Admissibility
12 The European Commission disputes the admissibility of the reference for a preliminary ruling on the ground that it is not clear that the answer would be of use for resolving the dispute in the main proceedings. According to the Commission, it is clear from the order for reference that the national court considers it established that the plot of land at issue in the main proceedings may be classified as ‘forest’ under both national law and Regulation No 2152/2003. The questions are therefore theoretical in nature, seeking only to test the soundness of the definitions adopted by national law.
13 However, that argument cannot be upheld.
14 It is settled case-law that, in the context of the cooperation between the Court of Justice of the European Union and the national courts provided for by Article 234 EC, it is solely for the national court before which the dispute has been brought, and which must assume responsibility for the subsequent judicial decision, to determine in the light of the particular circumstances of the case both the need for a preliminary ruling in order to enable it to deliver judgment and the relevance of the questions which it submits to the Court. Consequently, where questions submitted by national courts concern the interpretation of Community law, the Court of Justice is bound, in principle, to give a ruling (see, inter alia, Case C-379/98 PreussenElektra [2001] ECR I-2099, paragraph 38, and Case C-103/88 Gottwald [2009] ECR I-9117, paragraph 16).
15 It follows that the presumption that questions referred by national courts for a preliminary ruling are relevant may be rebutted only in exceptional cases, in particular where it is quite obvious that the interpretation which is sought of the provisions of Community law referred to in the questions bears no relation to the actual facts of the main action or to its purpose (Gottwald, paragraph 17 and the case-law cited).
16 Here, the grounds of the order for reference do not disclose a settled view of the national court that the plot of land at issue is in any event a forest under both national law and Community law. It is apparent from paragraphs 13 and 14 of that order that the national court makes its determination of the main proceedings dependent upon the interpretation which it seeks from the Court.
17 Clearly, therefore, it is not obvious that the interpretation sought is irrelevant in light of the decision which the national court is called upon to give.
18 Consequently, the reference for a preliminary ruling must be declared admissible.
Substance
19 By its first question, the national court essentially asks whether Article 3(a) and (b) of Regulation No 2152/2003, which define, for the purposes of that regulation, the terms ‘forest’ and ‘wooded land’, must be interpreted as precluding national provisions which contain different definitions of those terms as regards actions which are not expressly governed by the regulation.
20 As is apparent from Article 1, Regulation No 2152/2003 had the objective of establishing a Community scheme for broad-based, harmonised and comprehensive, long-term monitoring of the condition of forests. That scheme was intended to continue and further develop monitoring of air pollution and of other agents that have an impact on forests, monitoring of forest fires and their causes and effects, and forest fire prevention. It also had the aim of assessing the requirements for, and developing, the monitoring of soils, carbon sequestration, climate change effects and biodiversity, as well as protective functions of forests, and of continuously evaluating the efficiency of the monitoring activities in the assessment of the condition of forests and the further development of monitoring activity.
21 It is thus clear from those provisions that the Community legislature, which in addition specified in Article 12(1) of Regulation No 2152/2003 that this Community scheme was to run for a period of four years from 1 January 2003 to 31 December 2006, sought to limit the scope of the scheme.
22 It is true that, within the scope of the scheme, Regulation No 2152/2003 had general application, was binding in its entirety and was directly applicable in all Member States, by virtue of the second paragraph of Article 249 EC.
23 While the objectives, as set out in paragraph 20 of the present judgment, thereby accorded to the scheme for a specified period were binding on the Member States for the purpose of establishing forest management programmes, it is not in dispute that the Community legislature did not, however, intend to harmonise completely all activities concerning the management of forest areas.
24 It is undisputed that Regulation No 2152/2003 was adopted on the basis of Article 175 EC which falls within Title XIX of the EC Treaty, devoted to Community policy on the environment. The Community rules in this area do not seek to effect complete harmonisation (Case C-6/03 Deponiezweckverband Eiterköpfe [2005] ECR I-2753, paragraph 27). Even though Article 174 EC refers to certain Community objectives to be attained, Article 176 EC allows the Member States to introduce more stringent protective measures (Case C-318/98 Fornasar and Others [2000] ECR I-4785, paragraph 46, and Deponiezweckverband Eiterköpfe, paragraph 27).
25 Accordingly, while, in order to implement the forest monitoring scheme, the Community legislature sought to define the areas covered by that scheme, none of the provisions of Regulation No 2152/2003 indicates that the regulation was designed to establish common rules for governing other actions.
26 In those circumstances, it is only for the purposes of Regulation No 2152/2003, as Article 3 expressly provides, that the latter defines the two terms. Consequently, it must be found that Article 3 did not have the aim and cannot have the effect of precluding any other definition of what constitutes the forests and wooded areas that the Member States would seek to make subject to any action programmes other than those governed by Regulation No 2152/2003.
27 It is for the national court to determine whether the action programme at issue in the main proceedings is governed by Regulation No 2152/2003.
28 In light of the foregoing, the answer to the first question is that Article 3(a) and (b) of Regulation No 2152/2003, which define, for the purposes of that regulation, the terms ‘forest’ and ‘wooded land’, must be interpreted as not precluding national provisions which contain different definitions of those terms as regards actions which are not governed by the regulation.
29 In view of this answer to the first question, there is no need to decide the other two questions asked by the national court.