Stockholm (NordSIP) – On 18 October, the Platform on Sustainable Finance, together with the European Commission, launched the long-awaited EU Taxonomy Stakeholder Request Mechanism. It is an outreach to all of those affected by the framework, asking them to submit suggestions on new economic activities that could be added to the current setup. The mechanism also allows stakeholders to make suggestions on the need to revise some of the screening criteria of existing activities. The only requirement for the suggestions to be considered by the regulators is that they are evidence-based and substantiated either scientifically, technically, or both.
“Do you feel the EU Taxonomy is missing out on the great contribution that a particular economic activity has to offer to achieve net zero by 2050 or to meet EU goals in any of the other five environmental objectives? Tell us which one(s) and why,” comments Helena Viñes Fiestas, the Chair of the EU Platform on Sustainable Finance, on LinkedIn. “Make your case, and we will do our best to include it,” she assures potential contributors.
The stakeholder request mechanism will run continuously, monitored on a regular basis by the Commission and the Platform, allowing respondents to submit their input at any given time. However, the first deadline is now set at 15 December 2023. The Platform’s Technical Working Group will duly process all submitted requests received by that date. According to the announcement, a second cut-off date will be communicated as soon as possible.
Next year, the Platform’s Technical Working Group will provide a summary of the requests received, as well as an explanation of how they were assessed and what recommendations the Platform made on the basis of the requests. Ahead of this, they mention that they reserve the right to decide not to prioritise certain activities, even though the submitted requests were substantiated with the necessary evidence and the suggested changes or new activities complied with the requirements.
Once the Platform has submitted its recommendations, the next step will be for the Commission to assess them and decide on the need to amend the EU taxonomy in future delegated acts. As always, the Commission is not bound by the feedback submitted through the stakeholder request mechanism nor by the recommendations of the Platform.
With less than two months left before the first deadline, it is now high time for stakeholders with strong and substantiated opinions to make use of the mechanism and submit their suggestions.
