the Greens were a founding member of The Olive Tree coalition and in the 1996 general election, thanks to this alliance and several candidates in single-seat constituencies, they obtained 14 deputies and 14 senators, their highest number ever. Following the election, the Greens the centre-left governments led by Romano Prodi, Massimo D'Alema and Giuliano Amato. Ronchi was minister of the Environment (1996–2000) and Alfonso Pecoraro Scanio minister of Agriculture (2000–2001). Since 1996 the party however started a slow decline. Some of its leading members left: Rutelli (who was re-elected mayor of Rome) in 1997 and Ripa di Meana in 1998. The party also suffered the competition of several centre-left parties, some of them new as The Democrats, of which Rutelli was a founding member. In the 1999 European Parliament election the Greens were reduced to 1.8% and two MEPs, prompting the resignation of Luigi Manconi, who had led the party since 1996. The party was thus re-organised under Grazia Francescato, a former president of the Italy's section of the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF). At the 2001 general election the Greens formed a joint list with the Italian Democratic Socialists (SDI): The Sunflower. The combination scored 2.2%, thus failing to surpass the 4% threshold. The Greens elected seven deputies and ten senators in single-member constituencies, as part of The Olive Tree coalition. Shift to the far left After the alliance with the SDI, a relatively centrist party, the Greens shifted far to the left, prompting the exit of leading members as Ronchi, Mattioli, Scalia, Corleone and Manconi. The Greens were since part of the so-called "radical left", along with the Communist Refoundation Party (PRC) and the Party of Italian Communists (PdCI). At the 2004 European Parliament election the Greens obtained 2.5% of the vote and two MEPs. In February 2005 the Greens joined The Union, the new successor alliance to The Olive Tree, with party secretary Alfonso Pecoraro Scanio receiving 2.2% of the vote in the open primary election for the coalition's leader. At the 2006 general election the party was part of the winning coalition The Union, and scored 2.1%, obtained 15 seats in the Chamber of Deputies. The Together with the Union list, an alliance of Greens, Communists and Consumers polled 4.2% in the election for the Senate, electing 11 senators, 5 of whom were Greens. In 2006–2008 Pecoraro Scanio served as minister of the Environment, while