Ecopreneur.eu welcomes greening of crisis recovery plan

Brussels, 10 April 2020 – Ecopreneur.eu welcomes EU leaders backing a ‘green transition’ in the crisis recovery plan. We stress the importance of a strong green emphasis to any social support program, an ambitious floor to the carbon price, and rapid implementation of the Circular Economy Action Plan (CEAP).

We welcome the EU for preparing ‘a comprehensive recovery plan’ that integrates green aspects to overcome the triple, interlinked crisis of Covid-19, climate change and an economic recession. To avoid worse longterm impacts from the climate change crisis, it is crucial to keep climate goals and the European Green Deal high on the political agenda. Creating a more sustainable and resilient economy needs to be a key focus of the recovery phase. This includes the EU’s emergency response actions to address the economic and social consequences with support for the private sector, especially for small and medium enterprises (SMEs).

Manfred Mühlberger, Chairman of Ecopreneur.eu, said: ‘As dramatic as the current crisis is, it also offers a possibly unique opportunity to give a strong green emphasis to all Covid-19 emergency funds‘. Emergency funds must be used to support the rise of the new economy, like the proposed Just Transition Mechanism, and not strengthen a lock-in to the old economy. Social measures need to be taken in order to avoid that economy transition would harm the weakest. ‘We also urge the EU to introduce an ambitious floor to the carbon price to prevent further plummeting, and go full speed ahead with implementation of the Circular Economy Action Plan (CEAP) while integrating Ecopreneur.eu’s 11 key missing measures‘, adds executive director Arthur ten Wolde. These measures include a tax shift from labour to resources, helping SMEs to become greener and the rapid agreement on a goal of 55% CO2 emission reduction by 2030.

However, staying on track with the green low-carbon circular economy transition while fighting against Covid-19, requires double-large investments. Indeed the Renewed Sustainable Finance Strategy will be essential to mobilising capital. This is all the more important in the light of the current recession and the possibility of repeated crises during the next decade, be it from climate change, resource shortages, biodiversity loss or another virus outbreak.

With the right actions, this could be a unique opportunity to overcome the current crisis and steer away from business-as-usual towards a future which is more resilient to shocks, safe, just, healthy, clean and prosperous.

Ecopreneur’s recent response to the new Circular Economy Action Plan can be downloaded here.