But the move may not solve either party's central problem: both are polling below the 5-percent threshold needed to win seats, and their combined support would still not be enough. The latest ERR-commissioned Emor poll saw Eesti 200 at 1.9 percent and the Greens at 1.1 percent — a combined 3 percent.

The talks are driven by different needs on each side. Eesti 200, which has 13 Riigikogu seats, has long languished below the threshold and may struggle to find candidates by March. For the Greens, the issue is funding — potential candidates are unable to pay the €946 election deposit themselves, something Eesti 200 may be able to help with.

Party leader and Education Minister Kristina Kallas, according to Eesti Ekspress, "agrees with the statement 'the Greens and Eesti 200 are considering a merger'." Kallas said talks continue and clarity will come by end-October, when the Greens hold a general assembly.

Eesti 200 has met with other parties about potential mergers too. In spring the party met with its former coalition partner, the Social Democrats, though party leader Lauri Läänemets and former minister Piret Hartman soon wrapped up the talks. Eesti 200 also met with the Free Party, which had eight seats at the XIII Riigikogu (2015-2019) but currently has none — those talks drew a blank as well.

More progress has been made with the Greens, who last had Riigikogu seats in 2007-2011, Rasmus Lahtvee, Greens co-chair, and party board chair Marti Soosaar told the paper nothing has been decided, though Soosaar said he likes the merger idea and thought a new party emerging would be viable.

Commercial Register data shows the Greens currently have more members — 705 — than Eesti 200 at 579. The minimum number of members a party can have to remain valid is 500.

The original Eesti Ekspress article is here.

Eesti 200 were founded in 2018, winning their first Riigikogu seats – 14 of them – at the 2023 elections, and finding themselves in office with Reform and, until spring last year, SDE. Eesti 200's rating has tanked since then however, in the wake of donations to Ukraine scandal which engulfed one of its former MPs soon after the election. Another Eesti 200 MP, Züleyxa Izmailova, herself a former Green Party leader, went back to SDE in 2024.

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