Sustainable development and environmental assessment in the Bor basin

Abstract

In Serbia, the more recent sustainable development policy faces a number of serious problems, which are emphasized by the slow pace at which post-socialist reforms have been performed. Environmental aspects of transition reforms have hardly been tackled so far, the copper complex in the area of Bor (Eastern Serbia) being a notable example of such a delay. In effect, the practice of a more rigorous and systematic ex ante evaluation of possible future development scenarios is at its very beginning, implying that more research is needed, to apply a number of various evaluation methods, and to cover all relevant socioeconomic and environmental aspects. This is of particular importance, keeping in mind that the copper complex of Bor is situated in the border area of Serbia to Bulgaria and Romania, whereby the ecological risk involves an extra, i.e., international dimension.