Environmental issues take the stage at EXIT

The legendary EXIT music festival in Novi Sad, Serbia, has its origins in the political upheavals of 2000. That has led to EXIT retaining an air of rebellion and therefore being an ideal venue for a debate about the importance of the environment. The event – entitled “Development vs. Environment” – was organised at the festival in cooperation with the European Fund for the Balkans. Moderating, Gallup’s Andrzej Pyrka turned to his company’s polls that showed Americans giving priority to economic growth over environmental protection – see here. Pyrka wanted the panel’s views on where priorities should lie and if they really saw this as a choice between the environment and future growth.
Nebojša Pokimica, Serbian Assistant Minister of Environment and Spatial Planning, argued that his ministry was trying to raise awareness for environmental issues that were currently not very high on the population’s agenda. Pokimica added that he was interested in further developing this field, i.e. away from carbon, to more environmentally-friendly technologies. Nigel Jollands, Head of the Energy Efficiency Unit at the International Energy Agency, wanted priorities to be focused on quality of life with environmental protection being a key part of the future. As the Balkan region was clearly in transition, Jollands wanted policymakers to have the environment high on the agenda from the outset. Marko Rakar, an independent Croat analyst and activist, wanted more government intervention in support of environmentally-friendly products and, in response to a question from the floor, he said it was vital that young well-educated people of the region took responsibility in re-shaping their societies. Dorit Nitzan, Head of Country Offices of the WHO in Serbia and Montenegro, said it was difficult to find the right balance between environmental protection and economic development and that few emerging economies had found that balance. Although impressed by what the Serbian government was saying, she wanted more concrete actions. Certainly the audience felt that the government should be doing more.
Pyrka closed the debate with some more data from the Gallup polls; with – for example – 9% of Serbs and 11% of people in Bosnia and Herzegovina never having heard of climate change, there was still work to be done.