Irish Regions Office Website

September 15, 2009

Environmental Sustainability Index - an alternative to GDP

In search of a means of complementing the traditional system of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) to measure the standard of living, performance and progress of countries and regions, the European Commission has submitted a position paper to Member States and the European Parliament entitled 'GDP and beyond: Measuring progress in a
changing world'. This initiative confirms an intention as of 2010 to produce a new comparative yardstick based on more rounded statistics beyond the purely economic.

The somewhat less tangible or difficult to quantify factors that will be considered in calculating this new Environmental Sustainability Index include not only green concerns, such as water use and waste generation, but also societal aspects including inclusiveness. ''GDP was not intended to be a measure of well-being. It doesn't pick up on issues that are vitally important to the quality of our lives such as a clean environment, social cohesion or even how happy people are'' according to an 8 September Commission statement.

This is intended to form a long-term policy-making tool which better reflects realities on the ground by providing a counterbalance to the seemingly positive economic activity arising from clearly negative issues such as the overuse of natural resources or disaster recovery measures. As an extension, the Commission is also pledging to develop a 'European Sustainable Development Scoreboard' in order to allow for the identification of environmental trends and a benchmarking of best practices. To make this more of a reality it is intended to greatly speed up the processing and release of environmental and social data by Eurostat so that it is as timely as the economic equivalent.

Further information

Posted by iroronan at September 15, 2009 09:41 AM