The Council is making environmental reporting obligations in EU legislation more coherent and more consistent by amending ten legislative acts. The purpose of the regulation adopted today is to streamline reporting obligations, reduce administrative costs, improve the quality of available data for future evaluations and increase transparency.

The amendments will apply to ten pieces of environmental legislation:

the sewage sludge directive 86/278/EEC;

the noise directive 2002/49/EC;

the infrastructure for spatial information in the European Community (INSPIRE) directive 2007/2/EC;

the birds' directive 2009/147/EC;

the European pollutant release and transfer register (E-PRTR) regulation (EC) No 166/2006;

the animal testing directive 2010/63/EC;

the EU timber regulation (EU) No 995/2010;

the forest law enforcement, governance and trade (FLEGT) regulation (EC) No 2173/2005;

the convention on the international trade in endangered species of wild fauna and flora (CITES) regulation (EC) 338/97;

the environmental liability directive 2004/35/EC.

Background

The regulation was presented by the European Commission on 31 May 2018. It is based on the findings of the Fitness Check evaluation on the reporting and monitoring of EU environment policy which the Commission finalized in June 2017. The Council reached its position on the draft regulation on 7 November 2018.

Negotiations between the Austrian Presidency and the European Parliament started on 15 November 2018 and ended in a provisional agreement on 19 December 2018, which was confirmed by EU ambassadors of member states.

Today's adoption of the regulation by the Council is the final step in the legislative procedure. The legislation will enter into force on the day following that of its publication in the official journal. It will be directly applicable in all member states.