Geurt van de Kerk and Lex van Alphen were both founding partners of the K+V consultancy group which has completed numerous management assignments and research projects in the environmental sector. In 2006 Geurt van de Kerk developed the Sustainable Society Index.

România, catre o societate durabila

or, more understandable for most readers:

Romania, on its way to a sustainable society

Romania will be the first country implementing and using the Sustainable Society Index, SSI. For this purpose the Dutch Sustainable Society Foundation set up a project to focus the SSI on the Romanian situation. The project will be carried out by two Romanian consultancy firms – VeraNatura and Green Partners – in close cooperation with the national and regional governments.

The SSI has been developed for 150 countries all over the world, including Romania. The SSI shows at a glance the extent of sustainability of a country. This project will focus the SSI on the Romanian society, both on national and regional level. That requires updating of the SSI, collecting specific Romanian data in more detail, showing developments over time, and additional data on other relevant aspects. The results, the specific Romanian SSI, will be published, both in Romanian and English.
In the next phase the SSI will be implemented in the new Romanian National Strategy on Sustainable Development. In the meantime the project team will also cooperate with all eight regions in Romania to introduce and implement the SSI in each region.

October 8, 2007 this project started with an official opening ceremony in the very impressive building of the National Institute of Statistics in Bucharest. All speakers welcomed this project and stressed the importance for Romania. The project will take about 18 months.

You can find more information on this innovative project at www.romaniadurabila.net or
www.sustainablesocietyindex.com.