“ELCA brings the green voice of landscapers and gardeners to Europe”

That was the message of Egbert Roozen, Secretary General of the European Landscape Contractors Association (ELCA), at an online conference on August 17th of the Norsk Anleggsgartnermesterlag (Norwegian association of landscapers and gardeners). Although Norway is not a member of the European Union, they follow legislative initiatives in Brussels with great interest.

ELCA speaks on behalf of 26 countries, 13.000 companies and 125.000 workers in the landscaping and gardening branch. “That gives us the authority to be spokesman and partner in legislative initiatives. Our message is based on experiences, concerns and opportunities that entrepreneurs and representatives of companies bring in”, said Egbert Roozen. “The European Green Deal, that is launched by the European Commission in 2019, is of great importance for our sector. We can easily align our green and nature-based solutions to the challenges addressed by the EU Green Deal on climate change, biodiversity loss and care for the health of people.” Roozen explained what our role can be in the Climate Law, the Renovation Wave, the EU Taxonomy on green investments and the Skills Agenda. These initiatives within the EU Green Deal are already put in action on national level by the EU-member states.

Nature Restoration Law Actual on the political agenda in Brussels now is the Nature Restoration Law. This is the last pilar of the EU Green Deal. In the coming period the trialogue between the European Parliament, the Council of the EU and the European Commission will start to define the final text of the law. Egbert Roozen gave an overview of the actions that ELCA, in cooperation with the partners in the SoGreen Alliance, has done to express the great opportunities that we see in this law in greening cities. ELCA has sent letters to the participants of the trialogue with suggestions to make the law from the point of view of green cities even stronger.

“The aim of our lobby is to offer perspective in the future development to decision makers in our sector. We keep ourselves recommended for input and feedback to let our green voice heard loud and clear at European institutions”, concluded Egbert Roozen.