SOER 2010

Since 2009 the European Environment Agency (EEA) has been considering the shift from paper to web products for the European Environment State and Outlook Report 2010 (SOER 2010). The EEA Management Board agreed that the main paper product for SOER 2010 will be the Synthesis Document, while the content for Parts A, B and C is expected to be presented on the web. This led to discussions between EEA and Eionet counties on how to produce Part C on the web and to initiation of a project called Shared European and National State of the Environment (SENSE).

The SENSE project is about implementing the SOER part C national contributions as an RDF dataflow from interested Eionet countries. Its general objective is to implement a mechanism for SEIS compliant information sharing between national and European websites based on further enhancement of Reportnet, aiming at more timely and cost-efficient quality assured data flows i.e. assessments on the state and outlook of the environment as defined for SOER Part C.

The outcome of Bulgarian participation in the SENSE task force is the launch of the current web site. It is based on products, which were developed by EEA. The web site contains the three types of reports for SOER part C:

• Commonality – 6 common issues (Air pollution, Freshwater, Nature protection and biodiversity, Land use, Climate change mitigation, Waste);
• Diversity – Country differences and uniqueness linked to key geographical, cultural and socio-economic challenges; and
• Flexibility – Highlighting regional issues, good practice/success stories at country level, and/or tackling global issues at national level.

 Each Commonality issue is structured through 5 guiding questions:

     -     Why should we care about this issue?

     -     What are the state and impacts related to this issue?

     -     What are the related key drivers and pressures at national level?

     -     What is the 2020 outlook?

     -     Which responses have been put in place or planned at national level?

The Diversity folder is structured through 4 guiding questions:

     -     What are the factors that distinguish your country from others?

     -     What have been the major societal developments since 1980, compared with the period 1950-1980?

     -     What are the main drivers of environmental pressures and how do these contribute to multiple impacts?

     -     What are the foreseen main developments in coming decades?

The Flexibility reports contain:

• Single countries highlighting matters of particular national concern, e.g. good practice, success stories, major challenges, emerging issues, governance structures
• Groups of countries highlighting regional issues, e.g. Alpine, Baltic, Carpathian
• All countries addressing issue(s) of global concern from national perspective, e.g. environment and health