Congress 2024 Mouvement Ecologique asbl from 21 march 2024
The congress of the Mouvement Ecologique took place on 21 March 2024 to a full house. Below you will find a brief report of the congress and the speech by President Blanche Weber.
In accordance with the provisions of the Articles of Association, invitations to the Annual General Meeting were sent to all members by post on 7 March 2024. Numerous members accepted the invitation.
The agenda, as announced in the invitation, was as follows
– Blanche Weber; President, welcomed the participants, thanked them for attending and, in her subsequent welcoming speech, focused on the fact that climate and biodiversity protection are too often only mentioned in the context of “procedures” in today’s debates and that the government’s priorities in the area of sustainable development are currently not sufficiently recognisable. At the beginning of her speech, however, she also addressed the statements made by Prime Minister Luc Frieden in connection with nuclear power. The statements were a historic break with all previous governments since Remerschen and Cattenom.
– The next item on the agenda was the presentation of various activity reports:
Tanja Duprez and Catherine Jacoby presented the 2023 activity report of move. and briefly discussed the 2023 projects.
The 2023 activity report of the Mouvement Ecologique was then presented, followed by that of the Oekozenter Pafendalls by Kristina Hondrila and then the Climate Alliance Lëtzebuerg by Paul Polfer.
– It was up to Emile Espen, Treasurer, to present the accounts for 2023, which were approved by the auditors André Gilbertz and Patrick Loewen and the Fiduciaire Roland Kuhn. The two auditors confirmed good financial management and asked the Congress to approve the accounts. The draft budget for 2024 was also presented, and the 2023 accounts and the draft budget for 2024 were approved by the General Assembly. Both cash auditors stood for re-election; there were no new candidates. The two cash auditors were also confirmed in office by the Annual General Meeting.
– Following the presentation of the activities and the financial report, the Annual General Meeting unanimously granted discharge to the Board of Directors.
The next item on the agenda was the election of the new Board of Directors for 2024. The situation was as follows:
Resigning: Roger Dammé, Théid Faber, Béatrice Kieffer, Claude Petit, Jacques Pir, Jean Rischette, Blanche Weber
Not resigning and standing as new candidates: Emile Espen, Gérard Kieffer, Marianne Milmeister, Jeannot Muller, Bob Reuter
New candidate: Thomas Steinmann
This results in 15 candidates (whereby a maximum of 17 members are permitted on the Board of Directors under the Articles of Association). The new Board of Directors 2024 was thus elected unanimously.
– In conclusion, Blanche Weber thanked the members for their commitment and support – whether active or passive – during 2023.
Another key item on the agenda was an exchange with the new Minister for the Environment, Climate and Biodiversity, Serge Wilmes.
The statutory part of the meeting was followed by an exchange with the new Minister for the Environment, Climate and Biodiversity, Serge Wilmes. By way of introduction, Serge Wilmes emphasised how important the issues of biodiversity and climate protection are to him. The protection of forests and the greening of cities were particularly important to him. He was therefore impressed that the seminar on street tree design had been so well received. After the introductory words, Serge Wilmes took questions from the participants. Firstly, he was asked about the statements made that day by Prime Minister Luc Frieden. He had stated at an EU meeting that he was open to ideology and technology and that Luxembourg would therefore not oppose nuclear power projects from other governments and would also be prepared to invest in research to develop this technology. Minister Serge Wilmes was not yet aware of these statements and stated that this government, like the previous ones, was opposed to nuclear power. This statement caused irritation in the room, as it was clear that Luc Frieden’s statements had hardly been agreed with Serge Wilmes.
This was followed by an exchange with the audience. The questions from those present ranged from the greening of the villages, the construction of the Bascharage bypass and agricultural policy to the duration of the payment of subsidies and the extension of current support programmes.
Minister Serge Wilmes responded to the questions, although he made few promises as to what would actually happen. He referred several times to ongoing working groups. He repeatedly emphasised the importance of simplifying procedures. He also saw it as a priority to simplify procedures in the agricultural sector, as this alone would open up new perspectives for agriculture, as
more room for new ideas.
At the final standoff, some participants said that the minister’s commitment would have been noticeable. However, several felt that there was a lack of concrete direct measures. For example, at the level of agricultural policy.
In view of the numerous questions and the fact that many things are still in the planning stage, it was pointed out – somewhat ironically – that a monthly exchange would certainly be useful. The minister eagerly agreed to this. However, the next meeting of the Mouvement Ecologique with the Minister (it would be the second in this legislative period) is not until June.
This was followed by a “reception / walking dinner” during which the participants spread out over the meeting room, the foyer and the library of the Ecology Centre.
Translated by deepl.com – free version
27.03.2024