Today, And A Little on the Environmental Performance Index

Belgians call days like today 'ice days' or so I was informed.

I find this believable because at 2pm the temperature still reads as -2 degrees C. I walked home, fearful that exposed body parts might freeze and shatter. There was a wind, it was miserably bitingly cold.

Anyway, I got home and checked through the blogworld while eating my lunch. Erkan had mentioned Yale's Environmental Performance Index.

Sure it's interesting ... New Zealand was ranked number one ... I have to write of it.

I wandered through the pdf file EPI Report and discovered that New Zealand was first with an EPI of 88.0, Belgie was 39th with 75.9 and Turkey was 49th with 72.8. 133 countries were listed.

What is EPI?
It's the environmental performance index and things like air quality, water resources, biodiversity and habitat, sustainable energy, and productive natural resources are all measured.

The top 10 were NZ, Sweden, Finland, Czech Rep., U.K, Austria, Denmark, Canada, Malaysia and Ireland with Australia down at 20th on the list.

New Zealand is a small country ... with just 268,021 sqkm of land (about the size of Italy I think, or Colorado). We have 15,134 kms of coastline. The highest point is Mount Cook at 3,754metres. As well as claiming to be the Adventure Capital of the world, we enhance man-made adventure with earthquake and volcanic activity, and 'Lord of the Rings' and 'Narnia' were filmed on our fair shores. There are just over 4 million of us and we make some of the best wine in the world.

Ahhh New Zealand ...