WEST-HUNGARIAN RESEARCH INSTITUTE CENTRE FOR REGIONAL STUDIES OF HUNGARIAN ACADEMY OF SCIENTES No. 126/B Project leader: Dr. Irén Szörényiné Kukorelli The balance between economic development and environmental planning in the field of tourism development in the rural Europe (E.D.E.N.) SZIGETKÖZ (Hungary) Diagnostic Study I. Győr, 2001. Authors: Tamás Hardi Dr. Irén Szörényiné Kukorelli Judit Tóthné Hermann CONTENTS I. Regional Development and environmental protection in Hungary.................................... 1 1. Regional Development in Hungary.................................................................................... 1 The evaluation of the Act on Regional Development ............................................................ 2 National Regional Development Concept.............................................................................. 3 Institutional system of regional development......................................................................... 4 Inter-municipal regional development association............................................................... 10 2. The regulation of environmental protection in Hungary.................................................. 15 3. The harmonisation of environmental protection with regional development and physical planning.................................................................................................................................... 19 Environmental protection tasks in regional development .................................................... 21 The role of environmental protection in physical planning.................................................. 23 II. General features of the territories involved in planning in Gyõr-Moson-Sopron county. 25 1. Gyõr-Moson-Sopron county............................................................................................. 25 Climate ................................................................................................................................. 28 Demographic features........................................................................................................... 29 Economic features ................................................................................................................ 30 2. The Sokoróalja Development Association....................................................................... 33 Demographic circumstances................................................................................................. 33 Number of population ...................................................................................................... 35 Economic activity................................................................................................................. 36 3. Settlements of the Fertõmente Regional Development Association ................................ 39 Demography ......................................................................................................................... 39 Number of population....................................................................................................... 41 Economic activity................................................................................................................. 42 4. The Szigetköz area ........................................................................................................... 45 Demography ......................................................................................................................... 45 Economic activity................................................................................................................. 50 The supply of infrastructure in the settlements of the Szigetköz ......................................... 53 Land use in the Szigetköz..................................................................................................... 60 Analysis of the spatial connections of the Szigetköz and its region..................................... 65 5. Summary .......................................................................................................................... 81 A SWOT analysis of the general socio-economic situation................................................. 83 A SWOT analysis of the infrastructure ................................................................................ 85 A SWOT analysis of the agricultural land use ..................................................................... 87 The balance between economic development and environmental… (E.D.E.N.) 1 REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT AND ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION IN HUNGARY 1. REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT IN HUNGARY The XXI./1996 Act on regional Development and Physical Planning (modified by the XCII/1999 Act) determines the institutional frameworks and the system of means of regional development. According to the Act the objectives of regional development are: (a) to assist the development of a market economy in every region of the country, to create the necessary conditions for sustainable development; to encourage innovation and to create a spatial structure corresponding to social, economic and environmental objectives; (b) to reduce significant differences – in terms of living conditions, economic, cultural and infrastructural conditions – between the capital and the rest of the country, towns and villages, as well as developed and underdeveloped regions and settlements, to prevent the formation of new crisis areas to ensure equal social opportunities; (c) to assist the harmonic development of the country's capital and settlement structure; (d) to sustain and strengthen the sense of identity at national and regional levels. The tasks of regional development and physical planning are: (e) to encourage the initiatives of regional and local communities for regional development and physical planning, and to co-ordinate these initiatives with the national objectives; (f) to determine elaborate and implement development concepts, programmes and plans, which serve to maintain or improve the balance between society, economy , environment and nature; (g) to assist, through international co-operation, the adjustment to the regional policy of the European Union, to make use of mutual benefits of regional co-operation, and to assist the co-ordinated development of border regions (especially the disadvantageous border regions). Basic terminology: In the Law: a) regional development: on national and regional level implies b) the monitoring and evaluation of social, economic and environmental processes at national and regional levels and determining the directions of necessary, planned interventions; © MTA RKK NYUTI 2 The balance between economic development and environmental… (E.D.E.N.) ab) the determination, co-ordination and implementation of comprehensive national and regional short, medium and long-term development objectives, concepts and measures, within the framework of development programmes, and their implementation in other sectoral decisions. a) physical planning: determines the order of land-use and rules of land utilisation in the individual region, as well as in the whole of the country, in particular: ba) the identification and evaluation of resources and the load and load-bearing capacity of the environment, and the production of forecasts; aa) the elaboration of proposals on the appropriate utilisation of regional resources; bc) the specification of the spatial , technical and physical systems of development concepts and programmes; bd) international co-operation and the co-ordination of physical planning in Europe and in border regions within the framework of agreements. As far as the four basic elements of regional development – regional policy, means, regulation and management – are concerned, regulation and management are hardly detectable in the act while the planning is overemphasised among the means. The act defines quite a number of terminology: such as regional development (incomplete), physical planning, physical plan, regional development policy (complementing regional development), region (planning, statistical and development region) regional development concept and programme and different region types, etc. The evaluation of the Act on Regional Development The act enforces the "top–down" principle. The act often refers to the horizontal co-operation: regional development may become the main framework of the integration and harmonisation of sectoral intentions. The act devotes a separate chapter to physical planning and the regional information system. As a whole the spirit of the act is pointing ahead integrating the development and planning approach, thus it is unable to resolve the traditional segmentation of the institutional system and its informational relationships. The act resulted positive changes in the following fields: • it regulates the change of regional development model with the highest level legal regulation • it considers the modern EU principles • it institutionalised integration and co-operation between the branches and the tiers • it launched a process of decentralisation • it established a system of special institutions covering the entire country © MTA RKK NYUTI The balance between economic development and environmental… (E.D.E.N.) 3 • the institutional system – the relationship of the government, local-government, chambers, employers and employees, etc. – was based on the principle of partnership (amendment!!!) • it institutionalised in the regional tier the so called macro–regional