Timo, Tassos and Sandro made headlines in 2019 when the proposal of their European citizens’ initiative to tax jet fuel, conceived in a students’ dorm and launched with no experience or funding, made it to the European Green Deal. Following up on the success story, Timothée Galvaire, Tassos Papachristou and Sandro Esposito share how they got involved with the idea, their ups and downs, and what is their advice to other European Citizens’ Initiative enthusiasts.

How did I get involved?

Timo: I heard for the first time about the tax exemption on aviation fuel in November 2018 thanks to the “gilets jaunes” (the Yellow Vests) uprising in France, that were protesting against the rise in fuel taxes of cars. At the time, the French President replied to the demands to tax jet fuel by saying the question had to be handled at European level, because unilateral taxation could be a disadvantage for the competitiveness of French airports and airlines. Back then in Brussels, in the European institutions, kerosene taxation was not high on the agenda at all. So, we decided to launch this European citizens’ initiative to make sure that the European institutions, Members of European Parliament, the Council, and everyone in Brussels and beyond, would hear about the wish of European citizens to put a fair price on aviation pollution. We decided to use the European Citizens' Initiative instrument because, even though it is unfortunately not yet a very known instrument by EU citizens, it is still a very useful one. In fact, it is a great help to put something high on the EU institutions' agenda.

Tassos: At university, I made friends with people who are very concerned about the environment. We started having many discussions with them about environmental issues, and in the end, because we felt that this is a time to act, we decided to launch a citizens’ initiative. My personal responsibilities throughout the campaign were to contact politicians, make partnerships with NGOs, do a bit of background research, and see who would be more suited to be our partner. We also had to focus on building a European community through social media, because we need signatures from all around Europe.

Sandro: The reason why I got involved in Fairosene (the name of the initiative), was because my two close friends, Timo and Tassos, are studying politics and they came up with the idea of launching a European citizens’ initiative. Since I am really concerned about environmental issues, I thought this would be a great idea and it would also help increasing my knowledge about European politics. Since I am studying economics, I was not too much into politics before. The European citizens’ initiative and the whole journey gave me a lot of opportunities to increase my knowledge and at the same time I gained a lot of experience in other fields such as marketing. Finally, I learned how to advocate and network among organisations which are sharing the same values.

The emotional roller-coaster

Timo: The most exciting part of the whole campaign was when the Dutch government invited us to the Hague to a very high-level inter-governmental event to talk about aviation taxation. We felt really special! No NGO was invited, only representatives of the industry and finance ministers from all over Europe, but also from other parts of the world, to talk about putting a higher price on aviation pollution. This really proves that politicians and decision-makers in general take the European Citizens’ Initiative very seriously. The most frustrating moments were when we would be sending dozens of emails a day to get partners on board, to ask celebrities or journalists or politicians to share the petition and we would get very few responses… but now that I have started a job, I realise how many emails we get every day, and you fully understand why people do not always answer your emails. So, my advice: do not hesitate to take your phone and just call people and keep engaging with them.

After six months of campaigning and after collecting over 60,000 signatures, we learnt in early December 2019 that the European Commission was taking up the idea and they were adding our proposal of taxing aviation fuel in Europe to the Green Deal, the new “green” agenda of the European Commission. We felt extremely happy and relieved because after almost one year of campaigning, preparation, and hard work during our free time, it was the achievement of something! As EU citizens we very often feel unheard by national politicians, and unfortunately, even more by European decision-makers, but the European Citizens’ Initiative is really a great tool for making your voice heard everywhere in Europe.

Sandro: At the beginning of our journey with the European Citizens’ Initiative, I was sure that it was going to be difficult to achieve our goal. Basically, the hardest hurdle was first of all to come up with a pan-European campaign. We are just students and we do not have any experience in this, but it was really interesting, because it gave me the possibility to use, for example, some contents from my marketing courses and in general – to develop myself as a person.

Tassos: The best part was taking a big responsibility to write an initiative and a policy proposal to the European Commission. When we started the initiative, we had to go around conferences, which was something new for me personally, and chase around NGOs and politicians, start developing relationships with them. As we were only students, the European citizens’ initiative is not something that we could do alone.  Building partnerships with the people who have expertise in the field was something really interesting and joyful for me. The most stressful part was finding a balance between my responsibilities as a co-initiator of the initiative and as a university student who also has to manage studying. As university students who spontaneously started this effort, we were very underfunded, which is a problem we faced for many months in our campaign and we had to cover our own expenses. On this aspect, I wish I knew earlier about the European Citizens’ Initiative Forum which gives really good advice on how to obtain funds for people who are unexperienced like us.

Our two cents (of advice)

Sandro: I really, really want to stress out: if you have an idea on how to shape the future of Europe, or solve a problem,  please do not hesitate and start your own European citizens’ initiative!

Timo: Launching an initiative is not always easy. It is a long process, a tough procedure, and it is sometimes frustrating, but you should never give up.  You must believe in your proposal, otherwise it is quite likely that you will give up at some point. 

Tassos: I would encourage people who have a problem or a concern that is faced by many European citizens: do not think about it too much and just take action, because in the end you learn only by doing. This is also our experience: we were very unexperienced in the domain, in politics in general, in policymaking, but this is always something that you can learn on the way!