This document is an excerpt from the EUR-Lex website
Document 52015DC0478
The EU biodiversity strategy: a current review of progress
This summary has been archived and will not be updated, because the summarised document is no longer in force or does not reflect the current situation.
The EU biodiversity strategy: a current review of progress
SUMMARY OF:
The mid-term review of the EU biodiversity strategy to 2020 — COM(2015) 478 final
SUMMARY
WHAT DOES THIS REPORT DO?
It provides a mid-term review of progress in implementing the EU biodiversity strategy to 2020. The objective is to inform decision-makers of areas in which increased efforts are needed.
KEY POINTS
The report highlights the fact that, since 2010, biodiversity loss and the degradation of ecosystem services have continued in the EU and globally, despite some important progress in policy, improved knowledge and many conservation successes at the local level. This has significant implications for the capacity of ecosystems to meet human needs in the future.
The report assesses progress towards each of the 6 operational targets as follows:
Target 1: fully implementing EU nature legislation
Target 2: maintaining and restoring ecosystems and their services
Target 3A: sustainable agriculture
Target 3B: sustainable forestry
Target 4: sustainable fisheries
Target 5: combating invasive alien species
Target 6: helping avert global biodiversity loss
Conclusions
BACKGROUND
Biodiversity, the unique variety of life, is essential to the EU’s economy and well-being. It provides essential services such as clean air and water, food, materials, medicines, health and recreation, pollination and soil fertility, as well as protection from extreme weather and climate change.
However, human-induced changes to biodiversity have been more rapid in the past 50 years than at any other time in human history. This is why the EU adopted its biodiversity strategy, which has the headline target of halting the loss of biodiversity and the degradation of ecosystem services in the EU by 2020, while stepping up the EU’s contribution to averting global biodiversity loss.
ACT
Report from the Commission to the European Parliament and the Council: The mid-term review of the EU biodiversity strategy to 2020 (COM(2015) 478 final of 2.10.2015)
RELATED ACTS
Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions — Our life insurance, our natural capital: an EU biodiversity strategy to 2020 (COM(2011) 244 final of 3.5.2011)
Commission Staff Working Document: EU Assessment of progress in implementing the EU Biodiversity Strategy to 2020 — Accompanying the document Report from the Commission to the European Parliament and the Council The Mid-Term Review of the EU Biodiversity Strategy to 2020 (SWD(2015) 187 final of 2.10.2015)
last update 12.01.2016