APAT (Agency for the Protection of the Environment and the Technical Services)

Further to the sweeping reorganization of the environmental controls in 1993, the agency that had been initially set up as the National Agency for Environmental Protection (ANPA) has been subjected to a thorough reform that has caused it to merge with the Department of the National Technical Services of the Prime Minister's Office, with which it had already cooperated, and to change its name into APAT - Agency for the Protection of the Environment and the Technical Services.

The APAT carries out technical-scientific tasks and activities of national interest for the protection of the environment, the conservation of the water resources and the soil. The agency has technical-scientific and financial autonomy and is subject to the policy-making and supervisory authority of the Ministry for the Environment, Land and Sea and to the control of the State Audit Court.

The APAT works based on a three-year program - brought up to date on a yearly basis - that lays down objectives, priorities and resources, with a view to enforcing the directives of the Ministry for the Environment, Land and Sea. In the sectors falling within its province, the APAT carries out cooperation, consulting, service and support activities under special agreements with other public Administrations.

The APAT has joined the Network in 2004 and participates in the proceedings of the "Environmental Monitoring" Topical Working Group.