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stressors. The Ústí region (NUTS 4) lies on the border with Germany (Saxony) and
its land use is divided into the following categories: farmland greater than 50%, for-
est areas 30% and bodies of water 2%. As of 2008 its population was 835 thousand
inhabitants, 8% of the population of the Czech Republic as a whole. Population
density stands at 158 inhabitants per km
2
, which is 25% higher than the average
for the country. The region is one of the most heavily urbanised areas in the Czech
Republic, with 80.5% of its inhabitants living in towns. Unemployment is a signif-
icant problem in the region and is still running at the highest levels in the country,
despite its reduction in recent years below the 10% level.
In former times the Ústí Region was one of the richest parts of Bohemia,
renowned for its high quality agricultural activities. Ore mining for copper and
tin developed in the Krušné hory (Ore Mountains), which form a natural bound-
ary between the Czech lands and Germany, while in the foothills of those same
mountains open-cast mining for brown coal began as early as the Sixteenth century.
Today the Ústí region is one of the most heavily industrialised in the country, and is
dominated by the large-scale mining of brown coal and the subsequent production
of electrical power. The region is a power/fuel base that also hosts a high proportion
of the chemical and food-processing industries.
The Ústí region is an ideal study region on which to test the methodological
approach of environmental stress accounting. In the past it has been a barometer
that revealed the fundamental changes in the development of the Czech lands, of
which it was also frequently at the forefront. This is true both of the processes of
industrialisation and urbanisation, which were closely tied with the same processes
in Saxony in the mid-Eighteenth century, and of questions linked with ecological
problems (Balej et al., 2004).
3.3 Results from Case Studies
Ecological stress rose dynamically during the communist regime (1950-1990) - by
almost twofold (Fig. 3.2). While in the two decades between 1950 and 1970 eco-
logical stress increased by 53%, the increasing stress dynamics meant that the same
increase was then registered in the course of one decade only, between 1980 and
1990. The region of Ústí nad Labem was then on the brink of ecological catastrophe.
Following the political sea change in 1989 and thanks to the implementation of
environmental measures, the level of EcoS was brought down by 18.6% between
1990 and 2005. Spatial differentiation of ecological stress was on the rise during the
communist period, with the range of values almost doubling (14-25 points) between
1950 and 1990. In the post-industrial period, on the other hand, the degree of eco-
logical stress shows a stagnating trend, with the spatial differentiation of stress also
decreasing.
The development of individual indicator clusters reveals a marked differentiation
in ecological stress (see Fig. 3.2). Air pollution indicators showed the most dramatic
decrease (as a result of the desulphurisation of coal-driven power plants or their
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