London, 28 February 2011

EurActiv, the leading online media on European Union policies, will be running special coverage, from 28 February to 4 March, on raw materials. In the special report, EurActiv journalists will deal with the European Union’s strategy in the field and the positions of the relevant stakeholders, both NGOs and industry.

EurActiv will cover, among other topics: international trade issues, recycling, raw materials use and challenges in downstream industrial supply chain, as well as domestic mining.

In November 2008, the European Commission presented a new integrated strategy for raw materials, suggesting three pillars for the EU's policy response to global resource scarcity: better and undistorted access to raw materials on world markets; improved conditions for raw materials extraction within Europe; and reducing the EU's consumption of raw materials by increasing resource efficiency and recycling. Since then, an EU expert group has identified 14 raw materials seen as "critical" for EU high-tech and eco-industries and suggested that the European Union's global diplomacy should be geared up to ensure that companies gain easier access to them in future.

You can follow the Special Report stories here.

www.EurActiv.com is the independent online media network dedicated to EU policy, counting 609,000 monthly unique visitors together with the Web 2.0 platform Blogactiv.eu. Set up in 1999, the network is an important working instrument for actors (institutions, industry federations, NGOs, think tanks, the press and others) involved in defining or influencing EU policies. The EurActiv Network publishes EU policy news and information in 12 languages from offices in the capitals of 12 European countries: Bulgaria, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Hungary, Poland, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Spain, United Kingdom  and Turkey.