Deforestation: controls and sanctions, what the new European rules foresee
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Palm oil, soybeans, coffee, cocoa, livestock, timber and rubber, but also derivatives such as beef, furniture, chocolate and paper. Many products that contribute to deforestation will no longer be importable and marketable in the European Union. With 552 votes in favour, 44 against and 43 abstentions, theEuropean Union has adopted new rules against deforestation.
Environment
In Brazil, the forest returned to the indigenous people has started to grow again
by Sandro Iannaccone
The goal is to fight climate change by totally rethinking, at least in intentions, the entire production system to protect biodiversity. The new law obliges companies that trade a long list of raw materials agensure that products sold in the EU have not led to deforestation and forest degradation anywhere in the world after December 31, 2020. Fines foreseen for those who do not respect the rules: up to 4% of the turnover of the company, the professional or the various operators.
Ideas
Because we need healthy forests for healthy people
by Zhimin Wu*
Conscious consumers
Between 1990 and 2020, an area larger than the European Union was lost. According to the WWF, the EU is responsible for 16% of deforestation associated with international trade, second in the world only to China. The Commission’s analyzes lower this figure to 10%: still enough to take drastic measures.
Christophe Hansen (EPP, LU), rapporteur of the law, said after the vote: “Until today, the shelves of our supermarkets have too often been filled with products covered by the ashes of burnt rainforests and irreversibly destroyed ecosystems which had wiped out the livelihoods of indigenous peoples. Too often this has happened without consumers knowing about it. I am relieved that European consumers can now rest assured that they will no longer be unknowingly complicit in deforestation when they eat their bar of chocolate or enjoy a well-deserved coffee”.
Climate
Wetland forests get more rain
The new law, continues Hansen “is not only fundamental in our fight against climate change and the loss of biodiversity, but should also unlock the deadlock that prevents us from deepening trade relations with countries that share our values and our environmental ambitions”. Parliament also obtained a broader definition of forest degradation which includes the conversion of primary forest or naturally regenerating forest into plantation forest or other woodland.
The controls
As regards controls, EU competent authorities will have access to production information provided by companies. To avoid the possibility of providing false data, both the possibility of using the geolocation (controls with satellite monitoring) e DNA analysis to verify the origin of the products.
Ideas
Carlo Petrini: “There can be no ecological justice without social justice”
by Carlo Petrini
Then there will be one risk classification, for individual countries, from which the European Commission will start to carry out the checks: low, standard and high risk. The different levels will depend on the result of preliminary checks to be carried out within eighteen months of the entry into force of the regulation. The lower the risk, in the classification level, the faster and simpler the procedures will be. “Protecting the world’s environment, including forests and rainforests, is a common goal for all countries and the European Union is ready to assume its responsibilities,” he said in a statement. Marian Jure?kaCzech environment minister who led the negotiations for the Council.
The forests are home to approx two-thirds of terrestrial biodiversity and it is estimated that the survival of more than one and a half billion people depends on them. They store almost 300 billion tons of carbon, a figure 40 times higher than the greenhouse gas emissions produced by fossil fuels; for this reason deforestation pollutes as much as all means of transport combined in the world. According to Greenpeace and Legambiente, deforestation occurs in tropical areas to produce wood, palm oil, cellulose pulp, meat, leather or soybeans. Raw materials or finished products arriving on the Italian market.
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