Pres­id­ent Tajani: We must act now or there will be more plastic than fish in our oceans by 2050

In his key­note speech, European Par­lia­ment Pres­id­ent Ant­o­nio Tajani said: ​“Clean seas and coasts are a unique glob­al eco­nom­ic, com­mer­cial and tour­ist resource. But if we do not act now, if we con­tin­ue to exploit and pol­lute our oceans irre­spons­ibly, by 2050 there will be more plastic than fish in our oceans. ​“The European Par­lia­ment is at the fore­front of the battle for envir­on­ment­al sus­tain­ab­il­ity. We are giv­ing con­crete answers to the mil­lions of young people who took to the streets to ask for the pro­tec­tion of the plan­et and its oceans. We are on their side. ​“We have fought to include the pro­tec­tion of the oceans in the UN Mil­len­ni­um Devel­op­ment Goals. Last week, in Stras­bourg, we adop­ted a dir­ect­ive that aims to drastic­ally reduce the amount of plastic at sea, includ­ing by ensur­ing that ships dis­pose of their waste on land. ​“For this reas­on, the European Par­lia­ment has adop­ted a dir­ect­ive ban­ning this type of plastic from 2021. In addi­tion, we have launched a cir­cu­lar eco­nomy pack­age that aims to change the way we pro­duce, mak­ing it more sus­tain­able and encour­aging the recyc­ling and reuse of waste. Our goal is to recycle at least 1 mil­lion tonnes of plastic. In envir­on­ment­al terms, this would be tan­tamount to remov­ing as many as 1 mil­lion cars from the roads.” Pres­id­ent Tajani con­cluded by recall­ing that the European Par­lia­ment also calls for great­er efforts in terms of invest­ment: ​“The battle for the plan­et is also fought by provid­ing the neces­sary resources. The European Par­lia­ment has asked to increase by 50% the funds of the new Hori­zon Europe pro­gramme, bring­ing the total to 120 bil­lion euros, to also focus on clean tech­no­logy and the cir­cu­lar eco­nomy. We call for at least 30% of all actions in the next EU budget 2021 – 2027, and 35% of Hori­zon Europe, to be in sup­port of sus­tain­ab­il­ity. ​“Envir­on­ment­al pro­tec­tion, research, innov­a­tion and industry are inex­tric­ably linked. Con­tinu­ous dis­cus­sion between uni­ver­sit­ies, research centres, asso­ci­ations and com­pan­ies is the key to a prof­it­able mar­riage between the envir­on­ment and an innov­at­ive and com­pet­it­ive eco­nomy that can cre­ate new jobs.” Click here to read Pres­id­ent Tajan­i’s full speech. Source: European Par­lia­ment, press release, 29 March 2019