Italian NGOs win frail victory for 2014 environmental budget
Having dropped by a dramatic 2/3 since 2010, the austerity budget of Italy’s Environment Ministry can now hardly cover basic needs for nature conservation, control of environmental crime and protection against natural disasters.
According to a coalition of 140 non-governmental NGOs, including WWF Italia, Legambiente and Slow Food, the budget of the Environment Ministry has collapsed from 1.65 billion euro in 2009, to just 468 million, of which 306 million will be allocated to running operational expenditures of the Ministry’s services.
Following pressures from civil society, the Government agreed to increase the environmental budget to 509 million, which according to the NGOs is still insufficient.