6th Environment Action Programme 2001-2010 – Environment 2010 Our Future, Our Choice

Description

In the first year of the 21st century, the European Commission has adopted its proposal for a new Action Programme for the environment for the next 5-10 years. The Programme is far reaching. This booklet outlines the four environmental priorities and some of the actions to address them, along with proposed new ways of achieving our environmental challenges. What kind of environment do we want to live in? What kind of environment do we want our children and grandchildren to inherit? This is the starting point for the new Environment Action Programme: Environment 2010: Our Future, Our Choice, which the Commission has proposed to the Member States and the European Parliament. All of us believe that the air we breathe, the water we drink and the food we eat should be free of harmful pollutants. We want to avoid the threat and uncertainty of climate change. A clean and healthy environment is vital to the quality of life we desire for ourselves now and for our children in the future. Protecting the planet creates both challenges and opportunities. Through greater efficiency and better use of natural resources, we can break the old link between economic growth and environmental damage. We can be both more prosperous and greener. Many people in Europe have now become aware that we need to act more prudently and efficiently. We need to grasp opportunities for innovation that can improve our environment and the economy. We are starting to take more responsibility for our own behaviour and its impact on the environment. Individuals, families, businesses and environmental associations now make efforts to recycle waste, to save energy, to buy green products and to protect the countryside. We have made progress over the last 30 years. Since the 1970s, the European Union has put into place a network of measures to protect our environment. European Union policies have led to a steady improvement in the quality of air and water, for example. However, much more remains to be done. Pressures on the environment are increasing. We have to deal with climate change, the erosion of our countryside, growing quantities of waste and chemicals that get into food, air and water. If progress is to continue, we now have to put the environment at the heart of decision-making on every issue: from transport to energy, from industry to farming.