Directorate-General for the Environment

The DG's main role is to initiate and define new environmental legislation and to ensure that measures, which have been agreed, are actually put into practice in the member states of the European Union.

The overall mission statement for 2005 is: "Protecting, preserving and improving the environment for present and future generations, and promoting sustainable development".

[4] In its early years, DG Environment hired specialists with technical knowledge who had a different culture to the other Commission's officials.

[7] The Fifth Environmental Action Programme[8] which came into force on 1 January 1993 marked a change in DG Environment's approach to policy-making.

The programme demonstrated that legislation was no longer to be made solely behind closed doors, but together with all social and economic partners.