Małgorzata Sej-Kolasa

University of Economics in Wrocław Poland

e-mail: malgorzata.sej-kolasa@ue.wroc.pl

The Role of EU Funds in Financing Environment Protection

ABSTRACT. Measures aimed at improving the quality of the environment and the society’s standard of living require quite substantial investments. The prerequisite of meeting the requirements imposed both by the EU directives and by the government’s strategy for the environment is a coherent system of environmental investment financing. The financial resources to implement environmental projects may come from public, private or foreign sources. In the recent years, environmental projects in Poland have increasingly been financed from European funds, – namely the Cohesion Fund and the structural funds, among which the most significant are the European Regional Development Fund and the European Social Fund.

Received: Nobember, 2008

1st Revision: January, 2009

Accepted: March, 2009

JEL Classification: K32, Q56

Keywords:: environment protection, sources of environmental project financing, European funds