Representative of the Austrian EU Presidency 2006
Negotiation Team for the Revised EU Strategy for SD

Renewing the EU Strategy on Sustainable Development:
The Perspective of the Austrian EU Presidency

Dear Ladies and Gentlemen, I would like to welcome you on behalf of the Austrian EU Presidency here in the Austrian Representation to the European Union in Brussels. Sustainable development is a very important issue for the Austrian EU Presidency and with this symposium we want to highlight the important role civil society plays in this context. First of all I would like to thank our co-operation partners, Thomas Schauer, Director of the European Support Centre of the Club of Rome in Vienna and Raoul Weiler and Daniel Schaubacher, President and member of the Board of the Brussels-EU Chapter of the Club of Rome for the organisation of this event.

I am working in Austria in the Federal Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, Environment and Water Management. Representatives from this Ministry are doing the negotiations on the EU Strategy for Sustainable Development in close cooperation with the Chancellery.

The European Union has to face still several very unsustainable trends not only in the environmental field but also in the social field, although we had the strategy for sustainable development adopted in 2001 in Göteborg.

Now this EU strategy for sustainable development is being renewed. The European way of life, the quality of life are closely connected to some very important values like democracy, social cohesion, solidarity with future generations, a sound environment and welfare. The European Union has to show credibility as a front-runner, as a driving force for sustainable development. That is important also in a global context and globalisation is a big challenge for policies for sustainable development. We have to bridge the gap between words and action which was also the motto at the World Summit in Johannesburg, and I'm very happy to welcome here today Mr. Jakob von Uexküll, who will also talk about bridging this gap. Unfortunately there is a decline in trust in the institutions of the European Union which is shown by latest Eurobarometer surveys.

I'm also dealing with local initiatives like Local Agenda 21 processes and frequently I am addressed there with the question what is going on at the European level. Therefore the European strategy for sustainable development is also important to demonstrate local initiatives that they are supported by a European strategy.

The Austrian EU presidency has presently the task to balance the interests of all member states in the Council and it wants also to take the opinions of civil society organisations into account.

The European Council in December 2005 stated that it wants to see an ambitious strategy and a comprehensive one, including both the internal and external dimension of sustainable development. The Council wants to see a positive long-term vision, targets, indicators and an efficient monitoring mechanism. The EU strategy for sustainable development should be presented as a text which can easily be communicated to all citizens of the European Union.

Which are the aims of the Austrian EU Presidency? First of all we want to demonstrate that sustainable development provides chances rather than it is an obstacle - and that sustainable development is a precondition for long term competitiveness. This is an important point because the economic issue should not be reduced to the “Lisbon Strategy for growth and jobs”. It is not only important that the European economy grows but also how it grows! We want to stimulate a broad political debate in the Council and we have created a new working process because as Mr Wijkman mentioned, there are no respective institutional arrangements yet on the parliamentarian or the Council level.

We want ministers to discuss the sustainability issue – not only Environment Ministers but also different Council formations for example the ministers for education etc and we want to involve also the Heads of State and Government. Prime Minister Wolfgang Schüssel wants to have the issue on the agenda in June 2006.

The strategy will be of course a political declaration but we want to make it as operational as possible. We have installed a group called "Friends of the Presidency" in which the member states are represented for example by environmental ministries, by ministries for foreign affairs but also by representatives from Prime Minister's Offices.

We have organised 10 Council formations to have policy debates and we want also to involve civil society and other EU institutions. We had an informal meeting with the European Parliament yet and there will be one more during the next weeks. We had stakeholder events organised for example by the European Economic and Social Affairs Committee and the Committee of the Regions and we are in contact with the network of European Environmental and Sustainable Development Advisory Councils (EEAC). The European Environmental Bureau in Brussels (EEB) has organised a Round table discussion with Environment Ministers on the EU strategy for sustainable development in March 2006 also.

The Communication from the Commission (December 2005) is regarded as a very good basis for the negotiations on the EU strategy for sustainable development of which there has already been one phase from February to March with a general discussion on the vision and the so-called governance cycle. The second phase will last from April to May and we will discuss the questions of sustainable development indicators. In the next weeks the presidency will submit a new draft text of the strategy to the member states which will then be discussed in the "Friends of the Presidency" group. We will get contributions from the 10 Council formations and will have to put that altogether in one document for the meeting of the European Council in June.

The first discussions of the different Council formations but also with other stakeholders showed that there is a need for more details especially regarding the key actions and the targets. The topic of the targets is not easy to deal with because some member states want to have new targets whereas some would like to strengthen work on the implementation of the existing ones. Presently it is difficult to forecast the results of the discussion.

There is also an ongoing discussion on the relationship between the Lisbon strategy for growth and jobs and the EU strategy for sustainable development. After long discussions in the group of the "Friends of the Presidency" we prefer the option to keep the two strategies separate until 2010. The EU strategy for sustainable development needs more visibility for its broader approach. There is for example the topic of poverty reduction included as well as the health issue and the international dimension and there are many issues which are not covered by the Lisbon Strategy yet. And even though the environmental dimension has been strengthened in the Lisbon strategy, it is necessary to present a stand-alone document on sustainable development. The Commission will produce every two years of progress report and the Heads of State and Governments will discuss this report every two years.

There are further issues in discussion. One of them is the issue of sustainable ways of production and consumption which might be the seventh key issue being added to the six ones from the Communication of the Commission. Another very important issue is education for sustainable development which includes informal and formal education. There is also a strong focus on innovation, not only eco-innovation but also social innovation. Furthermore, a strategy for sustainable development without mentioning the role of youth for the future of our planet would not be complete. The strengthening of the biodiversity topic is discussed as well as the external dimension, the topic of rural development, gender mainstreaming and the cultural dimension.

Important challenges are the communication between different levels of policy-making and the visibility of the sustainability issue at all the different policy levels in order to generate mutual support. Especially the local/regional level is very important for the delivery of sustainable development and this policy level is indeed the closest to the citizens.

The question is how to involve civil society best in the implementation of the EU strategy on sustainable development. It is very important that the Commission document already includes the topic of follow up and governance. Civil society cannot only have a role in monitoring the strategy but also in implementation which would mean a share ownership of the strategy. There are also consultation mechanisms for major policy proposals established by the European Commission and there is one sustainable development indicator in the Commission's Communication which is called trust in EU institutions (published by Eurobarometer). Both NGOs and businesses are important and from both of them we need support for sustainable development.

As a closing remark please let me cite an African saying: If many people at many different places do many little things they have the power to change the image of the world. I thank for your attention and hope for your support.