The Institute for Environmental Security has launched - in partnership with GLOBE-EU in Brussels, and others - a programme focusing on mainstreaming environmental and sustainable development factors into European foreign and security policy.

Working especially with Members of the European Parliament, the aim is to promote the forging and implementation of an integrated strategy for environment, sustainable development and security - or the better inclusion of environmental security aspects in the EU Common Foreign and Security Policy, European Security Strategy and European Sustainable Development Strategy.

Key issues being addressed include:

• Mainstreaming Environmental Factors into EU Foreign Policy
  What needs to be done to promote the further mainstreaming of environmental factors into EU foreign and security policy (including energy and food security and security related to other resources such as land, water, living marine resources, and terrestrial biodiversity)?
• Mainstreaming of Conflict Prevention into EU Development Cooperation
  What needs to be done to help promote the further mainstreaming of conflict prevention and livelihood protection into EU development cooperation especially in vulnerable countries?
• Civilian-Military Cooperation
  How can military and non-military assets and resources be better deployed and co-ordinated in the pursuit of environmental protection and sustainable development policies and measures? And what additional capabilities will be needed for responding to environment-related humanitarian emergencies?
• EU-US Cooperation
  How can there be increased transatlantic cooperation on environment, sustainable development and security?
• Energy Security and Climate Security
  Should/could the EU conduct a global “threat assessment” of the impact of environmental degradation, in particular from climate change to 2050 and beyond, notably in terms of humanitarian and security crises resulting from resource depletion, droughts, floods, deforestation, inadequate poverty alleviation and under-development, and if so how could this be dovetailed into the EU’s external relations policies?
  How could energy security and climate security be pursued in tandem?
  How could climate mitigation and adaptation be given a higher priority in the EU’s external relations policies in practice?
  
• Relation to Other External Policies
  Should the CFSP/CESDP aspects of the EU’s external relations policy be made more consistent and coherent with its trade, aid, development and international environment policies and if so, by means of what institutional or legal mechanisms could this be achieved?
  Which of the individual sectoral policies (agricultural and rural development; health policy; energy policy and technology transfer; trade liberalisation etc.) are most likely to be decisive in combating poverty and reducing insecurity and instability in the world’s most vulnerable developing countries?

The programme was launched at the Symposium on Sustainable Development and Security at the European Parliament on 31 May 2006.

The aim of the symposium was to raise political issues with interested Members of the European Parliament related to improving the integration of environmental and development concerns, notably Climate Change, into the EU's existing Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) and the European Security Strategy.

Working Groups on Greening European Security

Four working groups were set up to review current policies and best practices and seek to identify gaps in European and international policy and action with respect to four stages in the conflict cycle:

Group A: Predicting Instability - Monitoring, risk assessments and early warning in vulnerable areas and measures to avoid conflict.

Group B: Preventing Conflict - Policy instruments and measures for areas of escalating tensions and for conflict prevention (military and non-military).

Group C: Building Peace - Crisis management and resolution in the event of conflict (military and non-military).

Group D: Recovery and Transition - Post conflict restoration, reconstruction and structural adaptation.

The working groups should produce policy recommendations taking into account the relationships between:

• Environment and Development
• Security and Development
• Environment and Security

... and the interface among all three.

The starting point for the groups will be to review the Report and Resolution on Environment, Security and Foreign Affairs adopted by the European Parliament on 28 January 1999 and the subsequent actions in this field by the European Commission.

Working especially with GLOBE-EU Members of the European Parliament, the groups will present their proposals for political action by the European institutions and Member States at a conference on Greening Foreign and Security Policy: The Role of Europe to be held in December 2006.

Related Documents

All links are to PDF files under 100KB, unless marked.

• EU Policy
  • Report on the Environment, Security and Foreign Policy of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, Security and Defence Policy, European Parliament
    Rapporteur: Mrs Maj Britt Theorin. 14 January 1999 (PDF 144KB)
  • Resolution on the Environment, Security and Foreign Policy of the European Parliament
    28 January 1999
  • A Secure Europe in a Better World: European Security Strategy
    12 December 2003
  • Message from Margot Wallström, Commissioner for the Environment, to The Hague Conference on Environment, Security and Sustainable Development
    The Peace Palace, The Hague, 9-12 May 2004
• Role of the Military
  • Book Review: The Utility of Force - The Art of War in the Modern World
    by General Sir Rupert Smith / Reviewed by Robert Cooper
  • Impact of the Military / Conflict on the Environment: Nature in War - Biodiversity Conservation
    by Esther Blom, Netherlands Working Group on Ecology and Development
  • The Effects of War on Biodiversity in Tropical Forests
    by Jeffrey A. McNeely, Chief Scientist, IUCN-The World Conservation Union (PDF 860KB)