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EUROPEAN ECO FORUM NEWSLETTER No 28 |
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1 EUROPEAN ENVIRONMENT AND HEALTH COMMITTEE DISCUSSES PREPARATORY ACTIVITIES FOR ROME-2009 On 25-26 October 2007, the 24th meeting of the European Environment and Health Committee (EEHC) took place in Bonn. The EEHC oversees coordination and follow-up of the “Environment and Health” process. The EEHC has been renewed, with Armenia, Belgium and France leaving, and Netherlands, Estonia, and 3 EECCA countries joining. The EEHC membership, therefore, includes: Cyprus, Estonia, Kyrgyzstan, Norway and Moldova (representatives of health ministries), and Austria, Finland, Italy, The Netherlands and Uzbekistan (representatives of environment ministries). The EEHC has elected 2 new co-chairs, Italy and Norway. The WHO secretariat proposed a new working manner for the coming two years till the next ministerial conference. Instead of 4 annual meeting, 2 of the EEHC and 2 of the CEHAPE Task Force, it is proposed to have 2 back to back meetings. This means that the Task Force no longer organises its own meetings. There will be 1 CEHAPE day as part of the combined meeting. These combined meetings will be inter-ministerial meetings, and will have a content part and a policy part, where the agenda and declaration for the ministerial conference in 2009 will be prepared. The Italian Delegation announced that, unlike earlier indications, when it seemed the Ministerial Conference “Environment and Health” would be postponed till 2010, it will take place at the end of 2009, probably in November. Most likely, the location will be Rome. Two drafting groups will be set up, one to develop the ministerial declaration for Rome-2009, and one on the “future of the process”. The Trade Unions urged that the meetings be consecutive. The secretariat will come with a proposal in this respect. The NGOs are welcome to take part in both groups. At the Intergovernmental Midterm Review meeting in Vienna in June 2007, the member states decided that the overall theme of the next ministerial conference will remain to be Children’s Environmental Health. However, this will be linked to cross cutting themes like equity, economy or climate change. The next EEHC/CEHAPE meeting will take place in the 2nd week of March 2008, probably in Rome. The following will take place in October in Spain. The documents of the EEHC meeting are available at http://www.euro.who.int/eehc/meetings/20070911_1 For more information and to express your interest in taking part in EEHC/CEHAPE meetings please contact: Sascha Gabizon Jasmine Osorio
2 AARHUS WORKING GROUP OF THE PARTIES DISCUSSES LONG-TERM STRATEGIC PLAN The eighth meeting of the Working Group of the Parties (WGP) to the Aarhus Convention took place on 31 October to 2 November 2007 in Geneva. The European ECO Forum was represented by John Hontelez, Mara Silina, Serhiy Vykhryst, Andriy Andrusevych, Gita Parihar, Olha Melen, Thomas Alge, Sergey Solyanik, and Nesat Azemovski. The representatives of the Parties to the Convention reported on the preparations of National Implementation Reports (NIR). The reports should be submitted by countries by mid-December 2007 to allow the Aarhus Convention Secretariat to develop a synthesis report. Most delegations reported that the drafts either had gone or were going through the public consultation phase. The vast majority of countries reported that their NIR would be submitted to the Secretariat in time. Slovakia was the only country to acknowledge that it would not be able to submit the NIR timely. The WGP discussed a draft of a long-term strategic plan, drawn up on the basis of draft elements prepared by the Expert Group on Long-Term Strategic Planning. It is expected that the long term strategic plan will be endorsed by the Third Meeting of the Parties in Riga. The WGP took note of the comments provided by delegations. However, further comments were invited from delegations to revise it as necessary. The WGP was informed about progress with regard to ratification of the GMO amendment, adopted by the MOP-2 in Almaty in 2005. Lithuania and Moldova have recently ratified the amendment. Previously, the amendment had been ratified by Bulgaria, Denmark and Luxembourg. The WGP discussed the preparatory steps towards a regional or international expert meeting on access to information, public participation and access to justice in the field of GMOs. The WGP addressed preparations for the Third Meeting of the Parties scheduled for 11-13 June 2008, in Riga, Latvia. The participants reviewed the main elements for the programme and agenda of the meeting. The documents of the WGP are available at http://www.unece.org/env/pp/wgp.htm#8thwgp For more information contact: Mara Silina
3. TASK FORCE ON WATER AND CLIMATE INVITES COMMENTS The first meeting of the Task Force on Water and Climate to the Convention on the Protection and Use of Transboundary Watercourses and International Lakes took place on 22-23 November 2007, in Bonn, Germany. The meeting brought together representatives of Armenia, Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Czech Republic, Finland, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Netherlands, Portugal, Switzerland, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, UNECE, UNESCO, UNFCCC, UNDP, International Sava River Basin Commission, Interstate Commission for Water Coordination of Central Asia, and International Council of Environmental Law. Diana Iskreva (Earth for Ever, Bulgaria) and Nataliya Chizhmakova (MAMA-86, Ukraine) took part as experts of NGOs. According to the decision of the 4th meeting of the Parties, the Task Force was entrusted with activities in two main areas: transboundary flood management, and water and climate adaptation. In the area of transboundary flood management, the Task Force should support the transfer of the experience and the results of the European Network of Expertise on Flood Risk Management to non-EU countries. In the area of water and climate adaptation, the Task Force should prepare Guidance on Water and Climate Adaptation for presentation to the 5th Meeting of the Parties in 2009. The Task Force addressed: -Draft Guidance on water and climate adaptation; The meeting fixed the deadline of 21 December 2007 for the collection of comments on the draft Guidance and draft Questionnaire, as well as suggestions concerning the workshop agenda. The Secretariat will then distribute the Questionnaire among EECCA and SEE countries. Volunteering lead country (ies) will process in March - June 2008 the responses received from countries and will prepare a background document on the main findings to be considered at the workshop and at the next meeting of the Task Force. All further work of the Task Force will be devoted to the preparation of the Guidance on Water and Climate Adaptation for presentation to the fifth Meeting of the Parties in 2009. The Secretariat cordially invited all interested parties to take part in preparations of the Guidance, the Questionnaire and the workshop. Further information on the work of the Task Force and all meeting documents in English and Russian is available at http://www.unece.org/env/water/water.and.climate.htm For more information please contact: Natalia Chyzhmakova Please send your comments to the drafts (Guidance and Questionnaire) and suggestions on workshop agenda before 15 December 2007 to: Anna Tsvietkova and Natalia Chyzhmakova
4. THIRD REGIONAL IMPLEMENTATION MEETING TO PREPARE CONTRIBUTION TO CSD-16 The Third Regional Implementation Meeting will take place in Geneva on 28-29 January 2008. It aims to prepare the contribution from the UNECE region to the 16th Session of the Commission on Sustainable Development which will be held from 5 – 16 May 2008 in New York. CSD-16 will open the third two-year cycle of its multi-year work programme with a focus on the following main thematic clusters: a) agriculture; b) rural development; c) land; d) drought; e) desertification; and f) Africa. While not all issues have the same relevance for all regions, the UNECE region is expected to provide inputs not only with regard to progress and challenges in its member countries, but also from a donor perspective, particularly for Africa. Deadline for registration is 10 January 2008. The documents of the meeting are available at: http://www.unece.org/env/SustainableDevelopment/3Session/sd_forum.jan2008.htm
5. AVAILABILITY OF RSS AT THE AARHUS CLEARINGHOUSE The Aarhus Clearinghouse Resource Directory and News sections are syndicated using RSS, the most common syndication format. These feeds always show the latest content published by the Clearinghouse. Most content management systems now include simple modules for integrating RSS feeds into your website. Another simple way to add a feed to your website is to use RSS-to-Javascript. Adding RSS feeds to your iGoogle home page, MyYahoo, or any other personal portal, is simple. The Aarhus Clearinghouse has chosen a few of the most common personal portal systems and added a one-click tool for adding feeds. You will find them in the Resource Directory and News sections. The Aarhus Clearinghouse for Environmental Democracy (http://www.aarhusclearinghouse.org) supports the effective implementation of the Aarhus Convention through the collection, dissemination and exchange of information on laws and good practices relevant to the public's right to access environmental information, participate in environmental decision-making, and achieve justice on environmental matters. The Resource Directory is available at http://www.aarhusclearinghouse.org/resources.cfm The News Section is available at http://www.aarhusclearinghouse.org/news.cfm
6. CONFERENCE ON PARTNERSHIPS FOR ACHIEVING WATER AND SANITATION MDGs IN THE EECCA REGION The first regional WfW Conference "Partnerships for Achieving Water and Sanitation Millennium Development Goals in the EECCA region" took place from 4 to 6 November 2007 in Kyiv, Ukraine. The conference was co-organized by Women for Water partnership (WfW), "MAMA-86" and Women in Europe for a Common Future. The conference brought together 64 representatives from NGOs of Armenia, Belarus, Bulgaria, Germany, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, the Netherlands, Romania, Ukraine, and Uzbekistan, the representatives of Ukrainian authorities, international organizations and donors, as well as water and sanitation experts. The Conference allowed sharing experience and lessons learned from water supply and sanitation programs in the region. It contributed to identifying opportunities for up-scaling best practices based on in-depth analysis of case studies from Armenia, Bulgaria, Romania, Ukraine, and Uzbekistan. The participants discussed regional challenges in the implementation of the Protocol on Water and Health and the achievement of Millennium Development Goals, as well as tasks arising from the forthcoming International Year of Sanitation. New approaches to waste water management were presented. The participants pa id a side visit to Bobryk and Vertiivka villages in Nizhyn rayon of Chernigivska oblasti and discussed the experience and lessons learned from the implementation of ecosan projects in the region. For more information contact: Anna Tsvietkova, MAMA-86
7. HANDBOOK ON THE CARPATHIAN CONVENTION The Regional Environmental Center for Central and Eastern Europe and the European Academy Bolzano have published a Handbook on the Carpathian Convention. The Framework Convention on the Protection and Sustainable Development of the Carpathians was signed in May 2003 in Kiev, during the 5th “Environment for Europe” Conference. It entered into force in January 2006. The Handbook provides a detailed analysis, article by article, of the substantive provisions of the Convention, which is complemented by examples of ways in which the obligations of the Convention can be met. The Handbook is intended to be a practical tool for local authorities to assist them in taking action and developing policies and practices to help in the protection of, and the promotion of sustainable development in, the Carpathians. The Handbook is available in English at
http://www.rec.org/REC/Programs/
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