Environmental Performance Index 2008 [BETA]

About Comments

The “Comments” feature of epi.yale.edu is for the use of communication amongst the visitors to the site to discuss the EPI and components in a public forum.

The authors of the EPI do not endorse or stand behind the accuracy, truthfulness, or reliability of any information (including statements of opinion and advice) posted by users in “Comments” and is not responsible in any manner for any of the content in their posts or for any subsequent actions you may take as a result of such posts. Statements made in “Comments” reflect only the views of their authors. We reserve the right to regulate posting of comments that we deem unacceptable. You remain solely responsible for the content of your posts.

“Comments” is committed to free expression but expects users to follow a good internet etiquette. Do not post any material that violates the legal rights or privacy of others, including material that is defamatory, infringing, obscene, pornographic, abusive, or otherwise unlawful. You can be held legally liable for what you write in “Comments.”

You may not use “Comments” to advertise, solicit, promote the purchase of goods or services, operate or engage in surveys, contests, chain letters, or commercial enterprises, or for any other commercial purpose.

Please try to post messages that relate to the topic at hand and avoid frivolous, repetitive, or excessively lengthy posts. We ask that you don’t unnecessarily antagonize others and don’t represent yourself as another person.

We ask that you be respectful of other posters and your reading audience. Please remember that messages posted to “Comments” are publicly visible to all visitors of the EPI website.

Inappropriate material may be removed or reclassified at any time, for any reason, without prior notice or explanation. Readers who engage in a pattern of misconduct or commit an egregious violation of these guidelines may face sanctions including, but not limited to, suspension of their posting privileges and erasure of their entire posting history. While the EPI team is committed to respecting your privacy, we reserve the right to report unlawful behavior and vandalism of our Web site to your Internet service provider or, in extreme cases, local law enforcement.

The EPI Team has sole discretion to apply any of these sanctions at any time and without prior notice. Concerns regarding the enforcement of these rules should be directed to epi@yale.edu. The EPI Team reserves the right to modify these regulations at any time.

By participating in the “Comments” section, you agree to be bound by the foregoing these guidelines. Any rights not expressly granted herein are reserved.

Comments from all pages

Comments
Maharram Mehtiyev (Mar 05, 2008): To the authors of “Environmental Performance Index” Report I would like to express my ideas regarding “Environmental Performance Index” report for 2007 prepared by you. I consider useful participation of countries in the development of “Environmental Performance Index” report. But we consider presentation of subjective information to the public, without any preparation, causing its confusion inadmissible for such respected universities. These conclusions based on the following analysis. Use of some indicators in the report reflects insufficient knowledge about indicators. Since some indicators do not imply only anthropogenic impact on environment. I would like to bring your attention to some of them: 1. Urban particulates Air pollution by particulates in the cities was defined by PM10 concentration measured at the monitoring stations. First of all this kind of monitoring stations are available only in the developed countries. We would like to inform you that we know precisely about unavailability of these monitoring stations in the Caucuses countries, including Armenia suddenly fallen into “Middle East and North Africa” group, neither in the Central Asia countries. Secondly, this indicator can not distinguish natural and anthropogenic wastes. The indicator could not be accepted as criteria under this consideration. One can not compare Canada covered by forest with Saudi Arabia placed in the desert based on this indicator. 2. Regional and local ozone Based on the presented results one can conclude that the figures were allocated in accordance with countries relief height level. This indicator is more related to natural conditions and could not be included in to environmental performance index. 3. Pesticides management This indicator is absolutely unreasonable. First of all there are countries which have not only ever used pesticide conventions but also never seen them. 4. Emissions per capita It’s not right to include this indicator in the assessment. The assessment of industrial and agrarian countries together does not reflect real picture. 5. Emissions per generated electric energy This also can not be accepted as indicator. Since it does not distinguish countries used nuclear and fuel stations. As result 5 undefined indicators from 25 bring effectiveness of the report to 80%. We did not even touch so far accepted sources of information for the indicators which cover different time periods. One could never compare information dated differently. At the end please bring to the consideration of the specialists that at least they can not use this document due to its lacks as a source of information. Yours faithfully, Maharram Mehtiyev Lead advisor Department of environmental policy and environment protection Ministry of ecology and natural resources of Azerbaijan Republic
Semon Crantuiton (Apr 13, 2008): Very nice site! Thanks! <a href=http://www.google.com>Nice</a> <a href=http://www.google.com>Nice</a> http://www.google.com
Dinouk Jayakody (Apr 21, 2008): Extremely helpful site.But the EPI should be publisized more.As a student in a Sri Lankan government school i havent learnt much about global warming,loss of species, conservation, etc.so it would be great if you could help start programmes locally to educate the younger genarations on effects such as global warming.Thanks!
Garron Fish (Apr 22, 2008): A useful tool for comparing similar countries (countries with similar resources and levels of development) but I agree with Maharram Mehtiyev that the published EPI values are completely subjective and should have been advertised as such. I really like it that you can change the weightings of the calculations. Using some weights settings Switzerland is at about 110 and Nigeria is 1st.
Cheryl (Apr 23, 2008): What about Brunei? I would like to know more about the state of my country’s environment,its efforts in protecting its environment and what more can we do to realize our environmental goals.
hemavani (Jun 02, 2008): i would like to thank you for creating such a wonderful site, which will be very useful for young engineers like us.To see where our country stands in the EPI.
Abubaker (Jul 06, 2008): Vey exciting materials reflected by your work which is considered a vauable subject for the coming generations.
Carlos Viesca (Jul 16, 2008): Certainly the EPI is a huge effort, however I believe that it can be improved significantly in two ways. Firstly, with the carbon footprint of international trade of goods. This issue has two dimensions: 1) the environmental impact of manufacturing goods and growing perishables in countries with lax environmental regulations (as opposed as doing so at home with more strict law) and 2) by the moving of freight around the globe, promoted primarily by commodities brands from top deciles countries and for the year-round consumption of perishable goods by such countries, coming from faraway sources in developing countries. Secondly, we know that official figures and general indicators are quite subjective. For example in my country (Mexico) official data on environmental issues is quite inaccurate (most times hiding negative results). So why not using subjectivity in EPI’s favor. In order to contextualize the results from the index, there could be a literature research on scientific papers to establish the most frequently quoted environmental perils and define a perception indicator from the scientific community.
Abubakar Yahaya (Jul 27, 2008): This is is really a very knowledgeable innovation that creates awareness of the environment. But what i still don’t get is how to compare two countries with each other say Malaysia and other African country like Albenia or Nigeria
Adam Gunn (Jul 29, 2008): Well done on a very difficult task-no doubt it will be further refined in the future. Where can we access the individual country reports- I am particularly interested in the South Africa report? Kind regards. Adam Gunn
ZAINI UJANG (Aug 11, 2008): May I know why countries such as Singapore is not covered in EPI? In addition, what is the methodology the research team applied to get information for countries with diverse environmental management agencies. In Malaysia for example, the 25 indicators are managed by at least 10 agencies, covering various aspects.
Edgar Soliz (Nov 01, 2008): Sres. EPI-YALE Es mi parecer que los índices ESI y EPI, para una mejor comprensión en el análisis, estén actualizados a la par, seguramente ocurrirá a futuro. Los valores de ambos para Bolivia son muy dispares, estoy estudiando las causas.
John Mulcahy (Nov 18, 2008): Exce;llent site, and very good to have some basis for comparison. One question – is the data used provided by the governments, or from available official statistics? For example, Ireland is given a 100% rating for drinking water, when there are widespread and serious issues with cryptospyridium, lead in water, coliforms in bottled water, etc. The fact is that in many urban and rural areas in Ireland it is demonstrably NOT safe to drink water.
Dan Matisoff (Nov 20, 2008): It would be helpful if there were a printable version of some of the maps, figures, and graphs so that they could be used as a teaching tool in class. Currently, I have to present everything on the projector, rather than having individuals receive their own printouts, and I cannot assign students reading material as easily without printouts.
Lapperton (Mar 17, 2009): this makes shit look like gold. seriously, im high and i can still tell that this is complete shite. i am so sad you are wasting my time with such bogus numbers.
siirt (Apr 11, 2009): Siirtlilerin buluşma noktası, siirtten haberler, siirtspor haberleri ve siirt hakkında gelişmeler. Benim Güzel memleketim siirt ve ilçeleri. Siirt hakkında arayıpta bulamadığınız bütün konuları bu sitede bula bilme imkanına sahipsiniz herkesi siirt sitesine davet ediyoruz. Siirtliler sitesi bir marka haline gelmiş siirt çevre ilçerlerini tanıtan bir sayfa haline gelmiştir. siirtliyiz.com sitesine herkes davetlidir. <a href=”http://www.siirtliyiz.com” target=”_blank”>siirt</a></div>
SİİRTLİ (Apr 11, 2009): http://www.siirtliyiz.com thansk
Rodger Grant (Apr 18, 2009): what is scary here is that some have indicated they will use this collection of distortions as teaching material!
Ingrid Saborio (Apr 22, 2009): I am glad and proud of my own country, Costa Rica, but what about the Kingdom of Buthan. I heard it is a very green country. Am I wrong?
Paul Southern (Apr 23, 2009): Where’s Singapore? Its the cleanest greenest country in Asia… isn’t it?
San Diego Web Design (Jul 12, 2009): <a href=”http://www.sandiegowebstudio.com”>The US is responsible for most</a> of the pollution in this world