SAPEA evidence review report (ERR) on One Health governance in the European Union: comments and future perspectives

ObjectivesThis study examines types and forms of cross-sector collaborations employed by rural communities to address community health issues and identifies factors facilitating or inhibiting such collaborations.SettingWe conducted case studies of...

BackgroundVulnerable pregnant women, defined as women threatened by social, psychological, or physical risk factors, need special support during pregnancy to prevent complications in pregnancy, birth, and childhood. Proper cross-sectoral collaboration in antenatal care is paramount to delivering sufficient supportive care to these women. General practitioners (GPs) often face barriers when assessing vulnerable pregnant women and may; as a result, under-identify and underreport child abuse. Little is known about how the cross-sectoral collaboration in antenatal care affects the GP’s opportunities of managing vulnerable pregnant women. This study explores GPs’ perceived barriers and facilitators in the antenatal care collaboration on vulnerable pregnant women and in the reporting of these women to social services.MethodsA qualitative study with semi-structured focus group interviews among twenty GPs from the Region of Southern Denmark. A mixed inductive and deductive analytic strategy was applied, structured according to the Theoretical Domains Framework (TDF).ResultsThree themes emerged: I) collaborative experience, II) motivation, and III) organizational working conditions. Barriers were lacking experience, i.e. knowledge, skills, and attention to antenatal care collaboration and reporting, inadequate organizational working contexts, i.e. insufficient pathways for communication between health care and social care systems, and laws restricting feedback on the consequences of reporting. This decreased the GPs motivation, i.e. poor confidence in navigating the system, fear of breaking the patient alliance when collaborating in antenatal care and reporting with the social services. GPs motivation to collaborate and report was increased by knowing the working contexts of their collaborative partners in the antenatal care and social services system and by a strong doctor-patient relationship enabling them to describe the vulnerability to collaborators.ConclusionsGPs experience system-related barriers to collaborating and reporting on vulnerable pregnant women within the health care sector and in the interplay with the social services sector. Organizational development of cross-sectoral antenatal care collaboration should imply user involvement of all collaborative partners. Results suggest that health authorities should consider establishing accessible communication pathways between the GPs and the social services to improve options for proper cross-sectoral communication and feedback to GPs, thereby improving care trajectories of vulnerable pregnant women.

Conversion of wastes to biofuels is a promising route to provide renewable low-carbon fuels, based on a low- or negative-cost feedstock, whose use can avoid negative environmental impacts of conventional waste treatment. However, current policies that employ LCA as a quantitative measure are not adequate for assessing this type of fuel, given their cross-sector interactions and multiple potential product/service streams (energy, fuels, materials, waste treatment service). We employ a case study of butanol and ethanol production from mixed municipal solid waste to demonstrate the challenges in using life cycle assessment to appropriately inform decision-makers. Greenhouse gas emissions results vary from -566 gCO2 eq/MJbiofuel (under US policies that employ system expansion approach) to +86 gCO2 eq/MJbiofuel and +23 gCO2 eq/MJbiofuel (under initial and current EU policies that employ energy-based allocation), relative to gasoline emissions of +94 gCO2 eq. LCA methods used in existing policies thus provide contradictory information to decision-makers regarding the potential for waste-based biofuels. A key factor differentiating life cycle assessment methodologies is the inclusion of avoided impacts of conventional waste treatment in US policies and their exclusion in EU policies. Present EU rules risk discouraging the valorisation of wastes to biofuels thus forcing waste toward lower-value treatment processes and products.

This chapter assesses the development and possible future orientation(s) of EU Energy Law and Policy, focusing upon the commitment to market liberalization and market-based approaches, as well as the combination of EU and national level actors, institutions and policies. The combination of goals in current EU policy - markets, competition & liberalization; environmental sustainability; and supply security - means that future developments in the EU's approach to energy questions will require nuanced and complex arguments, balancing between competing policies and interests. These issues are discussed in the context of renewables, climate change and emissions trading, the liberalization process and issues such as the unbundling of vertically integrated energy networks.

Research background The term “sustainable development” is an omnipresent expression reaching the dimension of a command in the EU under the leadership of Ursula von der Leyen. However, this is an ephemeral term with ambiguous and contradictory meanings which is employed in a particular manner by current EU policies. Purpose The purpose of this study is to reconcile various approaches and consolidate the understanding of sustainable development as advanced by current EU policies. Research methodology A historical and conceptual review creates a foundation to prepare comparative review tables to be filled with information about current EU policies and their quotes regarding “sustainable development”, as extracted from the EU Commission Websites and EurLex. This allows for a holistic, thematic and critical analysis about the teleological meaning as well as glossing and Socratic questioning. Results The juxtaposition of these findings suggests that the term “sustainable development” is a semantic puzzle which is perceived by current EU policies as a call for multispectral and inherently conflicting changes to be imposed by all stakeholders in the utilitarian context. Novelty Six pioneering propositions with controversial features emerge and are to be verified by further multidisciplinary longitudinal studies.

New processes of urbanization have recently led to a concentration of inhabitants in big cities and a consequent depopulation of marginal areas. In Italy, this phenomenon has also affected mountain regions, which are still facing dramatic depopulation and economic depression. The incapacity of public administrations to remedy this public problem has recently led to the introduction of new forms of collaborations with actors belonging to diverse jurisdictional areas (governmental institutions, private companies, no-profit organizations, and local communities). These forms of partnership can be defined as cross sector collaborations and, in the case of community involvement, can also be arranged as community-based enterprises (CBEs). In this paper, we investigate the capacity of CBEs to be an effective instrument for cross-sector collaboration in the field of urban regeneration. In particular, by applying a specific analysis model inspired by the framework elaborated by Bryson, Crosby, and Stone (2015), we analyze an Italian experience of community engagement promoted in Castel Del Giudice, a small town in the Southern Apennines. Through document analysis and an interview method, the paper gives a twofold contribution to the field. Firstly, it provides a rigorous exploration of the preconditions, processes, structures, and results of a successful case of cross-sector collaboration. Secondly, it offers elements to assess potentiality and points of criticisms of CBEs to promote urban regeneration policies. In this sense, we conclude that the creation of a community-based network represents a second level of cross sector-collaboration that can potentiate the capacity to pursue the community interest.

Nexus thinking in current EU policies – The interdependencies among food, energy and water resources

Metering: EU policy and implications for fuel poor households

The article examines the development of consumer protection policy from the most ancient historical acts to modern legal acts of the European Union. The key laws of the Roman Empire in the field of consumer protection have been studied, among which the main ones are: «Lex Iulia de Annona», «Edictum de pretiis rerum venalium — Edict of maximum prices», «Civil Code» of Emperor Justinian. It is determined that the studied legislative acts were the first attempts to consolidate the protection of the rights of buyers (consumers). Roman law, which became the basis of modern legal systems in Europe and many non-European countries, has not lost its relevance. Ancient Roman laws are compared with the modern practice of the European Union. The history of the emergence of consumer law in the European Community is considered, which is divided into three key stages from the establishment of the European Community to modern EU policy. It is determined that at the beginning of its creation the EU policy of consumer protection was considered as an element of ensuring the sustainable operation of the internal market. The key constituent acts of the Union are considered, among which the Treaty of Rome of 1957, the Single European Act of 1987, the Treaty of Amsterdam of 1997 and the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union of 2000 are highlighted. The analysis of Art. 2 of the Treaty of Rome stipulates that one of the key goals — protection and improvement of living standards was interpreted also as consumer protection. This strategy was later strengthened by the Amsterdam Treaty of 1997, which identified the promotion of a high level of consumer protection as one of the Community’s tasks. The current EU policy in the field of consumer protection, which is aimed at updating legislation in accordance with modern realities, is studied. Among the key acts of secondary law is the EU Directive № 2019/2161, which focuses on better application and modernization of legislation on consumer protection and amends existing EU directives. It is determined that the current consumer protection policy in the EU ensures the proper and effective functioning of the single market through constant updating of legislation taking into account social, technological, economic and environmental changes.

The COVID-19 virus ignited social and economic turmoil around the world Not since the Spanish Flu of 1918 had we seen a pandemic of such scale and severity The resultant global transformation of industries, supply chains, work, communication, and institutional frameworks suggests we are entering a period of non-ergodic change, in which the future cannot be extrapolated from the past (North, 1999) This means that we do not know the probability distribution or the outcomes from the virus So, we must find a way to coexist and build our resilience

It is our pleasure to welcome you to the 'Next generation mobile computing for dynamic personalised travel planning' workshop being held at MobiSys 2012. A key component of current UK and EU transport policy is to provide individuals with 'smarter choices' which, in combination, will 'nudge' them to adopt more environmentally friendly modes. 'Travel Planning' has been a concept that has emerged from the smarter choices research since the 2004 UK government White Paper. This has also taken the form of 'personalised travel planning' where blended measures are demonstrated to individuals in order to highlight the merits of adopting alternative modes of travel. The provision of dynamic traffic and travel information, particularly for public transport services, has been a key driver in travel planning and the advent of mobile technology now allows much greater visibility of current and future travel options, tailored to the individual's needs. Mobile apps have the potential to take 'personalised travel planning' to another dimension where context sensitive, real-time information can be provided to the individual traveler, directly from source. The workshop looks at some of the current issues in this area from the travel planning and computing perspectives by bringing together nine presentations grouped into three sessions: -- User needs and implications for dynamic personalised travel planning - Managing and harnessing travel data sets -- Applications for dynamic personalised travel planning. The sessions will help you understand the future challenges related to personal mobility given current UK and EU policy, and identify the current and future direction of mobile computing for personalised travel management. We hope that you will find this workshop interesting and thought-provoking and that it will provide you with a valuable opportunity to share ideas with other researchers and practitioners.

Farmer protests have characterised much of the debate on climate and the environment in the EU in recent years. The protests and the European Commission′s subsequent rollback on environmental requirements for farming have cast doubt on the viability of the European Green Deal (EGD). Work on farms is inherently intertwined with nature. Climate change—through rising temperatures and extreme weather events—is already impacting working conditions. At the same time, agriculture is responsible for 11% of greenhouse gas emissions in the EU and is a major cause of biodiversity loss. Most research on the EGD has tended to focus on energy-related sectors, with comparatively less research on what it means for sectors like agriculture. This article applies a social law lens to legislation on agriculture in the EU and asks: what does the EGD mean for those who work in agriculture, and, to what extent is a just transition envisioned for the sector? The article is situated within a broader turn in labour law scholarship to examine the labour-nature nexus. It identifies social measures within the EGD, the Farm to Fork Strategy and the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), with a focus on two disadvantaged groups: smallholder farmers and farmworkers. The article argues that there are elements of a just transition in current EU policies and legislation on agriculture, such as income support provisions, targeted measures for young farmers, and the introduction of a social conditionality clause. However, the social dimension of these instruments require further development to strengthen the connection between social concerns on the one hand, and economic and environmental concerns on the other. More fundamentally, the article points to a lack of a coherent vision of what a just transition in agriculture should entail—particularly in terms of its economic model and the position of those most affected, including smallholder farmers and farmworkers. This gap may help in explaining some of the underlying reasons for the farmer protests.

Air quality management: evolution of policy and practice in the UK as exemplified by the experience of English local government

Biological power to methane, where CO2 and renewable H2 are biologically converted to synthetic methane gas, could deliver strategic benefits including provision of a gaseous fuel that is compatible with existing infrastructure, increased energy security, a mechanism to recycle CO2 to displace the extraction of fossil carbon, enabling the storage of renewable energy, and provision of a vector for transportation and storage of hydrogen. This study shows that the technology is currently economically viable under very limited conditions given current UK and EU policy and economic frameworks. Three key policy and economic modifications are needed for broader deployment; i) international emissions allowance schemes should be structured such that recycling of carbon gases are encouraged, ii) ready access to low cost of capital funding mechanisms for technologies that can deliver multiple energy and environmental benefits, and iii) revenue is generated from all value propositions which, in the case of Power to Methane, includes the service of enabling of long-term energy storage. This study indicates that minimum revenues of £2.50 (€2.80) / kWh to £10 (€11.30) / kWh for enabling energy storage would be sufficient to deliver positive Net Present Values given the conditions and assumptions made.

EU member states have been encouraged to introduce energy efficiency obligation schemes (EEOS) to help meet energy saving objectives. As a result, there are now 15 EU EEOS in existence, compared with just six prior to the introduction of the 2012 Energy Efficiency Directive. At the same time, the long-standing EEOS in Denmark and the UK have faced challenges because of concerns over increasing costs. This paper considers the role of EEOS in current and future EU and national policy. Firstly, this paper sets out in more detail the place of EEOS in EU energy policy. Then, the future of longer-established EEOS is explored, using Denmark and the UK as case studies. Recent and planned redesigns in these two countries are detailed, with analysis of the factors which led to changes in policy ambition. For new EEOS, key risks to delivery of savings are an over-ambitious delivery target and time line in the absence of policy learning opportunities. The policy risk for nine EEOS is assessed, with savings being most at risk in Croatia, Latvia and Spain. The paper concludes with an analysis of EEOS within the future policy mix. The discussion considers the place of EEOS in evolving EU policy, future savings from EEOS, their relationship with energy companies and the possible influence of different framings of energy efficiency. The continuing need for EEOS is explored, with concluding ideas about how to secure a strong and effective future for this policy tool.