SP(2007)1426/2

SP(2007)1016/2

Results of vote in Parliament

The European Parliament adopted a resolution based on the own-initiative report drawn up by Danutė Budreikaitė (ALDE, Lithuania). The resolution emphasised the need to ensure that the three components of Sustainable Development, namely environmental protection, social equity and cohesion and economic prosperity, were properly integrated and implemented in all development cooperation policies.

There must be strengthened mechanisms for monitoring progress towards meeting the targets set in the Johannesburg Plan of Implementation and the MDGs. Parliament felt that more efforts were needed to combat current unsustainable developments, particularly those giving rise to greenhouse gas emissions, the depletion of fish stocks and the loss of biodiversity. Parliament was particularly concerned to emphasise the importance of protecting biodiversity and suggested that this either be added as a new key issue within the Sustainable Development Strategy, or at least be given special emphasis within the section on the management of natural resources.

Parliament went on to make several recommendations, inter alia:

- the Commission must work with ACP countries to prevent illegal dumping of toxic waste both by local operation and by international handlers originating and operating in the EU;

- developing countries must be assisted to adapt to the challenges of climate change and to take the necessary steps towards enhanced support for investment in clean and efficient technologies in the developing world;

- the Commission must ensure that Strategic Environmental Assessments and Environmental Impact Assessments are undertaken and made publicly available for every programme and project receiving EU financial support, in particular the EU-Africa Partnership on Infrastructure (please see COM(2006)0376);

- it should promote integrated water resource management within the EU-Africa Partnership on Infrastructure to ensure the provision of water for human well-being and ecological sustainability;

- there must be a far more serious commitment on the part of new and old Member States to achieve the goal of contributing 0,7 % of ODA/GNI to development cooperation;

- the establishment of a permanent advisory and monitoring body for Sustainable Development, which would include Member States and civil society representatives and would scrutinise the mainstreaming of the concept into EU policies and programmes, with a particular focus on development cooperation, would be of great importance and crucial to supporting the Commission's internal Interservice Group on Environmental Mainstreaming in Development Co-operation;

- strengthening SMEs was a key tool for promoting environmental, social and economic development in developing countries;

-the Commission was asked to monitor and report on the effectiveness of the Code of Conduct for European Enterprises operating in developing countries, particularly with regard to the implementation of Sustainable Development requirements;

- the Commission should put particular emphasis during the negotiations for Economic Partnership Agreements on strategies that foster greater diversification of exports from ACP countries and support growth and development models that are environmentally sustainable and socially just;

- on access to energy sources, Parliament stated that this should be promoted via the EU Energy Initiative and by upgrading the profile of energy efficiency in development programmes;

- urban water and sanitation was a key development issue. Parliament called for local authorities in the EU to be encouraged to use part of the revenue from charges to users for the provision of water and sanitation services to carry out decentralised cooperation measures to finance projects to improve access to water in developing countries;

- the EU must help to draw up strategies to encourage an economic and agricultural development path compatible with maintaining or restoring a high standard of water quality, from groundwater to the water supplied to the final consumer.

T6-0014/2007

Debate in Parliament

A6-0474/2006

A6-0474/2006

PE380.885

PE378.772