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The Government of the Republic of Serbia

In the service of citizens

Strategy of sustainable development one of conditions for EU membership

Novi Sad, 14 November 2007

Serbian Deputy Prime Minister Bozidar Djelic said today in the Assembly of the Autonomous Province of Vojvodina that the sustainable development strategy of Serbia is one of the conditions for starting negotiations on full EU membership.

Speaking at a public presentation of the strategy titled “Sustainable Progress", Djelic said that this strategy, apart from leading to a balance between economic and social goals of society and environmental protection, should also improve the overall quality of life of all citizens of Serbia.

He said that the real growth of GDP in Serbia, with the average of 5.4% per year, has been the highest in the region in the past six months.

Serbian Minister of Environmental Protection Sasa Dragin said that 30% of domestic laws should be harmonised with those of the EU, of which the greatest number deals precisely with environmental protection and sustainable development.

Dragin said that by initialling the Kyoto protocol, Serbia has committed itself to development of clean technologies.

President of the Executive Council of Vojvodina Bojan Pajtic said that we will be judged by the environment which we leave to our future generations, adding that we should at least provide our children with the same environment which we found.

Pajtic recalled that the Executive Council of Vojvodina has already adopted a strategy for environmental protection and sustainable development.

He said that during the previous years the provincial government supported use of modern technologies in production facilities which fulfilled European standards in environmental protection and led to 52,000 new jobs. He added this trend will be continued in the future.

Preparation of the sustainable development strategy is led and coordinated by the Serbian Deputy Prime Minister’s cabinet with the support of the Swedish International Development Agency (SIDA) and the UNDP with the aim to plan development until 2017.

Novi Sad is one of the twenty cities where members of the Deputy Prime Minister’s cabinet will present the draft strategy for sustainable development to the public as part of the campaign titled “Sustainable Progress”.

The aim of the campaign is to engage Serbian people in a country wide debate as well as through the internet, on the website www.odrzivi-razvoj.sr.gov.yu and actively take part in designing the final text of the strategy.

The adoption of this strategy will provide a definitive answer to the problem of harmonising economic development and social and environmental questions.