Although compositions, focus areas, and working methods among advisory councils that are member of the EEAC Network differ, the vast majority of councils faces challenges or has valuable lessons to share regarding matters such as collecting evidence, interacting with experts, policymakers and the general public, communication, ways of collaborating online, or regarding the structuring of council debates. In order to stimulate mutual exchange on ways of working and good practices that can contribute to improve the work and impact of EEAC member councils a series of online exchange session is scheduled to take place throughout 2023. A group of eleven advisory councils met online to exchange experiences and best practices with regard to the way in which advisory work is presented to policy makers and the wider audience. A next meeting in this series is scheduled to take place in March 2023.
The EEAC Network has elected a new board. During the EEAC’s Annual Plenary Session (APS), member councils elected four new board members, and renewed the mandate of the current Chair. Arnau Queralt Bassa (CADS) will stay on as Chair. Katalin Sipos (NFFT) and Jan Verheeke (Minaraad) will assume the role of vice-chairs. Julia Hertin (SRU) and Folmer de Haan (Rli) make up the rest of the board. The newly elected board started its duties on 1 January 2023. Read More
Following the CBD COP15, SRU Council member Prof. Dr. Josef Settele gave a presentation on the process and outcomes of the Conference. Representatives of ten advisory councils from across the EU joined the internal EEAC session that took place on Thursday December 22nd 2022.
In prelude to CBD COP15, The EEAC Working Group on Ecosystem Services produced observations, insights and recommendations on the draft post 2020 Framework for Biodiversity. Read More
SDG advisory bodies from more than 20 countries gathered in Cape Town, South Africa, in the context of the Global Forum Network Meeting 2022. The Global Forum is a network of multi-stakeholder bodies that accelerates SDG delivery through sharing experiences and jointly visioning forward across national perspectives. The EEAC Network is an active member of the Forum.
During this Network Meeting a joint call to action was discussed. Following the meeting the German Advisory Council for Sustainable Development (RNE) drafted a meeting report, and finalized the call to action. In the call to action representatives of advisory bodies that are part of the Global Forum, called for all governments and national stakeholder groups to support the United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres’s proposals in “Our Common Agenda”. They also called on all respective national governments and other stakeholders to take bold action, by taking concrete steps at both national and local level and bridging them with international tools and mechanisms. Read More
The Chair of the EEAC Network together with two experts met today with European Commission Executive Vice President Frans Timmermans to discuss the need to make food systems in Europe more sustainable.
During the exchange, the findings and recommendations of the EEAC Position Paper ‘Towards a sustainable food system’ were discussed, and the position paper was presented to the Commissioner.
A consortium of advisory councils and their members worked together during the recent past to formulate the position paper, which aims to feed the debate on sustainable food systems and contribute to the creation of a legislative framework for a sustainable food system at EU level.
Read the EEAC Position Paper ‘Towards a sustainable food system a position paper on the framework law’ here
The European food system does not deliver sustainable diets, with low environmental impacts which contribute to food and nutrition security and to a healthy life for present and future generations. To make the system more resilient, an EU Framework Law on Sustainable Food Systems should foster human and planetary health in a coherent and balanced approach between an agricultural supply policy, environmental policy and food (consumption) policy. A policy on a sustainable food system should direct the strong innovation capacity of actors away from ever lower food prices towards more sustainable farming, food processing and food consumption. However, a just transition is key: to the extent that healthy diets are not affordable for consumers compensation should be given by changes in minimum wages, social security or income taxes. This advice is given by a consortium of national advisory councils on environment and sustainable development, in an EEAC Network Position Paper on the framework law. Read More
The EEAC Network, together with the colleagues of ESDN, has established recurring exchange cycles with delegates from the Council Working Party on the 2030 Agenda and delegates from the European Commission. These exchanges aim to support inter-collegial exchange on Europe’s sustainability challenges. During the latest exchange in Brussels on November 18th, Delegates from the different organizations discussed the Voluntary Review that the EU will provide to next year’s United Nations High-Level Political Forum, the work of the Council Working Party on the 2030 Agenda and the upcoming global SDG Summit.
The Federal Council for Sustainable Development in Belgium (FRDO-CFDD) together with Brussels Region Environment Council (RLBHG) published an own initiative opinion on biodiversity policy. The opinion was prepared by the “Biodiversity and Forests” and “International Relations” working groups and was approved by the FRDO-CFDD General Assembly by written procedure. The original language of this opinion is Dutch, the translation in English became available in November 2022. Read More
Today ( 18 October 2022) the Chairman of the EEAC Working Group on Ecosystem Services published a summary of the observations, insights and recommendations that were discussed in the context of the upcoming CBD COP15 by experts that are part of advisory councils on the environment and sustainable development. The experts from seven different advisory councils met online twice and shared their insights during several written rounds.
As a starting point, the experts took note of the state of negotiations on the text of the Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework. They focused their exchange on the content of some crucial targets in the negotiation text and on the relationship between those targets.
The experts make a plea to better integrate biodiversity in 1) all spaces, and 2) within all domains. Both tasks must be properly anchored in the system of targets of the Post 2020 Global Biodiversity Framework, so as to have a ‘spinal role’ for the other targets in the text. Experts further underline that the European Union should opt for a realistic, fair and results-driven approach in the run up to and during CBD COP15 itself. In this process, the EU’s active and ambitious stance in the negotiation process needs to be reinforced, by also explicitly reflecting critically on the actions of the EU and its Member States in the context of biodiversity, they argue. Read More
The EEACNetwork, together with the Belgian Federal Council for Sustainable Development (FRDO-CFDD), the German Advisory Council for Sustainable Development (RNE), and the Department of Sustainable Development from Romania organised a joint webinar “Implementing the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive: Opportunities and Challenges”. The webinar took place on October 13th.
The recordings
The Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive
A provisional political agreement on the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) has been reached at EU level. By implementing the CSRD, the EU intends to make ambitious but standardised and accessible sustainability reporting mandatory for more than 50,000 companies across EU Member States. After the official adoption of the CSRD at EU level (end of 2022), EU Member States will have eighteen months to integrate the CSRD into national law. The way in which Member States implement the Directive is expected to influence the extent to which the objectives of this European proposal are actually achieved.
The Webinar
During the webinar a panel of high level experts addressed the following issues: 1) Which aspects need to be taken into account to ensure that the ambitious goals of the CSRD can actually be achieved? 2) What leeway do the Member States have in the implementation process, and how big a risk is this? And 3) How can we learn from the implementation of the CSRD’s predecessor, the Non-Financial Reporting Directive?
The webinar provided guidance and recommendations for action in the final phase of the implementation of the CSRD, so that the transformative potential of the new Directive can be fully achieved.
The speakers
We were pleased to have contributions from a variety of international policy makers, including: Tom Dodd, European Commission, DG FISMA, Karen Hofmans, the Federal Public Service Economy (Belgium), Jan Witzmann, the Federal Ministry of Justice (Germany), and László Borbély, State Councilor, the Romanian Prime Minister’s Office – Department of Sustainable Development (Romania).
