diff --git a/components/lazutils/lazutf8.pas b/components/lazutils/lazutf8.pas
index 95f3327dab..fa065b71ee 100644
--- a/components/lazutils/lazutf8.pas
+++ b/components/lazutils/lazutf8.pas
@@ -352,7 +352,7 @@ end;
 
 function GetEnvironmentVariableCountUTF8: Integer;
 begin
-  {$IF defined(FPC_RTL_UNICODE) or not defined(Windows)}
+  {$IF defined(FPC_RTL_UNICODE) or not defined(MSWindows)} //also WinCE, issue #0031788
   Result:=SysUtils.GetEnvironmentVariableCount;
   {$ELSE}
   Result:=GetGetEnvironmentVariableCountWide;
@@ -364,7 +364,7 @@ begin
   {$IFDEF FPC_RTL_UNICODE}
   Result:=UTF16ToUTF8(SysUtils.GetEnvironmentString(Index));
   {$ELSE}
-    {$IFDEF Windows}
+    {$IFDEF MSWindows} //not for WinCE, issue #0031788
     Result:=UTF16ToUTF8(GetEnvironmentStringWide(Index));
     {$ELSE}
     // by default the environment is in console encoding
diff --git a/components/lazutils/winlazutf8.inc b/components/lazutils/winlazutf8.inc
index dac98855c7..57bad1c135 100644
--- a/components/lazutils/winlazutf8.inc
+++ b/components/lazutils/winlazutf8.inc
@@ -222,6 +222,7 @@ begin
   end;
 end;
 
+{$IFNDEF WINCE}
 function GetGetEnvironmentVariableCountWide: integer;
 var
   hp,p : PWideChar;
@@ -238,6 +239,7 @@ begin
   FreeEnvironmentStringsW(p);
 end;
 
+
 function GetEnvironmentStringWide(Index: Integer): UnicodeString;
 var
   hp,p : PWideChar;
@@ -255,6 +257,7 @@ begin
     Result:=hp;
   FreeEnvironmentStringsW(p);
 end;
+{$ENDIF WINCE}
 
 function GetEnvironmentVariableWide(const EnvVar: string): UnicodeString;
 {$IF FPC_FULLVERSION>=30000}
@@ -287,6 +290,7 @@ begin
 end;
 {$ENDIF}
 
+
 //*************** END WideString impementations
 
 {$ifdef WinCE}