The Slovakian Parliament approved an amendment to the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) Act, which was initiated by Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of the Environment, Tomáš Taraba. Thanks to the approved legislation, environmental assessment processes will be accelerated and simplified by reducing process complexity and increasing requirements for expertise, announced the Ministry of Environment. At the same time, the amendment to the EIA Act will make it possible to meet one of the milestones of the Recovery and Resilience Plan of the Slovak Republic in connection with landscape planning.
Before finalising the new rules, Mr Taraba consulted about the new legislation with the EU representatives.
“It was in response to the European Commission’s recommendations, which came two days after the amendment to the law was approved by the parliament in September 2024. Therefore I suggested to the President of the Slovak Republic, Peter Pellegrini, to return the approved bill back to parliament to incorporate the proposals of the European Commission,” explained Minister Taraba. “I appreciate the constructive approach of the President of the Slovak Republic and the expert negotiations with the European Commission, where we clarified all the comments. Thanks to them, we will start applying the same rules in EIA processes in Slovakia as Germany or Austria,”
The legislation brings new EIA rules that will help Slovakia get out of the worst place to do business in the entire EU. “These proceedings, which last 180 days in other European countries, often lasted 400 or 500 days in Slovakia, which literally eliminated the interest of foreign companies in investing within our country. These unnecessary delays will definitely end,” the Minister said.
The approved legislation also responds to landscape planning, which is one of the milestones of the Recovery and Resilience Plan of the Slovak Republic. “With the new legislation, we are amending the Spatial Planning Act, which will ensure a more consistent process of the situation of the landscape, its protection and creation in spatial planning documents so that all obligations are met and at the same time the use of funds from the recovery plan is not jeopardized,” pointed out the Minister.