By Kate Abnett and Marine Strauss

BRUSSELS, July 12 (Reuters) – The European Parliament voted to pass the EU’s flagship law to restore nature on Wednesday, salvaging the environmental measures that centre-right lawmakers had campaigned to kill off. European Union lawmakers adopted the legal proposal with 336 votes in favour, 300 against, and 13 abstentions.

EU lawmakers and member countries will now negotiate the final text, aiming for a deal before EU Parliament elections in 2024.

The nature bill has been subject to months of fierce political campaigning that exposed deep divisions among EU countries and lawmakers over the proposals, and whether – as some government leaders have said – Europe is pushing through too many environmental laws as part of its overall green agenda.

The European People’s Party, the EU Parliament’s biggest lawmaker group, led a campaign to kill off the plan on the grounds it would harm farmers and endanger food security. That’s despite Ursula von der Leyen – the head of the European Commission, which proposed the nature law – being from the EPP, putting her at odds with her own party.

The law would be one of the EU’s biggest pieces of green legislation, requiring countries to introduce measures restoring nature on a fifth of their land and sea by 2030.