Is the so-called Green Deal, a package of European Union policy initiatives, a political scheme designed to impoverish and rob citizens that is not aimed at reducing the harmful effects of climate change? No, that's not true: Green Deal policy objectives are designed to help transform the European Union into a prosperous community with modern and competitive economies while aiming to reach climate neutrality goals by 2050.
The claim appeared in a video (archived here) on TikTok on February 4, 2024, with the caption (translated from Czech to English by Lead Stories staff):
Green Deal or robbing people live on TV
The speaker says (as translated):
The Green Deal is here just to impoverish you. And its only intent is to rob you.
This is what the post looked like on TikTok at the time of writing:
(Source: TikTok screenshot taken on Mon Mar 11 08:09:04 2024 UTC)
The video shows excerpts from a panel organized by the recently launched news website Denik.to, held on February 19, 2024 (archived here). The article about the panel says that "experts" agreed that the Green Deal is based on the false premise that CO₂ emissions need to be reduced, calling the deal's conclusions "political ideology," not a scientific consensus, that will lead to food shortages across Europe. One of the experts on the panel is identified by Denik.to as Pavel Kalenda, a Czech representative of Clintel (archived here). Clintel (archived here) is a Netherlands-based organization that features scientists, or energy sector professionals (archived here) who are known to promote climate change denial.
Kalenda says in the video on TikTok that the goals of the Green Deal are "completely different from protecting the environment." Another participant in the panel is identified as "Vidlak" by Denik.to, a nickname for a Czech anti-establishment disinformer (archived here).
The Green Deal is a package of policy initiatives set out by European Union (EU) leaders in 2019 (archived here) aimed at achieving a state of climate neutrality by 2050, a state where nations are not contributing to harmful emissions and practices that lead to a further rise in global temperatures. The initiatives include measures such as investing in green technologies, promoting innovation, supporting the development of new clean transport modes and decarbonizing the energy sector (archived here). It also includes the Farm to Fork Strategy, which aims to make EU food production more sustainable and environmentally friendly (archived here). While the EU's transition to a green economy may present both challenges and opportunities for individual EU states and their citizens, it cannot be said that the purpose of the Green Deal is to "rob" or "impoverish" people, or that it is not linked to environmental protection, which is its main purpose.
The claim that there is no need to reduce CO₂ emissions has already been debunked by Lead Stories here, here and here.
