Coronavirus Covid-19: EU Commission, a strategy for biodiversity and the “Farm to Fork” initiative

“The coronavirus crisis has revealed our vulnerability and how important it is to redress the balance between human activity and nature. Climate change and the loss of biodiversity are a clear, impending danger for mankind”. This is how Frans Timmermans, deputy president of the European Commission, who is also in charge of the European Green Deal, explained the EU Commission’s adopting two new strategies, one about biodiversity and one named “Farm to Fork”. The former deals with the main causes of the loss of biodiversity and – as explained in a notice from Brussels – “it is essential to prevent the onset of and strengthen resilience to any future pandemics, and to provide instant business and investment opportunities that may revive the EU’s economy”. The measures planned for the protection, sustainable use and replenishment of nature will give economic benefits to the local communities, by creating sustainable jobs and growth. The “Farm to Fork” strategy includes instead a number of initiatives to outline a food system that is focussed on sustainability, food safety and access to healthy food diets from a healthy planet. According to Stella Kyriakides, European commissioner for health and food safety, these are “steps forward to make the EU’s food system a driving force for sustainability” and to change “the ways we grow, buy and eat food, with health benefits for citizens, societies and the environment”.
Valentina Bombelli