The Finnish Embassy in Kazakhstan marks the start of Finland's presidency of the EU Council by challenging others towards climate action

Finland’s third presidency of the Council of the European Union begins on 1 July 2019. The slogan of the presidency, Sustainable Europe – Sustainable Future, describes well Finland’s priorities, as we seek to strengthen the EU’s position as a global leader in climate action.

The Embassy of Finland in Kazakhstan wants to do its part by making its own climate pledge. In the future, the embassy will reduce its carbon footprint by paying more attention to energy consumption on its premises, lowering the staff’s transport emissions and recycling more.

The embassy plans to take several concrete actions:   

• The embassy is located in a large office building where recycling has previously not been possible. The embassy is actively lobbying the management of the office building to set up a recycling program. We have already established our own waste sorting system and hope that other residents will join the effort.
   
• The staff of the embassy will commute to work and meetings by foot, bikes or public transportation whenever possible (taking into account schedules and local weather conditions).
   
• The embassy will give preference to vegetarian dishes in catering, and will not use plastic disposable tableware. Overall, we will give preference to re-usable and recycled materials.
   
• The lamps in the embassy premises will replaced with environmentally friendly LED lights over time.
   
•  We will take advantage of digitalization by utilizing electronic meeting materials, avoiding excess printing and using video conferencing when possible.

The Embassy of Finland in Nur-Sultan challenges the EU Delegation and other missions (whether EU member or not) in Kazakhstan to part take in climate action and make their own sustainability pledge!

 

For more information on Finland's Presidency program and priorities: https://eu2019.fi/en/priorities/programme(Link to another website.)