Spatial and environmental planning of sustainable regional development in Serbia

The paper analyses the planning framework for sustainable territorial and regional development. The spatial and environmental planning should play the key role in coordination and integration of different planning grounds in achieving the sustainable regional development. The paper discusses the spatial planning capacity to offer the integral view of the sustainable territorial development. The brief review of tendencies in new spatial planning and regional policy has been given. The focus is on the concept of balanced polycentric development of European Union. The guiding principles of spatial planning in regard of planning system reform in European countries have been pointed out. The changes in paradigm of regional policy, and the tasks of European regional spatial planning have been discussed. In Serbia problems occur in regard with the lack of coordinating sectoral planning with spatial and environmental planning. Partly the problem lies in the legal grounds, namely in non codification of laws and unregulated horizontal and vertical coordination at all levels of governance. The possibilities for the implementation of spatial planning principles and concepts of European Union sustainable territorial and regional development have been analyzed on the case of three regional spatial plans of eastern and southeastern regions in Serbia. The disadvantages in implementing the strategic environmental impact assessment as an instrument for coordination and integration of sectorial planning with spatial and environmental planning have been analyzed. The strategic environmental impact assessment has been implemented only in the spatial planning process. Through spatial planning process its feedback effect on sectorial planning has been indirectly achieved. The priority actions in Serbia for achieving the spatial and environmental planning role in coordination and integration of different planning grounds in sustainable regional development have been given.