The European Commission, or EC, has included in its Biodiversity Strategies to plant 3 billion extra trees, expand the organic farming, and cut pesticide use by half by 2030.

EU Biodiversity Strategy for 2030:  Bringing Nature Back Into Our Lives

In the EU Biodiversity Strategy for 2030: Bringing Nature Back Into Our Lives, the European Commission outlined several targets by 2030. The highlights of the target include : 

• Thirty percent of Europe's land and seas to be declared protected areas by 2030
• Strict protection of at least a third of EU's protected areas, including all remaining primary and old-growth forests, are provided 
• Develop a new EU restoration plan to restore ecosystems across the land
• At least 25 percent of agricultural land to practice organic farming and the adaption of agro-ecological practices to be increased
• Chemical and hazardous pesticide reduced by 50 percent
• Three billion new trees planted in the EU, taking into consideration ecological principles
• At least 25,000 kilometers of free-flowing rivers are restored
• Thirty percent of species to have improved conservation status

The biodiversity strategy was strongly linked to averting future pandemic like the coronavirus as the plan aims to protect habitats and limit the interaction of wildlife species with humans. 

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According to Frans Timmermans, the European Commission's vice president for the European Green Deal, biodiversity strategies such as protecting habitats and limiting interaction with species is essential to prevent the emergence of disease from zoonoses. Timmermans added that the destruction of nature and the risk of extinction of one million species in ten years threaten life, health, and well-being. 

Ambitious Targets

Environmentalist groups like World Wildlife Fund in Europe lauded the plans saying that it was unlike anything seen under the commission in the past five years. Upgrading the number of trees planted from 2 billion to 3 billion by 2030 is more ambitious than before, Sabien Leemans of WWF said. 

However, critics are skeptical that the strategy will work. In the past biodiversity plans, Europe has failed in its voluntary target to restore at least 15 percent of degraded ecosystems by 2020. 

Ariel Brunner of Birdlife International Belgium said that new laws must complement these ambitions from the biodiversity strategy. He suggests setting legally binding targets next year to restore ecosystems such as wetlands. 

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Leemans said that crafting legislation would give the plan teeth, but it is essential to define how large the area to be restored is. 

The goal for cutting the pesticide use in half is challenging but necessary, Brunner said.

George Schwede, of the Campaign for Nature, a coalition of more than 100 conservation groups said that the target for expansion of organic farms is possible if EU agricultural subsidies are reformed to create incentives for it, and consider the environmental impacts of fossil-fuel-based fertilizers. 

Schwede added that success or failure in attaining the targets of the Biodiversity Strategies would rely on how the commissions and the member countries will implement the plans. Although the strategy has a framework to track the progress of implementation, measures such as fines for member states if they miss the goals are not yet defined. The strategy largely hinges on implementation, Schwede added. 

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