Wednesday, 8 June 2011 - Strasbourg
Explanation of vote:
Report Anna Rosbach
Pino Arlacchi (S&D ), in writing . − I voted in favour of this report because it stresses the importance of agreeing on a systemic approach to setting up a coherent ‘Beyond GDP system’ to contribute to improved policy analysis. GDP is an indicator of economic activity that has become a standard benchmark used by policy-makers throughout the world. But GDP is only a measure of production. It does not measure environmental sustainability, resource efficiency, social inclusion and social progress in general. Therefore it can be misleading.
We need to measure quality of life in societies; we need to consider that achieving and sustaining quality of life involves important, consensual factors such as health, education, culture, employment, housing, environmental conditions, etc. For these reasons this report deserves to be given the highest consideration. It takes the view that indicators which measure such factors should be assigned a greater role.
[source:www.europarl.europa.eu]