Promotion of the Fifth Annual Report on Serbia’s progress in Chapter 27, symbolically titled ’’No-Progress Report’’, was held on Monday, May 14th in the Jevremovac Botanical Garden in Belgrade. The Report was jointly developed by member organisations of the Coalition 27, together with RES foundaiton. Event promotion was attended by the representatives of the Ministry of Environmental Protection, EU Delegation to the Republic of Serbia, civil society and media. The Minister of Environmental Protection, Mr Goran Trivan and State Secretary, Mr Ivan Karić, took part in the discussion in the pannel discussion at the presentation.
During the pannel discussion, lack of funding was recognised by participants, as a common issue in all of 10 areas covered by the Report. Lack of political will was also identified. Ms Duška Dimovi from the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), presented the key findings for the Report on behalf of the organisations gathered in the Coalitoin 27. ‘The price of neglecting the environment is quite high and all of us are already paying the price – through medical expenses caused by air pollution, to absence from work and reduction of our income, followed with the loss of biodiversity and ecosystems, which present a basis of our lives, and last but not the least – through consequences of climate change and natural disasters. We pay it sooner or later. Since around 0,5 of GDP is spent on environment protection, it’s clearly not a priority’ – these are some of the things Ms Dimović presented and used an opportunity to call for more engagement and cooperation of all stakeholders.
Minister of Environment Protection, Mr Goran Trivan, spoke about the efforts of newly established Ministry of Environment protection, aimed at improving condition of the environment. The Minister agreed that the funding was the top priority, which is something he’s been focused on since the day he assumed the office. He shared his plans to have consultations with the Ministry of Finance regarding the new budget, in order to make sure that the money collected through environmental fees is spent on environment protection.
One of the questions participants were most interested in was a potential date for opening accession negotiations in Chapter 27. Mr Ivan Karić, State Secretary in the Ministry of Environmental Protection, said the following. “In the best case scenario, we can open this chapter to be open in 18 months earliest”.
11 member organizations of the Coalition 27, together with RES Foundation, took part in writing the fifth edition of the Annual Report on Serbia’s progress in Chapter 27, which is published as a follow-up to the EU Commission’s Country Report. Coalition members are: Alternative for safer use of chemicals ALHEM, Belgrade Open School, Center for Ecology and Sustainable development CEKOR, Center for Environmental Improvement CUZS, Bird Protection and Study Society of Serbia DZPPS, GM Optimist, One degree Serbia, Climate Action Network Europe, Environmental Engineering Group, Young Researchers of Serbia and World Wide Fund for Nature. Belgrade Open School, one of the founding members of the Coalition 27, was in charge of the report chapter dealing with Horizontal legislation.
You can access the Report HERE
Author of the photos: Belgrade Open School
