Unanimous vote in the Senate committees for the Bucharest-Ilfov Green Belt

Unanimous vote from the joint committees for the environment and for forests in the Senate for the Bucharest-Ilfov Green Belt. Unanimity for free access to the forest for recreation and protection of outstanding trees. For many years, Bucharest has been in the top 3 of the most polluted capitals in the EU, recording the largest budget losses associated with the treatment of diseases caused or worsened by air pollution, with an annual loss of 6.35 billion euros.

Enshrined as amendments to the new forestry code, the protection of the forests of Ilfov against commercial exploitation, the cornerstone of the future Bucharest-Ilfov Green Belt, was voted today, unanimously, after four rounds of debates, by the assembled commissions for the environment and for forests of the Senate. The Ministry of the Environment officially supports the approach, along with parliamentarians from across the political spectrum.

The Bucharest-Ilfov Green Belt (www.centuraverde.ro) is a public health project with a strong social and anti-pollution component, as well as mitigating the effects of climate change, part of a systemic solution that also involves a significant environmental component, shows in a press release.

In the context of the dramatic pollution in Bucharest and the worrying cutting of forests around the Capital, over 150 non-governmental organizations, civic groups and public persons, united in a non-political approach under the umbrella of the Civic Platform Together for the Green Belt and with the support of the Presidential Administration, came meeting politicians and authorities with the Memorandum for Clean Air, Health and the Future.

The document, in seven points, contains the amendments to the new forestry code and which are intended to protect the forests of Ilfov, the cornerstone of the future Bucharest-Ilfov Green Belt, the creation of green belts for other cities, as well as solutions to pollution in Bucharest and county, but also in the rest of the country. Among them are the creation and adoption of an integrated plan of the Bucharest City Hall and the Ilfov County Council to combat pollution or the inclusion of the topic related to air pollution in Bucharest and other cities on the agenda of the Supreme Council of Defense of the Country.

With unanimity, the assembled commissions also voted today for free access to the forest for recreation, a topic that has sparked heated debates in the public space in the last half year and for which the civic platform carried out an intense advocacy activity.

Also, the assembled commissions also unanimously voted for the protection and conservation of outstanding trees from the National Forest Fund through the new forestry code, after, two weeks ago, the Civic Platform Together for the Green Belt obtained, through an unprecedented institutional commitment, the support official of the Ministry of the Environment for them. They are the custodians of an identity memory that, once lost, will never be recovered and will thus create a void that cannot be filled.

Through an online petition that has already collected over 11,800 signatures, (https://campaniamea.declic.ro/p/ImpreunaPentruCenturaVerde), the Civic Platform Together for the Green Belt invites citizens to join in asking political and executive decision-makers for concrete measures for Clean Air, Health and Future.

In 2024, air quality and the creation of green belts in peri-urban areas cannot be absent from the program and priorities of any serious party and any serious candidate in the upcoming elections, and at the same time cannot be absent from their personal assessment make every voter responsible.

Alex Găvan, founder of the Civic Platform Together for the Green Belt: “The forest around the cities means much more than the timber or the monetary value of the wood. Infinitely more. The forest means oxygen. It means Life. The forest means health, including mental health. It means therapy and healing for a society increasingly alienated by the loss of connection and abandonment of the man who makes it up. The forest is containment. The forest is love“.

The Civic Platform Clean Air and the Bucharest Green Belt again appeals to the president of the Social Democratic Party, Marcel Ciolacu, and invites him to join and sign the Memorandum for Clean Air, Health and Future, PSD being the only non-signatory party.

The PSD leader’s signature represents the defining signature that the residents of Bucharest and Ilfov still need at this moment so that the protection of the existing forests in Ilfov, the cornerstone of the future green belt, becomes a reality in the next few weeksit is explained in the communication.

Previously, the memorandum was also signed by party presidents Nicolae Ciucă (PNL), Cătălin Drula (USR), Kelemen Hunor (UDMR), Dragoș Pîslaru and Ramona Strugariu (REPER), as well as the mayor of the capital, Nicușor Dan, and by Hubert Thuma, president of the Ilfov County Council.

The initiators of the civic platform are Alex Găvan, high-altitude climber and conservationist, and Florin Stoican, president of the associations Kogayon and Rețeaua pentru Urbană Natură.

“Together for the Green Belt” is a project of the Alex Găvan Foundation. The foundation was created to manifest in a concrete plan the vision of its founder according to which “The Universe means abundance, generosity and altruism”, by carrying out projects in the field of environment, education, sports, arts and social causes.