You may have heard recently about a draft law called the proposed EU Nature Restoration Law. The law was originally proposed in June of 2022 and is meant to build on the objectives of the EU Green Deal to create binding targets for cities for biodiversity and climate to effectively support ecosystem restoration (European Parliament news).

GoGreenRoutes stands in full support of the proposed EU Nature Restoration Law and sees its implementation as a crucial step not only towards increasing biodiversity and climate resilience ahead of the EU 2030 Biodiversity Strategy, but also for improving community health outcomes.

Green Space and Mortality

Due to lack of green space, our cities are facing overheating challenges the likes of which we have never seen before. Our partners , IS Global, conducted a vital study, "Cooling cities through urban green infrastructure: a health impact assessment of European cities" (Lungham et. al 2023). Using data from 93 European cities, the study found that over four percent of deaths in cities during the summer months are due to urban heat islands. Conversely, this Lancet Planetary health study, "Green space and mortality in European cities: a health impact assessment study" ( Barboza et. al 2021), demonstrates that a large number of premature deaths in European cities could be prevented by increasing exposure to green space.

These studies were conducted in an international team with a great spectrum of knowledge on the subject and with support from many organisations including GoGreenRoutes. The leader of this adept team is none other than our GGR partner Mark Nieuwenhuijsen, director of the Urban Planning, Environment and Health Initiative at IS Global. He explains in this article, "Our goal is to inform local decision-makers about the benefits of integrating green areas into all neighborhoods in order to promote more sustainable, resilient and healthy urban environments.”

Indicators: a crucial aspect of greening efforts 

GoGreenRoutes experts have conducted a round of monitoring in our cities, setting up a baseline for air, noise quality and other environmental factors. These measurements allow for standardisation and quality of our co-creative implementation in our Seedbed Cities. Hitting these indicators will ultimately ensure that these sites increase in their biodiversity over time and provide healthy spaces that serve the needs of residents. We've seen first hand that many city governments across Europe are already working hard to contribute toward urban greening. The proposed EU Nature Restoration Law is a key piece to acheiving these ambitions across sectors and scales of governance in a way that is measurable and provides lasting impact to combat the climate and biodiversity crisis.

The proposed EU Nature Restoration Law will face another round of votes on 12 July. This vote will be a decisive one.

Catch the latest statements to stay informed on the legislation from:

IUCN

IEEP

NetworkNatureEU

ICLEI Europe and countless others.

Don't wait to contact your local MEP in support of the EU Nature Restoration Law. Together we must act #ForNature.