Integrative Approaches towards Sustainability in the Baltic Sea Region

Citation

Leal Filho, W. and Ubelis, A. (2004), "Integrative Approaches towards Sustainability in the Baltic Sea Region", Management of Environmental Quality, Vol. 15 No. 4, pp. 456-457. https://doi.org/10.1108/meq.2004.15.4.456.1

The challenges of sustainable development require that everybody, every institution, and every nation work towards long‐term strategies in order to move away from unsustainable practices. The same line of thinking applies to all nations around the Baltic Sea.

A general challenge for the Baltic Sea region is to broaden the interest of people in discussions of national approaches supporting sustainability. Finding effective instruments to support the process of sustainable development in countries in transition with an emerging and largely inexperienced entrepreneur community and economically fragile, is as important as the promotion of long‐term integrated sustainability strategies in countries which have well established democracies. The knowledge of the ongoing changes and the driving social, economic and ecological factors essential for the implementation of sustainable development in countries in transition must be broadened. The Baltic countries now joining the EU have to build capacity to draw up and implement sustainable development strategies at the national level, which are consistent with European strategies.

The book Integrative Approaches towards Sustainability in the Baltic Sea Region provides a contribution to the debate on environment and sustainable development in the Baltic Sea region. It is one of the outcomes of a conference with the same title, held in Riga, Latvia, on 26‐29 March 2003. It was organised by the University of Latvia, sponsored by DG Research and supported by BEIDS.

The first part of the book contains articles and abstracts related to the keynote speeches. It is meant to serve as a guide to readers in respect of the matters dealt with in the presentations. The second part of the book contains papers and reports produced by both senior and junior researchers from across the Baltic, dealing with a wide range of issues which are relevant to the region such as:

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  sustainable development and the 6th Framework Programme;

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  the zero emissions concept and prospects;

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  the industrial symbiosis at Kalundborg, Denmark;

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  reshaping competitive forces in the industrialised world;

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  how can the Baltic countries’ resources be oriented towards sustainability?;

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  sustainable forestry in Finland;

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  no sustainability without radical dematerialisation;

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  global small (sustainable management for all local leaders) initiative for sustainability;

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  environmentally sustainable domestic consumption;

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  approaches for local and regional sustainable development;

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  the sustainable neighbourhood;

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  education for sustainable development;

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  experiences from the Baltic 21 Education process; and

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  sustainability teaching at a technical university.

Due to its nature and international scope, this comprehensive book is of special interest to planners, politicians, university lecturers, researchers, administrators, university students and other professionals with an interest on environment and sustainable development issues in the Baltic Sea region. Orders can be placed via the Web site: www.peterlang.com