Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2012-05-23-Speech-3-420-000"
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"en.20120523.21.3-420-000"2
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"Mr President, Mr Gerbrandy, thank you for the report. I have examined a number of annual reports of various multinationals. AkzoNobel, a large multinational, states in its annual report that the higher price of commodities has cost them EUR 1 billion in profits. Thus, EUR 1 billion less profit due to higher commodity prices. In DSM’s annual report, the company states explicitly that one of the big problems it is facing is the rising cost of raw materials and the higher prices, which they have been able to pass on to consumers so far, is also a major problem for DSM. Unilever’s annual report is the same: higher commodity prices last year cost them EUR 2.5 billion in profits. This is another multinational indicating that the challenge of the future is: how are we going to deal with the increasing scarcity of our natural resources?
That is the agenda. It is not only a green agenda, it is also an economic agenda. Does this then mean that companies are very busy working on it at the moment? Research shows that in the Netherlands, only one in five companies are working on a strategy on how to deal with higher raw material prices. Only one in five! To put it simply, companies are still too unaware of the need to really start looking properly at how we deal with our natural resources. That is the bottom line.
With this in mind, we welcome the Commission’s programme, which addresses the appropriate issues: but how do we tackle this challenge? By shifting the burden from labour to raw materials, by looking at the question of whether we are able to set tax levels properly, by implementing existing regulations, for example, the Waste Directive, by integrating this agenda into other policy areas, such as the agricultural policy that we have in Europe, and by working on good targets and indicators. We have good policies and a good agenda, but this is now coming down to really taking action. Action is going to be of crucial importance right now.
This green, more efficient economy could be the way out of the current economic crisis, but then we really need to take it seriously. How are we going to look at the waste sector, for example? That will be crucial. How are we going to look at our agricultural policy? The efficient handling of nutrients such as phosphate is not included in agricultural reform at the moment. This is a great disadvantage in the current situation. We are now going to have to look at this issue because ultimately, what matters is that we make efficient use of our resources, because that is our future green economy. And that is the only economy we, as Europe, should head towards."@en1
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