European institutions – The AEGEEan – AEGEE's online magazine – AEGEE-Europe

Are you a good lobbyist?

Mathieu Soete — Fri, 20 Sep 2013 09:26:00 +0000

“Are you a good lobbyist”? This was the central question to a simulation played at the Summer University of AEGEE-Delft, “Create your own world”. More than 20 participants and some of the organisers took part in this interactive workshop on European Union sustainability policy, getting a hands-on grip on the mechanisms of lobbying at the European level.

In order to facilitate the discussion, the workshop at Delft’s amazing modern university library was kicked off with a brief introduction to sustainability and the European policy-making process. With the adoption of the Lisbon treaty sustainable development became a fundamental objective of the European Union. This is partly operationalised in the Europe 2020 Strategy, though unfortunately limited to energy and resource efficiency.

Nonetheless, a number of sustainability topics outside this restricted scope remain hot items in European politics. One of them is of course climate change, which is being recognised as a strategic priority of the EU. The international deal is to stay within a 2°C temperature rise since pre-industrial times (say 1750), but this will of course require significant cuts in CO₂ and other greenhouse gas emissions: from 20% by 2020 to up to 95% by 2050, compared to 1990 levels.

The EU has designed a cap-and-trade system to help achieving these goals, but due to the economic crisis and flaws inherent to the auction basis of this Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS), the carbon price is currently far too low to stimulate any investment into cleaner production. Still, European climate ambitions remain ahead of most other developed countries, making the EU a front-runner in international negotiations.

Another topic currently under discussion is the protection of biodiversity, which in recent years has reached alarming levels of destruction. With extinction threatening 1 in 4 mammals, 1 in 3 amphibians, and 1 in 8 birds in the near future, the EU’s initiative to translate the Nagoya Protocol into European law is more than welcome. This international protocol aims to preserve biodiversity by sharing some of the profits generated by its uses (e.g. in medicines or foodstuffs) with the inhabitants of the regions it originates from.

With such powerful players as the pharmaceutical or agricultural industry, and such huge amounts of money concerned, it comes as no surprise that the Members of European Parliament (MEPs) working on the new rules are constantly being approached by lobby groups, both from industry and civil society. What are their demands? How do MEPs deal with them? And who is the best lobbyist, using the best arguments to protect his/her interests?

Based on personal work experience at the European Parliament, a simulation of the lobbying activities was developed, with each of the participants receiving a specific role, ranging from French small-scale farmers over Peruvian indigenous populations to big industry representatives. Of course a couple of MEPs from various political parties were added to the mix as well, with the difficult task of judging the lobbying efforts and taking a final decision on the proposed European legislation.

After a cautious start, arguments started flying up and down the circle, with people adding new elements to the discussion to refute claims made by other lobby groups. The representative of the agricultural industry, for example, proposed the French small-scale farmers to switch to his more lucrative, genetically modified crops, but saw his argument countered by a particularly stubborn scientist from Germany pointing to the threats such crops can pose to local biodiversity.

At the end of the debate the lead rapporteur from the European Greens, acting as moderator, consulted with her colleagues and they then delivered their verdict: a percentage of commercial profits to be used for supporting small-scale farming, additional funding for research into the effects of GMOs on biodiversity, and a number of industry-supported and NGO-monitored projects to conserve biodiversity on site. A reasonable and balanced deal, applauded by all parties — though in reality things are not always that easy.

Written by Mathieu Soete, Policy Officer on Sustainability

Pavel Zbornik – from NetCom to CD member

Liliya Buyukliyska — Mon, 23 Apr 2012 06:30:30 +0000

First time I met Pavel Zbornik he was just traveling through Sofia to Agora Istanbul. I knew only that he was the president of AEGEE-Praha at that time and he loved beer. But later I started seeing his name over and over again in AEGEE-L mailing list discussion and even among Network Commission (NetCom) candidates a year later. Now we can see that he is ready to be even more involved in AEGEE as he candidates for Comite Directeur (CD) member. We are sure that his experience, working for Czech National Agency of Youth in Action taught him a lot and maybe even showed him secrets that I and you probably don’t know. But if he plans to share them with us…Read the following interview and maybe you will find the answer.

The AEGEEan: You are doing many thing. How does one regular day go for you? How do you control or organise your time management?

Pavel: What means regular day? I have flexible time schedule at work plus traveling for AEGEE events or business trips, which I have normally once or twice a month, destroy my regular schedule. Also right now finishing my master thesis, so I’m one day at my office, than next day in laboratory at my university or at some meeting. To tell the truth, I would like to have something more stable.

And how I organise my time? I have all activities in a calendar with different colors by type of activity and then I have also for each day appointed tasks with level of importance. For this I use Google Calendar and Remember The Milk which I have connected with my Gmail, Outlook and my smartphone. Important is to write every task down not to forget, even the simple one, same for activities. Also allocate time for your hobbies in calendar otherwise you find that you don’t have time for them.

Since years CD members are talking about and even having an IT Assistant. What are your plans in this direction?

In this direction I don’t have very ambitious plans, I want to keep the IT infrastructure working (by the way this is ambitious itself , especially in the CD house and provide support to the locals if they need. What I see as important is to help ITC with creating new Intranet (OMS) and organise IT European School. My plans in Public Relations about creating several new websites are quite depending on IT solutions, so I see these two fields quite connected.

Do you think you could do at the same time Public Relations (PR), IT and deal with European Institutions? Are you ready to leave some aside and which one?

I wouldn’t say leave. I see CD member as manager and I would like to collaborate and divide tasks, I believe that cooperation with Public Relations Committee (PRC) and Information Technologies Committee (ITC) will be fruitful, so I’ll be not only one for this tasks. And as I mentioned IT is quite connected with PR and vice versa.

Which of your experience give you an asset in front of other candidates?

It’s quite hard to judge yourself and not be critical. I would say that I have experience in quite various fields inside or outside AEGEE which gives me different points of view on many things. Also as student of engineering I’ve been educated to find solutions for different problems. You should also know that I come from small town so I know what means to work by your hands and repair things or fix something in the house. This can be useful taking into account that only three boys candidate and CD house is not in best shape.

Mailing list and forum are widely discussed topics. What is your opinion about them?

Both of them have their advantages and disadvantages. Forum is good tool to have structured discussion but when people are not using it? I guess we got used to hundreds of emails and are a bit “lazy” to leave our Gmail and login to Forum, but we have also people who don’t like full inbox. What I see as possible in the mean time before plug-in for forum will be developed is to use AEGEE-L for discussion of actual and hot topics but with changed subscription from regular to digest, so people will get one email a day with result of discussion, of course they can change for regular back. For the rest use forum. Question is what actual and hot topic is, there is not simple solution.

You have experience as Network Commissioner (NetCommie). Was this what motivated you to run for CD?

When you enter NetCom your life will change, you will get responsibility towards your locals and also your engagement in AEGEE will increase. You are in the core structure of AEGEE and all the things which you do address a lot of people and influence them. You think that is coincidence that 70% of all current CD candidates are/were NetComs or at least sub-commissioners?

And why you are not candidating to Network Director?

Thanks to being in NetCom I have overview over the Network and probably could be Network Director as well but I think that my knowledge concerning institutions, PR and IT is more valuable for CD especially when we have other good candidates for this position. Having such experience is quite good when you are in CD, you know Network and know what to expect.

What do you think about other candidates? Do you think you can form a nice team? To work easy and be more than just colleagues?

I really hope we can be more than colleagues as it’s vitally important when you spend with other six people basically whole year “locked” in the house. I know most of the candidates personally and I think we can be a good team.

How do you plan to break the ice in the CD house if you are elected?

(Smiles) I know quite a lot of games connected with consumption of CH3–CH2–OH (ethanol) and experience from several events taught me that it can work as quite good icebreaker.

Which beer is better – Czech or Belgium?

(Smiles) Czech Republic is famous for Pilsner type of beer which is most spread around the world and I don’t see reason why to drink copy if you can drink original. On the other side Belgium has many different kinds of beer like all kinds of ale or my favorite lambic. To answer your question and not talk hours about beer I think best beer is from small brewery where they brew beer with love and use quality ingredients.

Thank you and good luck in Enschede!

Written by Liliya Buyukliyska, AEGEE-Sofia