Pre-consultation for EU Green Paper on sustainable phosphorus use: Exploring governance innovations in the Baltic Sea Region agricultural-food system

In recent years, there has been mounting awareness that phosphorus is not only essential for agriculture/food production, but that it is also a limited resource, and that new governance measures are required to ensure its use is sustainable.

With the September 2011 Roadmap to a Resource Efficient Europe, the European Commission received approval to explore future governance alternatives for promoting effective recycling across sectors in society. A European Green Paper on Phosphorus is being prepared by the European Commission and will be published in early summer 2012. An online stakeholder consultation is to follow, and if negotiations go well, there are many opportunities to strike novel ‘win-win’ solutions for a range of sectors and societal interests.

The Danish Government, which currently holds the rotating Presidency of the European Council, has included phosphorus management and reuse on the agenda of a conference to be held in May 2012. As part of this process, the Baltic COMPASS team has been invited to submit a position paper that summarises Baltic Sea Region experiences and interests through the perspectives of stakeholders. This paper may also inspire inputs to the EU Green Paper.

This discussion brief outlines the key issues and invites Baltic Sea Region stakeholders to contribute to the position paper by participating in a survey. The survey can be accessed directly at http://bit.ly/Baltic-Survey; the questions and further details are also included on the brief.

Download the discussion brief (PDF, 908kb)