Western Balkans mayors commit to tackle air quality challenges with support of Energy Community Secretariat and Western Balkans Green Center
Environment
On the occasion of the Energy Community Just Transition Forum on 30 June, nine Western Balkan municipalities came together virtually to sign a declaration launching the Clean Air Regions Initiative (CARI). By signing the declaration, mayors of the nine participating municipalities committed to undertake voluntary measures aimed to reduce air pollution in their municipalities. CARI is an initiative launched by the Vienna-based Energy Community Secretariat and supported by the Hungarian Western Balkans Green Center (WBGC).
The CARI incentivises ambitious regions and communities to take action in the field of air quality on a voluntary basis. The initiative focuses on the most critical sources of pollution such as domestic heating, industry and traffic.
By singing the declaration, participating municipalities, with the support of the Secretariat and the WBGC, will strive to develop, adopt and implement local air quality action plans with ambitious policies and measures, share their experiences and learn about progress and achievements in other regions and municipalities.
The first nine signatories of the Initiative are the following:
- Banovići
- Bitola
- Kakanj
- Lukavac
- Maglaj
- Novi Sad
- Niš
- Pljevlja
- Tuzla
CARI will remain open to other interested municipalities in the future.