Socio-eco impacts of ‘sustainable solutions’ pose challenge to Europe: Finnish official

Socio-eco impacts of ‘sustainable solutions’ pose challenge to Europe: Finnish official

By Binsal Abdulkader

HELSINKI (Finland), 6th June, 2023 (WAM) -- The negative environmental and social impacts of some “sustainable solutions” such as electrification of economy, including electric vehicles, have posed a challenge to Europe, which also reveals the hypocrisy involved in this issue, according to a Finnish official.

Jyrki Katainen, President of Finnish Innovation Fund Sitra, said this while answering a question from Emirates News Agency (WAM) on the environmental pollution and forced displacement of communities caused by large scale mining of rare minerals that are essential raw materials of batteries of electric vehicles and similar solutions.

Political, security issue

The current geopolitical situation in Europe has triggered a debate whether the continent can depend on critical raw material imports like in the past, said Katainen who was European Commission Vice-President for Jobs, Growth, Investment and Competitiveness. Prior to that, he had held the positions of Prime Minister of Finland and Finance Minister.

During an interaction with a group of international journalists who visited Helsinki on a media trip last week organised by the Finnish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Katainen pointed out that solving this issue is extremely challenging as rare earth minerals cannot be produced.

He made it clear that Europe cannot always rely on