Costa Rica Ranks #3 in World for Environmental Performance

Costa Rica has moved up 2 spots to claim third place, according to the Environmental Performance Index or EPI, which was released earlier this year during the World Economic Forum, which is held biannually in Davos, Switzerland.

The 2010 Environmental Performance Index (EPI) ranks 163 countries on 25 performance indicators tracked across ten categories, covering both environmental public health and ecosystem vitality. These indicators provide a gauge of how close countries are to established environmental policy goals. The EPI’s proximity-to-target method allows comparisons within a single country and country to country, as well as analysis of how the global community is doing collectively on each particular issue.

EPI SCORES

1 Iceland 93.5
2 Switzerland 89.1
3 Costa Rica 86.4
4 Sweden 86.0

Ranking was determined by a scale of various criteria, Climate change and environmental health counted for 50% of the overall score. Although not listed in the chart below, the EPI Analysis also concluded that income has a major role to play in determining the level of success in environmental management.

The Environment Performance Index was first published as a pilot EPI in the year 2002 and was designed to supplement the environmental targets that were to be achieved by the United Nations Millennium Development Goals. The EPI 2010 has been produced by environmental experts of the Columbia University and the Yale University. The first edition of the EPI came out in 2006 and is prepared every two years since then. EPI 2010 is the third edition.

While the study is a good general over view of world environmental health, it is not complete. Only those countries with data available from international bodies like the World Bank, the United Nations and its various programs and other research groups were included in the study.