Marcel Ciolacu, prime minister and leader of the ruling Social Democratic Party (PSD), signed on Monday, June 3, a memorandum of understanding on solutions to combat the worrying air pollution in Bucharest and create a much-needed green belt around the capital city. “Pollution is not left or right. Pollution is killing us all! And all of us, together, have a duty to fight this invisible killer,” the PM said.<\/p>\n
With Marcel Ciolacu’s signature, the Memorandum for Clean Air, Health, and the Future<\/a>, a pillar of the Together for the Green Belt\/\u00cempreun\u0103 pentru Centura Verde\u00a0civic platform initiated by mountaineer and environmentalist Alex G\u0103van, has managed to unite leaders from across the political spectrum.\u00a0<\/p>\n Liberal leader and Senate speaker Nicolae Ciuc\u0103 also signed the memorandum, alongside party presidents C\u0103t\u0103lin Drul\u0103 (USR), Kelemen Hunor (UDMR), and Drago\u0219 P\u00eeslaru and Ramona Strugariu (REPER),\u00a0who were joined by Bucharest mayor Nicu\u0219or Dan<\/a>, Ilfov County Council president Hubert Thuma, and environment minister Mircea Fechet<\/a> (PNL).<\/p>\n Monday’s signing event was held in a place chosen for its essential symbolic value – a meadow in the heart of the Balote\u0219ti forest, part of the future green belt, on the banks of the Vl\u0103sia river.<\/p>\n “Very few people manage to climb eight-thousanders without supplemental oxygen. Alex G\u0103van is one of them! Yes, the air is thin up there. But down here, we’re all suffocating from pollution. That’s what the Bucharest-Ilfov Green Belt must be. Oxygen reserve for the people who live here and feel the effects of pollution to the fullest! We are developing Bucharest and Ilfov, we are building infrastructure for access to the city, but we must also make sure that pollution doesn’t suffocate us, and one solution is the protection by law of the forests around the capital, new afforestation to increase the existing forest area, but also the opening of these forests to people, for recreational purposes,” prime minister Marcel Ciolacu said.<\/p>\n Moreover, he stated that the green belt concept should be extended to other cities in Romania. Plus, the authorities are already working on identifying land plots that could be used for afforestation, backed by the EU-funded Recovery and Resilience Plan, including for this project in Ilfov county.<\/p>\n “I congratulate Alex G\u0103van and all his colleagues from the Together for the Green Belt civic platform for uniting all the parties and all the political leaders around a common project. Pollution is not left or right. Pollution is killing us all! And all of us, together, have a duty to fight this invisible killer,” he added.<\/p>\n\n In his turn, Alex G\u0103van noted that, with Marcel Ciolacu’s signature, the Green Belt project is now backed by all main parliamentary parties, offering the guarantee that the new Forestry Code will pass the Parliament and, with it, the amendments to safeguard the peri-urban forests of Bucharest.<\/p>\n The new Forestry Code reform passed the Senate in April<\/a> and moved to final debates and a vote in the Chamber of Deputies. Given the political consensus on the project, G\u0103van believes the bill is now on track to be adopted by the Parliament by the end of June when the current parliamentary session ends.<\/p>\n “One step at a time, those who chose to be Together for the Green Belt materialize a historic project, one of the most important in the last 30 years, a project that will have a major impact on reducing pollution and increasing the quality of life in Bucharest and the metropolitan area, just as it is happening right now in countries that have a culture of protecting the environment,” Alex G\u0103van said.<\/p>\n Protecting the forests of Ilfov, which would be the starting point for creating the green belt around Bucharest, is an initiative of the\u00a0Together for the Green Belt\/\u00cempreun\u0103 pentru Centura Verde civic platform, launched roughly a year ago by Alex Ga\u0306van and Florin Stoican (president of the associations Kogayon and the Urban Nature Network), and joined by over 150 non-profits, civic groups, and public figures. As its initiators say, it is a public health project with a strong social, climate change mitigation, and\u00a0anti-pollution component, which also involves environmental actions.<\/p>\n The platform, with support from several MPs, submitted amendments to the new Forestry Code bill aimed at safeguarding the forests in Ilfov county. The reform passed the senators’ vote and moved to the Chamber of Deputies. To become law, once it passes both chambers of the Parliament, the bill also has to be signed by president Klaus Iohannis.\u00a0<\/p>\n Other Forestry Code amendments that passed the Senate in April, also backed by the\u00a0Together for the Green Belt\u00a0platform, promote unrestricted access to the forest for recreation and the protection and conservation of the so-called remarkable trees (old trees with multiple social-ecological functions) from the National Forestry Fund.<\/p>\n Further details about the\u00a0Together for the Green Belt\u00a0platform, an initiative of the\u00a0Alex G\u0103van Foundation, are available\u00a0here<\/a>\u00a0(in Romanian). Through an\u00a0online petition<\/a>, which has gathered more than 12,200 supporters so far, people can also back the civic platform’s efforts by signature.<\/p>\n irina.marica@romania-insider.com<\/p>\n