A European report into Ireland’s “very poor” environment has been described as a “wakeup call” for the entire country. The State of Europe’s Environment criticised the Republic for the poor quality of its rivers, low rate of recycling and reliance on fossil fuels. Advertisement“The assessment of nature is very poor, with 85% of Ireland’s protected habitats and almost one third of protected species of flora and fauna having an unfavourable status,” it concluded. “What it’s telling us is that we’re seeing a long-term decline in our water quality. “And we’ve made no significant progress in our greenhouse gas emissions.”Professor Sweeney added that overseas visitors value pristine nature and believes further negative reports could “threaten” Ireland’s image abroad.