#Coronavirus - Open letter to the European Council

Dear heads of state and government,

We understand that the urgency of addressing the coronavirus pandemic necessarily pushed climate change off the agenda of your video conference on 26 March.

In hindsight, it is clear that the initial response by member states and the EU leadership has been slow, uncoordinated and inefficient in halting the progress of the virus. Ursula von der Leyen herself has acknowledged that “all of us who are not experts initially underestimated the coronavirus... we understand that measures that seemed drastic two or three weeks ago, need to be taken now.”

Similarly, you have long misjudged the devastating effects of climate change and ignored the repeated warnings of experts. It is only thanks to the unprecedented mobilization of youth, the unwilling heirs to this man-made quagmire, and the weight of public opinion that you are finally contemplating a European Green Deal. Its proposed policy measures that would have seemed drastic just a few years ago, are now viewed by experts as vague, underfunded, and barely adequate to meet the challenge posed by global warming. Nevertheless, if it is rapidly adopted and implemented it will at least be better than no Green Deal at all.

Unquestionably, your priority today must be to address the health emergency and economic crisis caused by the pandemic. But that must not serve as an excuse to further delay action on climate change. On the contrary, the urgent need to offset the consequences of COVID-19 on the economy, jobs and society is also a window of opportunity to deliver on the promises made for a green transition.

Inevitably, humankind will face more crises in the future – virus outbreaks, economic downturns, military conflicts, natural disasters – some of which will be caused or exacerbated by climate change. The interconnection of our societies and interdependency of our economies make us all more vulnerable to the impacts of global warming. The problem is structural and cultural, and our linear economic model based on perpetual, resource-intensive growth is clearly unsuitable for the world we live in.

The UN’s environment chief Inger Andersen has warned: “nature is sending us a message with the coronavirus pandemic and the ongoing climate crisis…If we don’t take care of nature, we can’t take care of ourselves. And as we hurtle towards a population of 10 billion people on this planet, we need to go into this future armed with nature as our strongest ally.”

Let us therefore seize this opportunity to invest massively in the energy and ecological transition, instead of subsidizing a short-sighted reversion to a system that has proven to be unsustainable, detrimental to our health and destructive of the biosphere.

Following your meeting of 26 March, at your request the Council President Charles Michel and Commission President Ursula von der Leyen have issued a Roadmap for Recovery towards a more resilient, sustainable and fair Europe. We are encouraged to read that “the Green transition and the Digital transformation will play a central and priority role in relaunching and modernising our economy. Investing in clean and digital technologies and capacities, together with a circular economy, will help create jobs and growth and allow Europe to make the most of the first-mover advantage in the global race to recovery.”

The road map further declares “The European Union needs a Marshall-Plan type investment effort to fuel the recovery and modernize the economy…This means investing massively in the Green and Digital transitions and the circular economy...The European Green deal will be essential as an inclusive and sustainable growth strategy.”

Ladies and gentlemen, at today’s (23 April) Council meeting we urge you to grant your unanimous approval to this Roadmap. We recall that in December you formally endorsed the objective of making the EU climate-neutral by 2050. That is indeed a laudable target, but it requires a stringent Action Plan with concrete measures and legally binding milestones in order to reach it. If Europe is to lead the world by example, those commitments must be formalized well in advance of the COP 26 next year.

The European people are showing solidarity and resilience in these difficult times. As our leaders, you have a duty not to repeat the mistakes of the past when tackling the existential challenges ahead. Please, do not fail us now!

Respectfully yours,

Rise for Climate Belgium

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