The European Community environmental
policy in the context of ‘sustainable development’

Environmental problems are actual problems of European continent. An ecological situation is very complicated there. It requires the necessity of cooperation between different countries in this area, a creation of special international mechanisms of protection, an intensification of activities of international organizations in this field. One of such organizations is the European Community (EC). An experience of environmental activity of this organization is of interest to Russia, because the EC is our neighbour and we have common ecological problems such as air, marine, soil, nuclear pollution, as well as protecting wild flora and fauna.

The European Community was founded on the Rome Treaty in 1957 as a regional international economic organization. In 1992, the EC joined the European Union (EU), according to the Maastricht Treaty. Today, the EC unites fifteen Member States – fifteen european industrialized countries, which economic activities are exerting serious impact on regional and global environment. The Community has been pursuing the environmental policy for 30 years, since 1972. In 1997, the Amsterdam Treaty gave a new wording of Community’s environmental policy, its aims and principles of its. Today, the environmental aims of the European Community and the European Union are:

-         high level of environmental protection;

-         improvement of environmental quality;

-         achievement of sustainable development.

These aims connect EU environmental actions with a global protection. The “sustainable development” is an official environmental concept of the United Nations. The definition of the sustainable development was given in the report of the World Commission on Environment and Development (so-called the “Brundland Commission”) “Our common future”. The sustainable development is ‘development which meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs’. The sustainable development is not only an ecological concept. It regards other economic and social problems, but the basic, central point of the sustainable development is the environment. The sustainable development aims at harmonizing environment and economy. It includes four groups of actions:

-         protection and restoration of ecosystems;

-         demographic regulation;

-         cessation of superfluous consumption;

-         ecologization of industry.

And we must not forget that the significant factor of the sustainable development is the protection of human rights.

The sustainable development concept was reflected in documents of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) held in 1992 in Rio de Janeiro. These documents are Rio Declaration on environment and development and ‘Agenda 21’. Today, we may observe a great influence of them on international relations and international law.

After the Maastricht Treaty and the UNCED, the sustainable development concept was taken in the European Community as the basis for environmental activity. The fifth programme of the European Community of policy and action in relation to the environment was named ‘Towards sustainability’. The programme was adopted in 1993 and it provides us with different measures on sustainable development on period by the year 2000.

In 1997, the Amsterdam Treaty fixed that the future development of the European Union must be based on the sustainable development concept. The new Treaty established a new principle of the European Community – the principle of environmental protection. This is a common principle of the European Community like principles of subsidiarity, proportionality or non-discrimination. The new principle means that the environment must be integrated into definition and implementation of all the Community’s other economic and social policies for the achievement of the sustainable development. In fact, this principle is not only for the European Community environmental policy, it is the principle for all Community’s policies, for all EC actions.

The European Union has two “lines” of environmental protection. The first “line” – “direct line” is the European Community environmental policy. The second “line” – “abroad line” is an effect of the common environmental principle on others Community’s policies.

The European Community environmental policy has own aims and principles. Aims of the EC environmental policy are:

-         preserving, protecting and improving the quality of the environment;

-         protecting human health;

-         prudent and rational utilization of natural resources;

-         promoting measures at international level to deal with regional or worldwide environmental problems.

Principles of the European Community environmental policy are special for the common principle of environmental protection. They are functional principles. The most important of them are the principle of prevention, the precautionary principle and the polluter-pays principle.

1. The principle of prevention means that the EC environmental policy should include assessment of risks and others procedures to avoid harm. There is a legal interpretation of this principle: ‘Best environmental policy consists in preventing the creation of pollution or nuisances at source, rather than subsequently trying to counteract their effects’.

2. The precautionary principle means that concrete measures of environmental protection should be taken even when there exists no scientific certainty about the likelihood of harm or the degree of environmental risk.

3. The polluter-pays principle means that persons polluting the environment are obliged to pay all necessary measures to eliminate or prevent the pollution. According to this principle, polluter is responsible for polluting the environment. This is the form of pollution tax or penalty.

In spite of the concentration on concrete actions, a realization of these aims and principles support the ideas of sustainable development.

The European Community environmental policy includes many different measures on environmental protection and on the sustainable development. They are include air, water, forests protection, pollution control and waste disposal control as well as protecting animals and birds, biodiversity, climate change, acidification, depletion of natural resources, deterioration of the urban environment. The European Community records and analyzes the environmental information as well as it develops the European Environmental Information and Observation Network. A special establishment of the European Community – the European Environment Agency is responsible for this. There is a special instrument for financing environmental projects in the European Community (the instrument LIFE).

The European Community has promoted a series of measures aimed at integrating the environment into plans and activities of manufacturing companies. The most important of them is a mechanism of the ‘Environment management and audit’ scheme (EMAS).

The EC’s activity aims at the reduction of CO2, SO2, NOx from energy production through the introduction of the carbon/energy taxes on fossil fuels and the integration of the environment into energy planning and supply.

The European Community attaches great importance to the guarantee of the environmental rights of European Union citizens. The European Community law fixes right on access to environmental information, right on participation in environmental decision-making, right on access to justice in environmental matters. The public must be informed about the current ecological situation, must be consulted in decision-making process of environmental impact assessment procedures and may defend own ecological rights in a court of justice.

In the field of global environmental protection, the European Community participates in international actions against global warming, depletion of ozone layer, diminution of tropical forests and desertification. The European Community cooperates with third countries and other international organizations in tackling global environmental problem. The European Community joined basic international environmental conventions and agreements, for example UN Framework Convention on Climate Change 1992, International Tropic Timber Agreements 1994, Convention for the Protection of the Ozone Layer 1985, Convention on Biodiversity 1992. The European Community conducts regional and global environmental actions in combination of the United Nations (UN Environmental Programme), the World Health Organization (WHO), the World Trade Organization (WTO), the United Nations/Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE), the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and other international bodies.

The environment knows no frontiers. Environmental problems are not possible to be tackled by the efforts of a single country. That’s why the European Community has been developing own environmental policy for a long time. At present, the European Community is taking a policy towards sustainable development. It connects the European Community environmental policy with global actions and it rises a role of the European Community and the European Union in global environmental protection. Only common efforts can tackle common problems and provide us with worthy, reliable and sustainable future for our generation and future human generations.

See also: Consultation paper for the preparation of an EU Strategy for Sustainable Development. COM(2001)264 final.

P.A. Kalinichenko