Transport & environmental policy (EU)
TRANSPORT & ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY
Our modern world is heading towards
creation of more and more regional blocks in order to achieve greater stability
and prosperity in all areas. The European Union, one of the strongest regional
blocks, has its economic policies as its main concern how to achieve stronger
cooperation, integration and prosperity within the organization. The main
discussion of this paper will be the EU Transport and Environmental policy. The
main purpose of this essay is to introduce main concepts and workings of both
policies separately and then evaluate how these are applied in reality. However
the main concepts based on the previously mentioned ideas will be to stress out
the importance or need of both policies and what have been their major
successes and failures so far. At the end the main task will be to analyze and
make a conclusion, for both policies together, what should be done better and
what would be the possible directions of those in the future.
Transport Policy
For the EU’s goal to have an efficient and dynamic
economy and cohesive society the crucial issue is to move goods and people as
quickly, cheaply and efficiently as possible. This concept is reflected by
proper transport policy. The basis of the Transport policy within EU is
reflected in articles 74 to 84 of the Treaty of Rome (1957). These articles set
the rules that call for the following points: common set of rules that would
govern the transport policy within EU; for promotion of public transport
services there have to be state aids to support it; to have as low costs as
possible; introduce several means of transport (road, water, sea and air
transport). Why it is actually important to have an effective transport policy
within the EU? The main reason for this is, that transport as a growing
industry has a significant importance in the economy of the EU. In other words
if EU wants to have a integrated and prosperous economy it has to built up an
effective transport system. Therefore the main concern of transport with regards
to the economy involves several important aspects: support the process of
Single Market; promote sustainable development; creating appropriate
infrastructure to reduce disparity among regions; provide and improve safety;
establish relations with third countries etc. At the end it is also important
to mention that EU system of transport does not necessarily stop at EU borders,
it might continue even further if a non member country has an agreement with
the EU concerning the transport issues.
Over time the demand of transport means and services has
changed rapidly within EU. There were several factors contributing to such
changes: shifting of manufacturing away from many of originally urban sites;
the great increase in sector of services; greater mobility among professional
people; increase in incomes therefore more use of transport is created etc.
What this change actually means in reality? Firstly, the new transporting
network (beginning of 20th century) was created and is used by all states apart
from Spain. Secondly, in general since last two decades there has been major
increase in transport, which created a new mobility within the EU. The
transport of passengers increased over 85% (fastest change in air transport).
However despite many disadvantages (pollution, traffic jams etc.) road
transport has achieved the greater increase and currently dominates in the area
of transport means.
By the completion of Single Market the transport policy
was heading towards the advancement. The main concern, again, was to create a
set of rules where within the Single Market the transport would be efficiently
provided and also the competition would be present as well. The main worries
concerning the Single Market issue were not to allow the creation of
monopolies, not distorting competition, managing of structural changes and
ensuring that all means of transport will cover their costs (even causing the
environmental damage). These issues were more or less solved but mainly two
issues have been the center of debate concerning the impact of Single Market.
The first one is the road haulage, mainly because it is the most common of
means how to transfer goods. The second is the civil aviation (which grows
constantly) and is the main means of passengers’ long-distance travelling.
The road haulage is one of the major concerns of the EU
transport policy because it is the major means of transporting goods within the
region. Firstly, this area has been the main concern for the transport policy
mainly because it is the most important mode of transport and both
“international and domestic freight transport have been subjected to a variety
of controls and restrictions in terms of prices and entry into market” (Barnes,
Barnes 84). How much restricted control is applied varies from one country to
another. For example while Germany applied strict regulatory controls, UK used more liberal approach towards such issue. However the main principle of
international haulage is characterized by the use of so-called quota system,
meaning that hauliers have to obtain the permit to be able to undertake
international journeys. One form of permit is so called Bilateral permit,
which is mainly about two particular member states who make a bilateral
agreements about the amount of haulage licences to be granted to non-domestic
carries. Another form is Multilateral permit, which allowed unlimited
journeys within the EU region. This one became especially important over the
last two decades and was given even wider scope by the EU. Secondly, because of
fairness among domestic and non-domestic hauliers there was the introduction of
payment for usage of roads (1250 ECU per year, Euro-regional tax disc).
Thirdly, because there are other issues in which a member states differ (weight
that trucks might carry) there was the introduction of weight allowed to be
carried by trucks that could vary as much as 30 % depending on particular
member state. Finally, the new agreements created more competitive environment
within the EU. Trucks could obtain loads for tour journeys so that they are
more often fully loaded. However, the road haulage now days takes highest
percentage of modes of transport even though it causes the highest pollution
and therefore most harm to the environment. Main concern that it should be
joined if not substituted by other modes of transport (such as rail, inland
waterways, air, sea etc.) that are more ecological. The best way to achieve
this would be through incentives, targeted advertisement emphasizing for the
need of usage of other means of transport.
The civil aviation form of transport is the other crucial
area because it is the constantly growing and most common means of transport of
passengers for the long-distance travelling. It is important to mention that
prior to 1990s the air transport was highly regulated and in most cases
state-owned. However due to increasing importance of global competition the
aviation industry switched from being a infant industry to being a provider of
mass service, mainly privately owned. The major breakthrough came in 1986 with
the so-called “Nouvelles Frontieres judgement of ECJ, which confirmed that
competition rules did apply to the air transport sector as well. Competition
rules applied under Article 85 of Treaty of Rome, which takes into
consideration the anti-competitive agreements; and Article 86, which concerns
the abuse of dominant market positions (Barnes, Barnes 89). The main features
of liberalization of aviation services came in years 1987, 1990 and introduces
the following concepts: free pricing for scheduled airfares; rules against
predatory pricing were strengthened; entry into industry was easier; allowed
duly licensed air carries to operate virtually all routes between airports in
the EU. Most importantly, the liberalization of air transport is the part of
completion of Single Market in service sector and is believed to bring the
prosperity mainly because the possible threat of oligopoly is reduced, price of
the air travel will fall, there will be available grater availability of
flights (more efficient transport area) and finally there will be provided new
spirit for competition between existing airlines.
One of the important concerns with regards to the air
travel services is the amount of state aid given to the particular airlines.
During the period of 1991 to 1994 there was a great amount of state aid given
to the European airlines in order to improve the situation within the area of
air transport. However the state aid was inefficiently used by many airlines.
The main example was the French “Air France” that had a loss of 440 million
Euro in a first half of 1993, and recognized a need of financial help from the
state. However after it had received the help from state the actual loss at the
end of 1993 turned out to be 1 billion Euro. Other airlines argued that giving
a state aid to companies that show significant level of loss deprives them for
any possibility of gaining the help from state if they need it and prevents
them from equal treatment and opportunities. Therefore after a successful
discussion the EU Commission has changed the criteria for giving the aid to
airlines and the outcome has brought following points: the state aid is given
on “one last time” basis; the remaining airlines that are not privatized should
do so; careful monitoring of restructuring process; government should not
participate in commercial decisions of airlines and so on and so forth. What is
important to mention concerning this issue is mainly that if transport policy
has to work properly in this sector there has to be emphasis on coordination of
infrastructure of industry. EU could possibly help the process by providing
enough funding but at the same time there has to be a will of national
governments to encourage competitive practices.
For the European economy to operate as a Single Market
there has to be presence of common transport policy. Simply speaking, many
member states consider their national transport issues but undermine the
importance of the overall European system of transport network that would connect
all areas within the region, bring closer cooperation and greater economic
efficiency and success. These is to be achieved through the establishment of
so-called Trans-European networks (TENs). Its establishment will require member
states to combine with the EU in order to achieve greater coherence. This ought
to bring the economic growth and deeper integration within the EU. The main
tasks include “better and safer travel at low costs; effective planning in
Europe in order to avoid a concentration of population; bridge building towards
Eastern Europe in order to step up investment and promote trade” (Barnes,
Barnes 98). All these have to be achieved mainly through removing of financial
and regulatory obstacles and involving private investors in such issues. What
is most believed that effective working of such a network will bring economic
and social cohesion. The important thing to be emphasized here is that this
idea needs the proper funding coming from all different sources (involving
arrangements between public and private sector). In order to achieve the
all-European strategy the new routes have to be taken and focus especially on
those areas were the coordination between member states and EU authorities is
performed badly therefore has to be improved.
For better understanding of the whole issue let’s
summarize major successes and failures of the EU transport policy. First major
success was actually the stressing out the importance of transport policy
within the EU as a necessary part for the effective economic integration and
therefore making it a part of the EU law. Another significant success could be
connected with the increase, during last two decades, of usage of many means of
transport mainly road, air, rail, water etc. It could be followed by
liberalization of road haulage and civil aviation. The last, but probably most
important, success would be the effort to establish Trans-European networks
(TENs) which is supposed to provide EU with better economic and social
cohesion. However there are several failures that have to be mentioned as well.
One of them would be that even though there has been an effort to liberalize
the road haulage, this means of transport is most commonly used despite the
fact that causes the biggest threat to our environment. There has been complete
failure by EU to substitute it with other more ecological means such as air or
rail transport. Another significant failure by EU concerns the state aids and
ineffective spending on policy issues (e.g. Air France). This could be followed
by the fact that EU did not manage to convince or create greater cooperation
between member states and EU authorities therefore leaving the states to take
care more of their national interests rather than common European interest.
Generally speaking, the EU has created a lot of good proposals and concepts
concerning effective trade policy on the paper but it has done much less in
converting it into real practices (more important). What is necessary for the
future is that EU should find the way how to spend the money devoted tot the
trade policy more efficiently and most importantly to find means for applying
all these practices that it has on paper in reality so to achieve a real
progress in all areas.
Environmental policy
The concept of environment is crucial because it affects
all citizens and therefore its presence in the EU legislation is of great
importance. Unlike many other policies, the beginning of environmental policy
does not go backwards up to the Treaty of Rome in 1957. Its main concern
(importance) was introduced in 1972, were a great amount of amendments,
regulations, decisions, directives have been adopted by member states.
Afterwards it became the part of the Treaty on European Union (TEU), more
precisely in article 2, where its importance is firstly recognized by a EU
treaty. Mainly, legislation has been introduced to cover such issues as
“quality of water, waste management, air quality, control of pollution from
transport, emission of chemicals, protection of wildlife and countryside, as
well as measures to make a legislation work. As a result the EU’s environmental
policy has an impact on all aspects of life” (Barnes, Barnes 294). It was easy
for the EU to put all these aspects on the paper but more difficult to make 15
member states (currently 25) to adopt and practice these in reality. The main
aim how to achieve this was through the introduction of different levels of
sustainable development principles. The main aim of this policy in the future
will be to redistribute costs and responsibilities among major polluters and
encourage cooperation between different groups, industries etc.
As was already mentioned the importance of environment
and its protection within the EU was introduced for the first time in 1972. The
most important thing considering the legal basis of environmental issue was
that in 1986 the SEA included a chapter on environmental issue which gave the
policy much firmer legal background. The SEA clearly stated main points of
environmental issue as follows: preserving, protecting and improving the
quality of human life; contribution towards human health and rational use of
natural resources. These were to be achieved by the three main principles which
include: prevention is better than cure approach; rectification of damage at
its source; polluter pays to clean up the damage. What is also important
concerning the legal basis is that SEA included requirement that environment
should become the common part of EU policies and also introduced the principle
of subsidiarity. Another important concept that deserves mention is the
sustainable development. The main idea was that in 1987 there was a need to
develop environmental policy that would contribute to greater economic growth
but with condition to be coupled with effective protection of the environment.
The idea of sustainable development was introduced in 1987 “Bruntland Report, Our
common future” (Barnes, Barnes 295). There was presented the idea that it
is possible to achieve economic growth with the effective protection of
environment. This created the principle of sustainable development which was
supported in 1992 in Rio summit and is common phenomenon now days.
One good aspect to realize is how the economic prosperity
and growth are connected to the environment issue. Here we can emphasize
several main concepts. Firstly, it is argued economic benefits heading towards
removal of trade barriers have a negative impact when it comes to an
environment. The idea is that only at zero economic growth there is no negative
impact on the environment. Secondly, there has to be ability of EU to intervene
and harmonize definitions an standards in areas where differences might cause
distortion to barriers to trade. If the state keeps the low standards compared
to others where the standard is higher than they practice unfair advantage over
these states. Simply speaking, if the low standards are cause of ignorance
towards an environmental damage the product prices in such a country could be
lower therefore giving companies unfair advantage on the Single Market. This is
where the EU ought to intervene. Thirdly, there has to be some measure at EU
level concerning environment in order to achieve effective implementation of
legislation. Finally, there has to be potential for creation of eco-industries
as well as development of new technologies that will promote more competition
within the EU environmental industries and relationships.
The main concern is to see what is the great importance
of the environmental policy and how it’s effective application can be achieved
in reality. As was already said the EU environmental policy was started in 1972
during the Summit conference of Heads of the States in Paris. At the same time
was launched the First Environmental Action Program to meet those main
criteria. The criteria that emphasize why we need the environmental policy are
the following: “prevent, reduce and eliminate pollution; maintain satisfactory
ecological balance and protect the biosphere; avoid damage to ecological
balance; to ensure that more account is taken of environmental aspects in town
planning and land use; to work for those ends with non-member states of the EU”
(Barnes, Barnes 301). The Second Environmental Action Program created
more proactive approach in the environment, meaning that it looked for specific
resources for the prevention of the pollution. The Third Environment Action
Program emphasized mainly on the prevention rather than cure principle. Fourth
Environmental Action Program as adopted at the same time as was the Single
Market program, therefore representing clear linkage of economic and
environmental issues. The economy should not undermine the protection of
environment. Fifth Environmental Action Program was created mainly for
better approach towards environmental management. The emphasis was put mainly
on research and monitoring of environmental problems. This encouraged many
states to use several tools (taxes, market-based instruments) to protect the
environment. What is also important, the program established EU Financial
Instrument for the Environment (LIFE). Most important is the last or the Six
Environmental Action Program (until 2010). The main principles are:
“tackling climate change and global warming; protect natural habitat and
wildlife; addressing environment and health issues; preserving natural
resources and managing wastes” (Environment). All policy is based on
“polluter pays” principle (payment can be required through investment or
taxation on goods etc.).
As with all other policies the environment policy has to
be backed up by the financial support if it want to work properly and achieve
the necessary progress. There are several places where the environmental policy
can be supported from. Firstly, the Structural fund provided some 1 billion ECU
during the period of 1988 to 1993. However taking into an account that
environment is a crucial aspect of EU policies this amount of money is
negligible for such a period of time. Secondly, Cohesion fund within the EU
provided some very small amount of money in 1994, which again made no
significant progress in such a crucial issue. Finally, the most important
source of funding is currently The Financial Instrument for the Environment
(LIFE). However this was not created as to be separate agency financing the EU
environmental issues but only as a body that ensures that financial support
coming from all different resources is used in a most efficient way so to get
the highest possible impact (sustainable development). As we can see here lies
one of the main problems of environmental policy which is the lack of financial
support for its effective implementation. For the future concern would be to
increase of funding from whatever sources if the EU environmental policy is
about to be efficient.
One of the most crucial issues concerning environmental
policy is to see to what extent it is actually effective. One of the first
concerns is the actually there is a lack of commitment among the Member states.
More precisely, the most of the legislation was adopted in the form of
directives. Directives is the principle were the end result is crucial but the
way it is going to be achieved depends on the particular member state. As a
consequence the gab has been created between the drafters of the legislation
and member states who responsible for putting legislation into practice. Main
point is that if particular member state lacks the commitment to particular
issue then the effective outcome is uncertain. These cases occurred in
countries such as Greece, Ireland, Italy and England. Other main concern in
this area is that there has to be legal compliance with legislation. The main
idea is that Commission encourages individuals to report infringements of EU
directives, therefore Commission will afterwards restore the order. Commission
has already taken action against states such as Belgium or Italy for not managing to introduce legislation to put EU’s laws into practice. In addition
EU has introduced new penalty for states that fail to do so: “If the state
concerned fails to take necessary measures…within the time limit laid down by
the Commission, the latter may bring the case before the Court of Justice. In
so doing it should specify the amount of lump sum or penalty payment…If the
court of Justice finds that the Member State concerned has not complied with
its judgment it may impose a lump sum or penalty payment on it” (Barnes, Barnes
307). Certainly those two factors are of great importance for effectiveness of
policy as such but there are other factors, such as sufficient financial
support and finding most appropriate means for solution of the problem for each
specific area, that are even more important.
The need of agency that would support the enforcement of
EU legislation led to creation of the European Environment Agency, based in Copenhagen. The main task of the agency is to provide the state of environment and warn
before the problem is about to arise. The agency mainly provides the
information on which decision is made by member states; ensures the promotion
of best practices for the environmental protection and technologies; helps the
Commission in sorting the research results. However the main concern of the
European Environment Agency is to support initiators and provide effective
enforcement of legislation mainly by providing and spreading information.
There are several market-based instruments proposed by EU
that are supposed to force both consumers and producers to behavior that is
headed in direction, which is less harmful to the environment. The idea of EU
is that by usage of economic and fiscal instruments the true price will be
always paid therefore companies won’t be able to continue with wasteful
practices. One of the first parts of the legislation to deal with such issue
was “EU’s Eco-management and Audit Scheme Regulation (EMAR). It is based on the
introduction of cycle of environmental auditing by a company with the objective
of identifying and introducing measures to improve environmental performance
over time” (Barnes, Barnes 312). Another type of instrument is so-called
Eco-labeling, which makes consumers aware of the issue of environment and
stressing out its importance. However in both cases the important thing is that
information is made public and is commonly shared by the citizens of Europe. Another form how to intervene in this area is the form of taxation. The main idea
is to impose taxes on the activities that cause pollution The last of the
concepts is the application of principle of subsidiarity, meaning applying same
conditions of competition and same environmental practices to all member
countries.
The very important concept of the environment within the
EU is that pollution prevention and control has to be more integrated. The main
idea of this approach was to supplement existing directives by new ones that
would force member states to adapt their minimum discharge standards to best
available techniques. This means that technology will be commonly developed but
its adaptation will be left to member states to decide how to use it in most
efficient way. Every member state will be required to impose limit values for
all substances listed in “Annexes to Directives”. The main goal or purpose of
this approach is to protect environment as a whole rather than let it transfer
from one area to another.
Once again the useful thing would be to summarize all the
successes and failures that EU has achieved within the concern of environmental
policy. Among the biggest successes we could count the fact that despite
failure to recognize the importance of environment in the Treaty of Rome it has
been achieved later on in 1972 and made a part of TEU. The success is obviously
the ability to create the legal principles and main ideas of the policy.
Another form of success could be seen in the creation of EEA and establishment
of Six Environmental Action Programs that deal with issue of environment into
more details. Probably the biggest success was the creation of Market-based
instruments to make public aware of an issue and also to make it participate in
such an important concept. However there are probably more failures than
successes in this case. One of the most obvious failures is that EU does not
provide policy with sufficient financial backing therefore preventing it from
being effective in a first place. The other failure, closely linked to the
previous one, is that even the financial support given to the policy issues is
not spent efficiently (not spent on most important concepts). Another failure
could be the fact that EU deals with the environmental policy in a very broad
sense. It means that it should go more into details and deal with specific
areas of the whole environment. Finally, one of the biggest failures similarly
to the first policy discussed, is that EU has done great deal of putting all
necessary concepts on the paper but still does not do very much in reality.
Therefore if the environment, as a crucial issue for everyone of us, has to be
taken towards a progress for the future concern of EU would be to find
appropriate means for every particular aspect of the whole policy and instead
of lovely talks what should be done it has to start practicing these in real
world situations.
After analyzing the need, main concepts, workings,
successes/failures of transport and environmental policy, there is a necessary
task to realize what has to be done by EU in the future for making greater
integration and greater progress in all areas of the European Union. We have
seen that both policies, as well as many other policies within EU, are of great
importance and are more or less closely linked to each other. Both of the
policies have the good structural background with all its main working
principles and basic ideas but unfortunately these are only well performed in
the legislation or treaties. The EU, for its future progress, has to overcome
several concepts that it has been missing so far. Firstly, the EU has to
redistribute its funding to every policy according to the actual need of
particular policy, meaning that it has to provide enough funding for every policy
in order to make it work well. Secondly, the funding available has to be spent
in most efficient way, meaning that areas of particular policy that really need
the financial support have the priority over the others that are less in need
of financing. Thirdly, EU when approaching its policies, in most cases tends to
get the concern of a policy in general terms. This should be substituted by
taking deeper approach, more precisely into specific areas of a problem of
policy and then building up a whole aspect of policy. Finally, the most
important idea is for EU to establish specific concepts for particular policies
and rather then on the proposal based on documents what should be done it must
implement these main ideas and concepts more in real life situation. By doing
so this is the only way how to achieve progress within the EU policies. The
progress within the economic policies is a must to survival of the European
Union in future.
Works Cited Page:
Ian Barnes, Pamela M. Barnes. The Enlarged European
Union. Pearson education limited, Essex,
England. Published: Addison Wesley Longman Publishing, New York, USA: 1995.
Transport. Environment. May 14, 2004. http://www.europa.eu.int
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