As from next year the European Commission will be introducing a new green index complimenting GDP statistics in order to measure progress in the quality of life of its member states.
The new index will track important life qualities such as a clean environment, social cohesion and well-being and will help the EU to better shape its policies.
Announcing the plan in Brussels yesterday, European Environment Commissioner Stavros Dimas said that the environmental index will chart progress in areas such as greenhouse gas emissions, pollution, water use and waste generation to better reflect economic and social progress.
"A broader index was needed to enable policymakers to meet new challenges and steer policies towards green growth, low carbon emissions and resource efficiency," he said.
He said GDP, which measures the final market value of all goods and services produced within a country during a given period, was no more than an indicator of economic activity and not intended to measure wellbeing.
"It becomes a problem when GDP is understood to be the unique yardstick for progress," he told journalists. "It does not pick out issues that are vitally important to the quality of life, such as green environment, social cohesion or even how happy people are," Mr Dimas said.
The European Commission has been working on plans to develop indicators that look beyond GDP and other data as a measure of economic and social progress.
In its communication on the new index, the Commission presented five concrete steps aimed to direct policies towards green growth and a low carbon society. There will also be a sustainable development scoreboard so that trends can be seen and will allow benchmarking of best practice.
"I would hope to see a headline indicator of environmental sustainability that is published alongside GDP figures. This would be a National Sustainability Index that is as simple, as reliable and as widely accepted as GDP is. It would be an index where populations take pride in positive results, a catalyst for change," Mr Dimas said.
Although optimistic, the Commissioner admitted that this will take a number of years to materialise.