EU puts money over environment: Campaigners

Brussels, Apr 28: The European Union remains too focused on the costs of protecting the environment despite sending strong signals on its plans to fight climate change, environmental groups said.

Ten organisations, including Greenpeace and WWF, presented a report on the European Commission's environment strategy rating the EU executive just 4.3 out of 10.

''The general picture is poor performance,'' John Hontelez, secretary general of the European Environmental Bureau, a group of European environmental organisations, said yesterday.

''(The Commission) still sees environmental issues at first as a problem for the economy, a problem for competitiveness, and only when it leads to direct efficiency gains ... then the Commission is prepared to act,'' he said.

The EU's 27 governments in March backed a plan by the Commission to cut greenhouse gas emissions by at least 20 percent by 2020 compared with 1990 levels, for which it received praise from the groups.

''It's an extremely important international signal the Commission has triggered, that the EU is going forward with further reductions,'' said Matthias Duwe, director of Climate Action Network Europe comprising environmental groups.

The EU executive received a score of 7 for its strategy on climate change. But it fared very poorly in the groups' assessment of its record on marine protection and forest management, where it scored 2 on both counts.

The Commission failed to prevent destructive fishing and there have been no effective moves to stop illegal timber from tropical rainforests reaching the EU, the groups said.

''The Commission's rhetoric is much greener than its actions.

Its actions have been influenced by the principle that if it is good for the environment it cannot be good for the economy,'' said Jorgo Riss, Greenpeace's European unit director.

Reuters>