During the annual ENPE and Eurojust conference on Environmental Crime 29 – 30 October 2019, IMPEL representatives shared their work on preventing and combating environmental crime. The theme of the conference was “International collaboration & co-operation in the fight against environmental crime”.
Various IMPEL projects and activities were presented to the audience, existing mainly of judicial practitioners, prosecutors and other specialists from the EU members states, including IMPEL’s work on air pollution, financial provisions and the IMPEL partnership projects SPIDER WEB, WasteForce and LIFE SWEAP.
IMPEL Project Manager Nancy Isarin shared the ambitions of IMPEL for the next 10-15 years as laid down in the position paper ‘IMPEL – the next generation’. She encouraged to further strengthen the work between the relevant networks. She also suggested to consider developing a joint strategy which would ensure a sustainable way forward in preventing environmental crime as a collaborative action by all partners in the monitoring and enforcement cycle involved.
The conference consisted of two days of plenary and breakout sessions, as well as a dedicated workshop focusing on how best to co-operate globally in tackling environmental crime. Highly interesting case studies were presented, such as investigations on illegal breaking of ships and prosecuting cases of illegal killing of birds. More than 100 specialists from all over the world attended the event.
IMPEL is actively involved in planning the so-called 4 Networks Conference in the fall of 2020 jointly with partner organisations ENPE, EUFJE and EnviCrimeNet.