The OECD and the Directorate-General for Environment, the European Commission department responsible for EU policy on the environment, joined forces to examine current and future water-related ...financing challenges faced by EU member states. These include investments needed to comply with EU regulation for water supply, wastewater collection and treatment, and flood protection. As part of the research, new data was produced on current levels of expenditure for water supply, sanitation and flood protection, as well as on projected needs. It supported a comparison across member states and substantiated tailored policy discussions in selected countries and at European level. This report captures the rationale for the research, the main quantitative outcomes and the policy issues and recommendations that derived from this two-year co-operation. Lessons from Europe outlined in this report can inspire similar research and policy discussions in other parts of the world.
The modern way of life requires the exploitation of natural resources, which leads to a significant deterioration of the environment and can even endanger human health.The basic hypothesis is that ...the population of Slovenia in general is still too inadequately informed and insufficiently environmentally educated and aware about water as a natural resource to have the motivation and capability to actively participate in the protection of water as a natural resource.Most people support environmental protection in principle, especially declaratively, since this is a socially approved action. However, when faced with restrictions that would interfere with their way of life by limiting their activities or increasing their expenses, their enthusiasm decreases rapidly. And the closer we get to actions we could define as “environmentally active,” the fewer people are actually prepared to protect the environment. Possibly a fifth of the population can be defined as people who favour environmental protection and consider it a value for which they themselves are willing to do something.The survey showed that level of education is very significant relative to people’s response to environmental problems and that the more educated are more environmentally friendly.
