The European Parliament has rejected the European Union Forest Monitoring Law proposal.
Between concerns over centralised authority and calls for stronger environmental monitoring, members of the EP in Strasbourg yesterday voted against a law that required in the end more reporting and regulation.
Protecting forests, MEPs from various political groups agreed, is a shared European concern – but not one the EU can easily legislate for.
The regulation, proposed by the European Commission in 2023, aimed to improve data collection and monitoring of Europe’s forests to strengthen resilience against droughts, pests and wildfires.
MEPS, from EC President Ursula von der Leyen (European People’s Party, EPP) to right-wing groups, though, said it would bring more paperwork than progress. The proposal was rejected by 370 votes to 264.
The EC had already hinted it would withdraw the bill from its upcoming work plan. The rejection followed a similar outcome in the EP’s environment and agriculture committees.
Alexander Bernhuber, EPP group negotiator for forest monitoring at the EP’s Committee on Environment, Public Health and Food Safety (ENVI), explained why they had already voted against the proposal.
“This is a member-state competence so this would totally go against that … and take a look at a map, countries like Malta with basically no forest, do not need that,” he said.
Forests fall under what EU treaties define as a “shared competence” — areas where both the EU and national governments can act.
In practice, that often leaves unclear who should legislate, as forest policy remains largely a national responsibility, yet environmental protection is a shared EU competence. That overlap, many MEPs said, risks constant friction.
“While these goals are promising … it does not seem to align with our current goals, as it absolutely brings more bureaucracy and a lot of work for member states to bring all the documentation,” Bernhuber said at a press conference before the vote.
He added that “twenty-four member states already do a very good job in forest management” and that extra controls would “bring duplication and unnecessary cost”.
Stefan Köhler, another EPP member, said the EP had “the opportunity to end this once and for all: So many rules and costs for taxpayers we do not want or need”.
MEPs on the other side of the hemicycle argued the opposite. They said the law would have helped Europe anticipate and prevent the devastating wildfires seen across the continent.
The Socialists & Democrats Group wrote that rejecting the text meant “refusing to take the necessary steps to guarantee reliable and harmonised monitoring of Europe’s forests”.
Its negotiator in the agriculture committee, Eric Sargiacomo, said the group had proposed compromises “that respect subsidiarity, give member states more resources and ensure stronger control over data”.
Greens/EFA group Vice-President Nicolae Ștefănuță said the decision deprives Europeans of “a tool to monitor our forests at a time when they are burning down or dying from drought”.
Liberal voices also criticised the outcome. Belgian Renew MEP Yvan Verougstraete posted on X yesterday that “once again, the right, the conservatives and the far right unite to block any European environmental progress”, arguing that protecting forests “is protecting our future” and that Europe must build “a reliable and transparent system based on harmonised data”.
Conservatives countered that, without rejecting the need to protect forests.
Waldemar Buda, European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) Group shadow rapporteur with the EP’s Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development (AGRI), said the proposal “went far beyond monitoring” and sought “to control national forestry policy through delegated acts and centralised data systems”.
Bernhuber also highlighted the financial aspect of the proposed regulation. “This risks duplication in current structure and additional cost for member states which won’t be covered by the European Commission,” he said.
Behind those exchanges is the fact that shared competences are more blurred than EU competences such as trade, where the EC negotiates and signs exchange agreements and determines what can enter EU borders and at what price.
For many on the Left, the vote was a missed opportunity in a year when wildfires have become increasingly dangerous for both nature and humans nearby.
For the Left and Greens, the rejection comes as the need for common data is more urgent, as it could help prevent a part of the damage caused by forest fires.
“In a year when forest fires have killed scores of people and wrought havoc in Portugal, Spain, Greece, Cyprus and elsewhere,” the Left group wrote, “the proposed law would help to map forests, enable data sharing between member states and train the Copernicus space programme to predict forest fires and natural disasters”.
