Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2006-06-14-Speech-3-178"
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"en.20060614.16.3-178"2
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"Mr President, what we are debating today, then, is the review of the Sustainable Development Strategy, an extremely important document from the European Council’s meeting in Gothenburg five years ago. We should have liked to have seen a more comprehensive review and, above all, a report by the Commission noting what has really been achieved during the last few years. We should also have liked to have seen more ambitious long-term goals specifically set out.
The truth is, of course, that, in many areas, we have not made any clear progress in comparison with how matters stood in 2001. Biodiversity continues to be impoverished and climate-affecting emissions are still increasing in the majority of Member States. We have social divisions, migratory pressure at our borders and an array of problems in the field of health, for example resistance to antibiotics. These are all things that we must, of course, get to grips with in a way that takes account of the long term.
I wish to thank the Austrian Presidency for having involved MEPs in a meaningful way. Horizontal in nature, this is a difficult issue to deal with, and it has to be asked whether we are sufficiently well organised, both in government offices and in the Commission and the European Parliament. We are organised on a vertical and sectoral basis, but this is a horizontal problem. We should reflect on this in the long term.
One of the main issues in this connection is the relationship between the Sustainable Development Strategy and the Lisbon Strategy. Certain MEPs wish to combine these strategies in the long run. What is important right now, of course, is to bring about the best possible coordination and for we MEPs to be involved in the process. We think that the Sustainable Development Strategy should not, in the first place, be seen as an obstacle to, or problem for, growth and development but, rather, as an opportunity. The world is crying out for intelligent solutions to, for example, our energy and transport problems. This should be made a main issue in the Lisbon process.
A big advantage of the Commission’s new proposals is that the international dimension is now included. We see the EU leaving an ever bigger ecological footprint on the world, a state of affairs that we must, of course, do something about. It also requires that progress in society be measured in a different way in the future. We cannot only look at GDP growth, but must also consider a range of other factors. Another logical consequence of the international perspective is, of course, that we must let the sustainability dimension influence our development aid very much more than we have allowed it to do so far.
Finally, I wish to emphasise the importance of research issues. I have a number of questions for both the Commission and the Council. How do you wish to strengthen coordination between the Sustainable Development Strategy and the Lisbon Strategy and, above all, how do you wish to ensure that there is more encouragement for the environmental technology industry and for innovations in this area? How does the Commission wish to ensure that the sustainability aspects are better reflected in the budget than they are at present, especially in the aid budget?
Finally, we must get to grips with the problem of the EU’s increased ecological footprint. Are you considering integrated measures of some kind to tackle this issue?"@en1
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