Decoupling environmental impacts from industrial growth: Case study for South Morava river basin

摘要

The widely accepted term ‘sustainable development’ is a comprehensive concept that requires multi-dimensional indicators showing links between economy, ecology and society. The concept of human development is obviously more complex than it could be understood from any aggregate economic index or from detailed sets of socio-economic statistical and ecological indicators. The research and analysis of the values of separation indicators for the Ju?na Morava basin agglomerations clearly show the impacts of industrial growth on the quality of the basin water bodies over the last three decades. Separation indicators have been derived from the statistical relationship between the situation indicators and drive indicators. The situation indicator SSWQIrb was derived as a composite index from ten chosen parameters which represent, by their quality, the characteristics of surface water, by reducing it to one index number weighed from the interrelation between the discharge at a given measurement station and the discharge at the exit profile of the basin. The index of the physical volume of industrial production (indexIND) has been accepted as the drive indicator. The indicators were calculated as a series of index numbers with 1981 as the base year. The values of separation indicators, i.e. degree of separation and factor of separation show the least separation in the first decade (1981-1990) when the volume of industrial production (indexIND) increased the most and the quality of the basin water bodies was the poorest (SSWQIrb). The improvement of the quality of basin water bodies in the last decade (2001-2010), marked by a higher value of the separation factor is a result of a slow growth of industrial production and positive impacts of an abrupt fall of total economic activity occurring already in the second decade (1991-2000). The research has confirmed the importance of applying the concepts of separation of economic growth from environmental impacts. Taking into consideration very low quantities of treated waters as opposed to the total amount of waste waters in Serbia, the separation indicators pose challenges to be faced in the near future. Separation indicators will serve to decision makers and the expert community as a key toolkit for verifying the results of the water resources protection policy.