Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2011-09-28-Speech-3-423-000"
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"en.20110928.23.3-423-000"2
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"Mr President, thank you very much for Parliament’s expression of active support and for your useful written input on Rio.
As I have heard this debate, there is clearly a very strong resonance with our Communication and the position we are developing in the Commission with the Council, so thank you for that. We are looking forward to continued cooperation on the very long way to achieve what we want in Rio. We must work together now to get a strong EU position for our input into the UN system which should harness and express our common ambitions for Rio, and I think we are well on track to meet that.
I will make a few comments on everything that has been said. First, Mrs Merkies said we need specific goals. The Commission very much agrees with that. That is why we will try to come up with tangible proposals for specific goals when it comes to water, energy, the oceans, sustainable agriculture and forestry. We will really try to make very tangible proposals.
The other question from Mrs Merkies was how we are going to do it. There, I think we have something to offer in the European Union, because we have very good examples that pricing works and we have very good examples that setting targets works. I would also say that with the Millennium Development Goals, although they are not perfect, the world has seen that setting such goals helps to keep a lot of governments focused on what they need to deliver: access to water, access to education and so on. They have not been perfect and they have not been fully fulfilled, but the world has basically moved in the right direction, so that is why we should continue along this way. When the Millennium Development Goals were set, it was in a world that did not speak too much of environmental goals and not too much of energy goals and that is why we need to get that into the Rio+20.
Mr Stevenson was in favour of moving to a green economy provided that it cost nothing. This is not doable. It is true that to make the transformation into a green economy will demand investments. I think that it is very important to emphasise that to continue business as usual also comes at a very high price. We heard some of it here today: the depletion of fishing stocks, for instance, forestry, nature or raw materials. It is a misunderstanding in the debate that if we simply continued business as usual then it would cost us nothing. What we are talking about is whether we want to invest in business as usual – and then clean up afterwards and pay the very high price – or we want to choose a wiser development strategy and get the growth we need for the nine billion that have been mentioned many times. As long as we still have this choice, I think it is very important that the European Union is trying to push the world in the right direction.
That leads me to my third and last point. I agree with Mr Gerbrandy who spoke about the issue of whether to be sustainable or not. But then the question of course is whether the EU should then influence these kinds of global conferences, and I understood that the answer from Mr Clark would be no. I must say I disagree strongly. I think that we have a very fine track record in Europe over many years, that we can actually try to push the world in a better direction by our very strong involvement. I think we should try to do that also for Rio+20.
The world is at a very important crossroads and I think the world would be poorer if we were not investing our energy and our policies in trying to use influence here. That is what we should do, and I look forward very much to working with Mr Leinen and the rest of Parliament to get a strong and united EU position on our way to Rio – hopefully to achieve not just a lot of words and fine declarations, but things and recommendations that can lead to immediate action moving the world into a more sustainable place."@en1
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