Report from the Commission to the Council and the European Parliament on the experience gained in the application of Directive 2003/4/EC on public access to environmental information

The Commission established this evaluation report to the European Parliament and to the Council in accordance with Article 9(2) of Directive 2003/4/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council on public access to environmental information and repealing Council Directive 90/313/EEC. It is based on the experience gained by the Commission and the Member States over several years of application of the Directive. As required by Article 9(1), every Member State has reported on how it is implementing the Directive.

As stipulated in Article 9(2), the report takes into account developments in electronic technology. This review therefore forms part of the Digital Agenda for Europe. It also fits in with the general goal of making 'full use of information and communication technologies', set in the Europe 2020 Strategy.

This report focuses on the new provisions, such as the broader definitions of terms and more active dissemination of information. It must also be seen in the context of recent policy developments such as the Communication on Implementation, in which the Commission identified access to information as a key priority for improving implementation of environmental law and committed itself to assessing how to make the Directive more effective.

EUR-Lex: COM(2012)774: Follow the progress of this document through the decision-making procedure http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/HIS/?uri=COM:2012:774:FIN

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