to-day basis to build up their administrative capacity even after they become EU members. Achieving and maintaining compliance with the body of EU environmental law requires an ongoing effort backed up by adequate human and financial resources. It cannot be taken for granted.

Unfortunately it is too often the case that the Commission has to resort to legal action to remind Member States of this!

The reason the European Union takes environmental issues so seriously is quite simply that the world faces very serious environmental challenges with major implications for the prosperity and stability of our societies in the future. We - and Romania as a prospective EU member - have to 'think big' if we are to tackle these effectively.

The two greatest threats are without doubt climate change and the continuing loss of biological diversity - that is, the variety of species and habitats that make up the complex web of life that sustains us.

Climate change is already beginning to change the face of our world. Mountain glaciers and polar ice are melting, heralding higher sea levels that threaten hundreds of millions of people living in coastal areas. The ski resorts in the Carpathians will be affected sooner or later, like those elsewhere.

Extreme weather is becoming more frequent, and the damage it causes is becoming more costly. Increasing drought and water shortages in some parts of the world are reducing food harvests. At the same time floods, which hit Romania so hard last year and which have caused death and destruction in other parts of central Europe over this past week, are predicted to become more common as the world gets warmer. Last year Romania was one of the recipients of European civil protection assistance - a gesture of solidarity among partners. It is by working together that we can face such. climatic challenges.

The EU is convinced there is still time to win the battle against climate change if the international community agrees to take serious action to limit and then reduce global emissions of greenhouse gases. These crucial discussions on what should follow the Kyoto Protocol when it expires in 2012 will start next month in Bonn. Romania has long supported EU positions on climate change and we appreciate that.

Climate change is increasingly capturing the attention of the media and the public but the rapid loss of biological diversity across the world is no less serious a threat.

The ongoing destruction of habitats and species is steadily weakening the intricate web of life on which we all depend. We are in danger of undermining the Earth's life support systems to the point where one day they could collapse, with untold consequences for future generations.

Tackling this challenge was at the centre of our discussions at the conference of parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity last month in Brazil. The EU, for its part, is committed to halting the loss of biodiversity within its frontiers by 2010, and next month I hope to present an action plan setting out how we can reach this target.

I am glad to say that Romania is also committed to this target, since it was endorsed by all European ministers of environment at their meeting in Kiev in 2003.

Ladies and gentlemen, we face daunting environmental challenges that can only be overcome if countries work together, regionally and globally.

The EU has proved a highly effective framework for cooperation on the environment for more than 30 years, with the result that environment policy is one of the most popular EU policies with European citizens. Cooperation with Romania on the environment is already good and Romania's accession will further strengthen it.

Your country has already come a long way in implementing the requirements of EU environmental legislation. There is still some way to go and some big challenges ahead. But we have seen a willingness to change and a determination to succeed, and I congratulate you on that. This is very encouraging for the future.

I look forward to working with Romania in the near future - no longer as an accession country but as a full Member State of the European Union.

Thank you.