The development of the 4th National Environmental Protection programme, which is aimed at assuring the environmental requirements for sustainable development, is complete, the Ministry of Rural Development's Deputy State Secretary for Parliamentary, Social and International Relations Katalin Tóth announced on Friday in Budapest at the conference organised to discuss the new Programme.

According to Hungarian law, a National Environmental Protection programme must be developed every six years and forms part of the National Nature Conservation Master Plan.

According to Deputy State Secretary Tóth, it is thanks to the currently operative 3rd Programme that the emission of greenhouse gases in Hungary has decreased, as have the quantity of generated waste and water usage. Forest areas have, in contrast, increased by 20 percent. However, natural habitats continue to be fragmented, soil degradation has continued and the realistic pricing of natural resources has not yet been successfully established, she pointed out.

On the subject of financing, the Ministry's Deputy State Secretary for Environmental Protection and Conservation András Rácz said that HUF 36 billion had been spent within the framework of the Environment and Energy Operational Programme (KEOP) during the EU financing period 2007-2013. The budget for the new Environment and Energy Efficiency Operational Programme (KEHOP) for the upcoming budgetary period until 2020 is HUF 31.3 billion, but the decrease in funding is purely illusionary as several other operational programmes also include environmental items.

The development of the programme for the next six years began a year ago and is constructed from the grassroots upwards to such an extent that politics did not even determine an orientation for its elaboration. Amendments arising from the social debate organised on the document will be transposed to the text, after which the programme will be adopted by Parliament, the Deputy State Secretary said, explaining the procedure.

According to Mr. Rácz, 30 percent of Hungary's territory is semi-natural, which is an excellent ratio in European comparison. Some 250 thousand hectares of national park land should be returned to state ownership to secure the protected restoration of habitats, an objective that has already been realised with regard to 150 thousand hectares, with the remaining 100 thousand hectares becoming state property by 2015, according to plans. This year's budget includes HUF 1.4bn in funding for this purpose.

(Ministry of Rural Development)