Mapping the Landscape of EU Environmental Policy: Coherence and Linkages

Abstract

EU environmental policy is at a critical crossroads with a number of important policy processes and strategic discussions currently underway. They include the adoption of new strategic plans (e.g. on future EU biodiversity policy) and roadmaps (e.g. on resource efficiency); as well as a number of comprehensive reviews of existing legislation such as EU policies on water, chemicals and air quality. Substantial discussions on priorities for spending under the next long-term EU budget are currently taking place as are efforts to take forward the EU’s new economic strategy - the ‘Europe 2020 Strategy’ and related ‘Flagship Initiatives’. In parallel, there are also a number of on-going reform processes in relevant sectoral policies such as energy, transport and agriculture policy. These different processes will have an important influence on the context and scope of EU environmental policy to 2020 and beyond. Given this convoluted and evolving backdrop, a key question concerns the inter-linkages, policy overlaps and omissions created, between different areas of environmental policy itself as well as with relevant sectoral policies. This paper provides an overview of some of the key strategic processes currently underway which are of relevance to or will have an impact on the development of future EU environmental policy. In doing so, it aims to identify some of the main inter-linkages and thematic overlaps between the different documents, the extent to which relevant sectoral documents take into account key environmental considerations, and to draw some initial observations on the overall coherence between the different initiatives.