Europe Puts Muscle Behind Green Diplomacy Network

BRUSSELS, Belgium, November 13, 2003 (ENS) - An initiative by the European Union to advance its environmental vision on the world stage and boost its effectiveness in international negotiations is taking shape.

Following a meeting in Rome November 3, the EU's self-titled Green Diplomacy Network has now identified its first targets for action after being set up in the summer.

Top of the agenda is an effort to bring maximum political pressure to bear on Russia to ratify the Kyoto climate protocol. Without Russia's ratification the instrument will collapse, with incalculable and disruptive consequences for European climate change policies.

President of the European Commission Romano Prodi of Italy confers with Russian President Vladimir Putin at the EU-Russia Summit November 6 in Rome. (Photo courtesy European Union)

Next on the list is the 7th meeting of Parties to the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity scheduled for February. The EU will be focusing its efforts on reducing the rate of biodiversity loss and ensuring strict controls on trade of genetically modified organisms.

Three other target areas have been identified but not yet fleshed out in detail. One is to advance the EU's Johannesburg Summit agenda for boosting the global use of renewable energy.

Second is marine environmental protection. And third is how to achieve international environmental governance, in particular through a strengthened United Nations Environment Programme.

The role of the Green Diplomacy Network is to leverage the extensive worldwide diplomatic resources of the enlarged EU's 25 member foreign ministries, embassies, and development cooperation agencies. Ten candidate countries will join the European Union next spring, bringing the total EU membership to 25.

The European Commission is also involved, with three departments represented at the Rome meeting.

Participants in the Rome gathering agreed that the process of embracing the concept of green diplomacy could help in providing more coherence - a vision consistent with environmental issues in all policies, better synergy among the different EU programs, and stronger coordination between the different bilateral and multilateral levels.

According to working guidelines agreed last week, the network should "identify potential allies and opponents and improve working relationships with them." It should also "orchestrate campaigns and demarches that bring the EU message to third parties all over the world."

By garnering early intelligence on third party positions the network is also expected to enable better coordination between EU members, a task that currently often takes up so much time that the bloc finds itself surprised or outmanoeuvred when it finally sits at the negotiating table.

Separately, the network is charged with advancing the EU's "Cardiff process" of environmental integration within foreign ministries.

In a related development, the EU and China on Wednesday signed a political agreement on strengthening environmental cooperation during a visit to China by EU Environment Commissioner Margot Wallstrom.

A report on the first two years of the Green Diplomacy Network’s operation will be presented to the European Council in 2005.

{Published in cooperation with ENDS Environment Daily, Europe's choice for environmental news. Environmental Data Services Ltd, London. Email: envdaily@ends.co.uk}