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EUROPEAN ECO FORUM NEWSLETTER No 29 |
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1. ANNOUNCEMENT BY THE REFORM ISSUE GROUP OF THE EUROPEAN ECO FORUM Dear European ECO Forum members! As you, probably, are aware, the 6th Ministerial Conference “Environment for Europe” made a decision to reform the process “in order to ensure that the process remains relevant and valuable, and to strengthen its effectiveness as a mechanism for improving environmental quality and the lives of people across the region”. Main aspects of the reform, according to the Ministerial declaration, will include:
For full text of the Ministerial Declaration, please go to http://www.unece.org/env/documents/2007/ece/ece.belgrade.conf.2007.8.e.pdf European ECO Forum is continuously fighting for the efficiency of the Environment for Europe (EfE) process. Unfortunately, despite discussions prior the 5th Ministerial Conference, the decision about the reform was not adopted in Kyiv. Now, being optimistic, we all should see the reform as an opportunity for the environment at Pan-European level and for the ECO Forum. However, number of concerns remains. For instance, the Declaration failed to respond to most urgent issues highlighted in the EEA 4th Assessment report. European ECO Forum, based on Brussels Declaration and Environmental Citizens Organisations (ECOs) discussions in Belgrade, adopted and disseminated Belgrade statement, which emphasized on three main themes to become a priority for the EfE process for the next period. There are:
These issue priorities are important but only one among many other issues of the EfE future. At the same time, the format in which Ministers adopted their decision about the reform, made ECO Forum worried about possible transformation of the process from political to technical level and the conversion into purely technical assistance to least developed countries of the region. Indeed, the national implementation of the EfE decisions in the EECCA countries is the area of concern of the ECO Forum, and in the plenary statement about the reform at the Ministerial we called for harder thinking on “national implementation modalities which could include inter alia national EfE inter-ministerial panels with participation of different stakeholders, including NGOs and private sector”. We also are concerned about already decided shift of the responsibility for the EfE coordination from the WGSO to the UNECE CEP meaning that the negotiations should comply with the UN rules. This questions the format of the ECO Forum involvement and the flexibility of dialogues to come. For more details, please see below ECO Forum Belgrade Statement, ECO Forum intervention to Agenda 7 item “The Future of the process” and ECO Forum Final statement at the 6th Ministerial. To follow the EfE reform process and actively participate in it, ECO Forum decided to establish a new Reform Issue Group. If you would like to work on the EfE Reform issues, please, subscribe to the Reform IG list-serve reform-efe@eco-forum.org by sending e-mail to mara.silina@eeb.org and anna@mama-86.org.ua indicating your name and organisation. The Group currently consists of Mara Silina, Chair of the Coordination Board of the ECO Forum, John Hontelez, EEB (Belgium); Olga Ponisova, Eco-Accord (Russia), Victoria Elias, WWF Russia (Russia) , Ilya Trombitski, Eco-Tiras (Moldova), Jeffrey Barber, IFS (USA), Lidia Astanina, Greenwomen (Kazakhstan). To start working on the reform, we propose you to fill in the QUESTIONNAIRE, which you will find below. This Questionnaire is a first step to consolidate our vision on focus, format and priorities of the future EfE and the European ECO Forum. Other aspects of the reform will be proposed for the discussion later on. Before filling it in, please, read other attachments and Ministerial Declaration as it is mentioned above. It would be very helpful if you could respond to it before the start of Christmas Holiday, (that is before December 24). A summary of responses will be disseminated through the Reform IG list-serve in the middle of January 2008 and will serve as a basis for the ECO Forum position at the upcoming UNECE CEP Bureau. Thank you very much in advance, With warm regards Anna Golubovska-Onisimova
2. QUESTIONNAIRE FOR ECO-FORUM MEMBERS ! DEADLINE: 24 DECEMBER 2007! This Questionnaire as MS Word file, click here
Please, send your ready Questionnaire to Anna
Golubovska-Onisimova,
anna@mama-86.org.ua Thank you very much for your work!
3. BELGRADE STATEMENT OF THE EUROPEAN ECO FORUM We, the representatives of environmental citizens organisations from the UNECE region, participating in the 6th Ministerial Conference ‘Environment for Europe’, gathered in Belgrade on 8-9 October 2007 for our preparatory meetings, adopted this statement. The EfE process is a unique regional platform for cooperation. This is the only platform where nations within the EU, EECCA and SEE regions can meet to address environmental issues and policies of common value and importance on high political level. We have reviewed the work done in this process and published this as ‘Environment for Europe Implementation report’. One key conclusion is that this process should continue since it has a clear value and shows obviously positive outcomes in the whole UNECE region. We would like to reiterate the key messages of the ‘Brussels Declaration’ adopted by ECOs of the UNECE region in Brussels in March 2007 and presented to this conference. Reflecting on the Belgrade Assessment we call upon the Belgrade Conference to agree upon the following priority initiatives: Sustainable Production and Consumption
Water
The EfE process must become more effective. We are deeply dissatisfied with the lack of progress and implementation. Decisions and initiatives of the EfE need to be transferred from the international level to national/ regional and local levels. On the national level, we call for inter-ministerial panels with the participation of NGOs to implement EfE commitments. Stronger communication of results to a broad audience will ensure national EfE implementation mechanisms and improve the influence of environmental authorities. Lessons learned, best practices shall be shared within the whole Pan-European region. On the EfE level, we call for the monitoring of implementation of targets in between the EfE conferences through mid-term reports, assessments, the use of response indicators, etc. This should lead to a permanent progress assessment from the view of government, international organisations and civil society groups. The process should remain at ministerial level and should not shy away from introducing legally binding instruments where they can help to make progress. Precise and measurable responsibilities should be put upon countries participating in EfE process. Adequate level of financing of all elements of the EfE process remains an important precondition. Without that it will be impossible to achieve progress. We are against the transfer of responsibilities from EAP Task Force to the RECs of the EECCA region. Such a decision should only be made after thorough evaluation of the REC’s functions and performance has taken place, with the full involvement of environmental citizens organisations, in particular, from that region. We also urge governments to be more active in the process and make more commitments to implement this EECCA Strategy. The European ECO-Forum calls for the continuation of the open and transparent character of the EfE process, with full involvement of environmental citizens organisations, at all levels. We would like to thank the governments of Belgium, Denmark, Finland, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, as well as the UNECE Secretariat and Fundacion Biodiversidad (Spain), for their financial support to our preparations and participation in the Belgrade Conference.
4. REFORMS STATEMENT OF THE EUROPEAN ECO FORUM Intervention to Agenda item 7 “The Future of the
process” by Anna Golubovska-Onisimova, Ì AMA-86
NGO, Kyiv, Ukraine Mr. Chairman, Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen, The EfE reform, which first was discussed in preparation for the Kyiv conference, seems to come to reality. Environmental citizens organizations ultimately agree that the EfE must become a more efficient and effective process. But, the reform should by no means be an argument against implementing already agreed thematic processes and programmes, in particular, PELBDS or the water and sanitation, especially because the Belgrade assessment warned that Pan-Europe “is not making sufficient progress with regard to increasing access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation by 2015, as well as to a significant reduction of the rate of loss of biodiversity by 2010.” Either the EfE planned reform must not hamper adequate resources allocation for these EfE processes and programmes. Unsustainable production and consumption pattern is a major cause of biodiversity loss, climate change and resources depletion. We expected a decision here on setting up a supporting platform specifically dedicated to SPC as the major EfE cross-cutting issue for many years ahead. Instead, we end up with vague language on SPC, and shifting responsibilities out of UN ECE. This is not an adequate response to the scale, complexity and significance of the issue as well as to the demand for a regional Pan-European SPC strategy. As European Eco-Forum, we will keep working on the establishment of a multi-stakeholder Pan-European TF on SPC as a part of the EfE process in the future. European Eco-Forum stays on the position that new initiatives and legally binding instruments should be introduced after Belgrade where they can help to make progress. At the same time, to assess by delivery, we call for the monitoring of implementation targets through mid-term reports, assessments and the use of response indicators. We call for harder commitments from the countries participating in the process and warn against a EfE transformation into a purely technical mechanism for capacity building. EfE is a political process and should stay at the Ministerial level to ensure a permanent and strong environmental pillar of Europe’s development. Assuming that the proposed structural change will be aimed exclusively to the strengthening of the EfE process, we are of course concerned about those regions, subregions and countries where the environmental policy reform is especially difficult, e.g. countries in transition. The EECCA Environmental Strategy framework, other background documents and guidelines developed by EAP TF do provide intensive knowledge on how to make national environmental policies in countries of Eastern Europe, Caucasus and Central Asia delivering improvement. However, more attention to national implementation should be given and we are not convinced the New-RECs are the solution. We are satisfied with current language of the declaration but propose to think harder on national implementation modalities which could include inter alia EfE implementation inter-ministerial panels with participation of different stakeholders, including NGOs and private sector. We trust that NGOs as EfE partners will be fully involved in the reform of the EfE process and understand the language “consultation with EfE partners” as NGO participation in a manner we are used to in the process so far. So, we are looking forward for the consultations to start. Thank you for your attention.
5. FINAL STATEMENT OF THE EUROPEAN ECO FORUM IN BELGRADE Final Statement by European ECO-Forum at the
6th Ministerial Conference 'Environment for Europe' The 6th Environment for Europe Conference is almost over. Environmental citizens organisations took part in its preparations and the discussions at the official and side-events. We had major concerns about attempts, of a UNECE Member State that is not even part of the pan-European region to terminate the EfE process. We are relieved to see that this was not followed, and we have confidence that the reform process will be inspired by constructive intentions to make the process better on delivery. But rather than reform, what is needed is real political commitment to ensure follow up of any of the agreements made in the EfE process so far. Without governments that practice what they preach these conferences are still nice networking events, but are not delivering the changes in consumption and production patterns this region really needs. We reiterate our belief that the EfE process is a unique regional platform for cooperation. This is the only platform where nations within the EU, EECCA and SEE regions can meet to address environmental issues of common value and importance on high political level. But meeting is not enough. Under the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities, all countries that are part of the region should show real commitment, with regards to funding, exchange of practices, twinnings, strengthening of national and regional institutions, etc. But we are also convinced that without binding regional and international instruments, which will create level-playing fields in the region, put pressure on all governments, mobilise international organisations and funding, we cannot make real progress. The conference was about delivery. We still see big differences between many speeches at the conference and the reality at home. The first condition is honesty. It is disappointing to see that, for political reasons, the Ministerial Declaration does not even reflect the results of a very important exercise done under the EfE, Environmental Performance Reviews in EECCA and SEE countries. We refer in particular to conclusions about failing institutions, lack of progress in areas such as waste management, biodiversity, soil protection and land-use, chemical safety, transport and energy efficiency. At this conference we underlined three issues in particular that we wanted the EfE make progress on:
In all three areas we have been disappointed. region, with increasingly integrated economies, will in the future respect its ecological footprint and also will not put an unbearable burden on the global environment. - The future of the Pan-European Biological and Landscape Diversity Strategy is uncertain. We have heard many positive words, but no real binding commitment of the EfE governments to make this a real priority of their common work. -Ministers are satisfied with existing initiatives on water and sanitation, while it is clear that the Millennium Development Goals are not going to be achieved. The European ECO-Forum stays on the position that new initiatives and legally binding instruments should be introduced after Belgrade where they can help to make progress. At the same time, to assess by delivery, we call for the monitoring of implementation targets through mid-term reports, assessments and the use of response indicators. We call for harder commitments from the countries participating in the process and warn against a EfE transformation into a purely technical mechanism for capacity building. EfE is a political process and should stay at the Ministerial level to ensure a permanent and strong environmental pillar of Europe's development. Assuming that the proposed structural change will be aimed exclusively to the strengthening of the EfE process, we are of course concerned about those regions, sub-regions and countries where the environmental policy reform is especially difficult, e.g. countries in transition. The EECCA Environmental Strategy framework, other background documents and guidelines developed by EAP TF do provide intensive knowledge on how to make national environmental policies in countries of Eastern Europe, Caucasus and Central Asia delivering improvement. However, more attention to national implementation should be given and we are not convinced that RECs are the solution. We are satisfied with current language of the declaration but propose to think harder on national implementation modalities which could include inter alia EfE implementation inter-ministerial panels with participation of different stakeholders, including NGOs and private sector. We trust that NGOs as EfE partners will be fully involved in the reform of the EfE process and understand the language "consultation with EfE partners" as NGO participation in a manner we are used to in the EfE process so far. So, we are looking forward for the consultations to start and for the EfE to continue, to deliver on its existing promises, and to take up urgent environmental issues for the entire pan-European region.
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