Faced with the water problem in the Mediterranean region, the European Committee of the Regions is calling for water management to be a strategic priority.
The Director General for Institutional Relations and Relations with the Parliament, Xesca Ramis Pons, took part today in the second plenary session of the European Committee of the Regions, which began yesterday, Wednesday, in Brussels, where she made two speeches. The first was in relation to an opinion on Active Subsidiarity, stating that “the policies carried out by the European Union institutions affect the regions unequally and it is necessary to carry out territorial impact assessments to take into account the particularities of certain territories, such as island regions”. Territorial Impact Assessments analyse the possible asymmetric territorial impacts of EU policy and legislative proposals.
TDB keeps you informed. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram
In Brussels, the government is calling for territorial impact assessments to avoid inequalities in island regions with EU policies
The second intervention took place in the debate on an EU Water Strategy for the future of EU cities and regions, where the director stressed that “the Balearic Islands, and all the regions of the Mediterranean basin, are suffering from the current climate crisis, which has become one of the main challenges for the coming decades” and highlighted “the importance of irrigation in Mediterranean agriculture, as an important element for the economic viability of family farms and with a high cultural, social, environmental and productive value”.
The negative impact that droughts, floods and other extreme weather events have on the EU’s economic, social and territorial cohesion hampers the implementation of its cohesion policy and increases the risk of exacerbating social inequalities. In most EU member states, local and regional authorities have institutional and political responsibilities and competences for water management, which shape the implementation of many EU environmental directives and policies on water. Within this framework, the European Committee of the Regions has joined forces with the European Parliament and the European Economic and Social Committee to call for an ambitious European Blue Pact. This initiative aims to move towards water resilience and safeguard water availability and quality for current and future generations. The Mediterranean region is considered to be the most water-stressed region in the world. With this draft opinion, the European Committee of the Regions calls on the European Commission to make water a strategic priority in its next mandate 2024-2029.
Finally, 15 of the 16 amendments tabled to the draft opinion on the adoption of a European Blue Pact from the perspective of agriculture and rural development in all EU regions, which were proposed by the Director General for Water Resources and the Director General for Agriculture, Livestock and Rural Development of the Govern, were adopted.
The European Committee of the Regions is a consultative body of the European Union made up of local and regional representatives responsible for communicating the needs of the regions and influencing EU policies.