Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2007-01-31-Speech-3-181"
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"en.20070131.22.3-181"2
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".
Mr President, I would very much like to welcome Parliament’s report in response to our Green Paper and of course to congratulate Mrs Ries for her excellent work. I can easily say that I agree with her approach taken in the report and especially of course the underlining of the need to place public health at the centre of considerations right across Europe.
The challenge for all of us is to make this happen. We are talking here about a big challenge because we are referring to changes of lifestyle and that is not always an easy task. It is a long-term and constant effort and we have to insist and persist on this. It is a complex problem which requires complex solutions. The Commission did not follow the blame game because, in reality, we are all to blame for this. We saw the problem creeping up but we tended to ignore it; we always thought it was more of a problem for North America and we were ignoring the fact that it was becoming a European problem. So we all have responsibility and therefore we all have to contribute to its solution.
This issue is very high on our agenda, and I can repeat here once again that obesity could easily be the most serious health threat for the European Union for the 21st century. There is no need to analyse the problems and the health concerns and harm that arise out of obesity. Even more worrying is the rising prevalence of obesity among children. The figures are really worrying: 40 million children today, increasing by 400 000 a year. This is really something of concern.
The Commission will adopt a White Paper this coming month. In developing and drafting this paper – I can call it a strategy – we will take the ideas and the views raised in the report seriously into account.
For us, this approach will follow a combination of self-regulatory, voluntary and – why not? – some regulatory measures as well. In relation to regulation, I could easily refer to health claims or the review on food labelling that will be coming out soon, this year most probably. But of course we have the platform, you are aware of that, where we have concrete commitments on the part of the stakeholders. These are commitments that have to be verifiable and monitored and independent in an objective way. We will soon be issuing the second monitoring report from the platform.
The report touches on many issues and many topics with which we agree, such as food reformulation, incentive schemes for self-regulation and the very sensitive issue of the advertising of foods to children. The truth is, until now we have been concentrating very much on the intake of food, on nutrition. We now aim to put more emphasis on the physical activity part, which is also a serious concern for European citizens. Member States also have a great responsibility here and I would like to highlight the reference in the report to sports in schools. This is a very important factor. It is embarrassing for me to say that in the European Union there is not enough physical activity in schools among children and teenagers. The big challenge is not only to bring it back but to make it fun again. This is an important factor. I can very briefly refer to a parent who was complaining to me that his son comes back home from school and plays basketball on the computer and does not play the real game outside in the schoolyard. This is the reality. So your reference to video games is very important, but we also have to use a more scientific, a more advanced, a more modern approach to bring fun back to physical exercise so that schoolchildren and teenagers exercise for fun. Sport should not just be for athletes and competitors, but for everybody.
We have already referred to the reform of the common organisation of the markets in fruit and vegetables. We intend to promote the consumption of fruit and vegetables. This is a very important aspect, but we will also continue working on the aspect of affordability as well, because unfortunately nowadays healthy food is much more expensive than what we have come to know as junk food.
I would like to finish here and thank the rapporteur again for her excellent work. I assure you that we will take Parliament’s views very seriously into account when we are drafting our strategy over the next few months."@en1
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