This edition of State of the Union focuses on the talks about the future top jobs in the EU and NATO and the final approval of the EU Nature Restoration Law.
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00:00Hello there and welcome to State of the Union, I'm Maeve McMahan in Brussels.
00:11This week saw the city come to life again after the lull around the EU elections. Incoming
00:16MEPs flocked here to take selfies, show their voters they're getting down to work.
00:22But the big happening of the week was this, EU leaders catching up on the European Parliament
00:27elections. With the world in turmoil, rumour had it they would quickly decide who should
00:32get what top Brussels job. But their seven hour summit was just an anti-climax for hundreds
00:38of journalists with nothing to report.
00:41I think it's our collective duty to make a decision by the end of June. I made several
00:47times publicly disappointed.
00:49But the summit proved to be a very good day out for this man, the outgoing Dutch Prime
00:53Minister Mark Rutte. With the Dutch coalition government almost sworn in, Mark Rutte hopes
00:59to be the next Secretary General of NATO. He got some face time with Hungary's Prime
01:04Minister on the sidelines of that summit and agreed not to deploy Hungarian troops to Ukraine
01:09nor to spend Hungarian money on Ukrainian missions. This got him the thumbs up from
01:14Viktor Orban to run NATO.
01:16What didn't get a thumbs up among Brussels circles though was this, the Hungarian presidency's
01:21slogan for their upcoming six month EU presidency. A copycat from the Trump days, Hungary chose
01:28Make Europe Great Again as their mantra to shape the EU's political agenda and warn that
01:33Europe is declining in the world.
01:43Meanwhile in Luxembourg, on Monday EU environment ministers gave their final blessing to a landmark
01:47law that aspires to restore damaged ecosystems and polluted rivers. After years of negotiations,
01:54it's a big win for Belgium, currently presiding over the European Union, even though the Belgian
01:59government actually abstained from the vote due to divisions between Wallonia and Flanders.
02:04The vote only passed though thanks to Austria, whose Green environment minister Leonora Gevesler
02:10voted in favour, going against the government line.
02:15Well to hear what this law will mean exactly, earlier I spoke to Ioannis Agapakis, an environmental
02:31lawyer from Client Earth who's been following this law for years and was very pleased to
02:35see it pass.
02:37So what exactly is in this nature restoration law? What will happen once it's implemented?
02:42So the law in practice seeks to restore all ecosystems in Europe in need of restoration
02:47by 2050. And in order to achieve that, it imposes upon member states a series of binding
02:55targets to restore a diverse array of ecosystems, so from forests and oceans to farmlands and
03:02urban green spaces by 2030 through 2050. So member states, the first stage that they will
03:09have in order to implement the nature restoration law, will be to come up with their national
03:14restoration plans by 2026. These are the plans in which they will determine the measures
03:21but as well as the areas that they will choose to restore. Yet delaying restoration action
03:26up until 2026 would not be advisable as that would impose increased regulatory burden and
03:32costs upon member states.
03:34And why in your view was this law so necessary?
03:37So just for a bit of context, currently less than 15% of EU's ecosystems are in good condition.
03:44So we continue observing a steep biodiversity decline across the Union and this is despite
03:51the already existing laws and all the non-binding policy initiatives that are in place. Scientists
03:58are warning that once certain tipping points are reached, the functions of ecosystems,
04:04relating to their capacity to produce food or to regulate water and even protect us
04:09from climate related disasters, are disrupted.
04:12Now this law was not of course without controversy. The farmers were against it. Did they get
04:17any concessions in the end?
04:19The majority of negotiations revolved around agricultural ecosystems and farmers. It is
04:24very important to note that the law imposes zero legal obligations directly on farmers
04:31and the provisions on the restoration of agricultural ecosystems have been significantly watered
04:37down in order to reflect the realities of the sector and the requests that were made.
04:43Still, I would like to underscore that reducing nature restoration into ideological warfare,
04:50as we observed happening in the past year, is quite irresponsible. Farmers are the ones
04:55that first experience the adverse impacts of both the climate crisis but also the crisis
05:01of biodiversity collapse and these are also the first and best agents to mitigate such
05:08crisis.
05:09And this law of course is a key component of the EU Green Deal. What else should we
05:14look out for in the EU Green Deal? Should other parts of it come to life soon or do
05:18you think it's politically dying out due to the political environment?
05:22First and foremost, I think that the vast majority of legislative files coming out
05:27of the EU Green Deal have either been adopted or terminated due to political considerations.
05:33There are still a couple of files that we may see becoming reality in the next coming
05:37years. For instance, the revision of the Energy Taxation Directive as well as the revision
05:43of the Marine Strategy Framework Directive. Both instruments are quite critical in our
05:48transition into a climate-neutral and biodiverse Europe. Still, I think that the focus of EU
05:55lawmakers and member states, most importantly, will really be on implementation. The EU Green
06:01Deal provided a momentum but also, at the end of the day, provided a series of legal
06:07tools that member states now have in their arsenal in order to tackle the complex and
06:12intertwined crisis that they are facing.
06:15Thank you so much for speaking to us.
06:17Aga Pak is there from Client Earth speaking to me a little earlier. And one topic we didn't
06:23dive into was the impact global warming could have on beer. With summer festivals underway,
06:29scientists keep warning that hotter, longer and drier summers could change the taste,
06:34texture and even increase the price. Now beer, of course, is dear to the hearts of all Belgians
06:40so it would come as a surprise this week to see French beer for sale in Belgian supermarkets.
06:45But turns out Belgian brewers have been teaching their neighbours a thing or two about beer
06:49brewing as climate change is also presenting the wine country with a challenge.
06:53Well, that's it for this edition of State of the Union with me, Maeve McMahon. Thank
06:58you so much for tuning in. See you soon.