Meeting: Environmental CSOs for Albania's integration into the EU

On 10th of February 2021, EDEN Center conducted a consultative meeting - "Environmental CSOs for Albania's integration into the EU, Chapter 27. Integration of green principles in policy-making", held in a combined form, organised parallel physically and virtually via the Zoom platform.
Key stakeholders involved in environmental protection in the country became part of the meeting, such as experts, members and directors of environmental organisations, representatives from public administration, students from environmental field-studies, environmental activists – that came from 6 cities (Tirana, Berat, Librazhd, Tropojë, Kukës).

Moderated by the Executive Director of EDEN Center, Mrs Ermelinda Mahmutaj, the meeting started with the presentation and discussion of the environmental organisations group GREEN+27, on the country’s progress in the frame of Chapter 27 of EU negotiations for the integration of the country. The sub-chapters reviewed are Water Management (REC Albania); Waste Management (URI); Nature Conservation (INCA) and Horizontal Legislation (EDEN Center). An interactive Q&A session followed the presentation of the national report, where representatives of environmental CSOs suggested and gave their comments regarding the scope of the report.

Following, the second part of the meeting continued with the presentation of Mrs Sonja Vukovic (from Slap Association, Croatia) on the purpose of the regional study and its findings on opportunities for developing the Green Economy in the region. Mrs Vukovic stressed the importance of the role of the Green Economy as an instrument in integrating the implementation of the European Green Deal in the region. At the end of the presentation, representatives of CSOs shared their contribution in promoting Green Economy in the country through their project activities and local initiatives. Besides, attendees briefly gave comments on the situation of supporting mechanism (incentives, policies, etc) to the green economy.

Despite the difficult condition due to Covid-19, we thank the speakers and attendees of this meeting that did not hesitate to share their insights and opinions, even though that the meeting was conducted combined virtually and physically.

The meeting “Environmental CSOs for Albania's integration into the EU, Chapter 27. Integration of green principles in policy-making" was conducted in the frame of the “ Green Economy for an Advanced Region (GEAR)” project and the Swedish-Albanian program on Support to Albanian Negotiations for Environmental Chapter 27 (SANE27).