European ECO-Forum News Digest

In this issue:

1. BELGRADE-2207 MINISTERIAL AGENDA: RESULTS OF THE 2nd MEETING OF THE WORKING GROUP OF SENIOR OFFICIALS
2. ECO-FORUM EAP ISSUE GROUPS ACTIVATES ITS' E-DISCUSSIONS TOWARDS BELGRADE-2007

1. BELGRADE-2207 MINISTERIAL AGENDA: RESULTS OF THE 2nd MEETING OF THE WORKING GROUP OF SENIOR OFFICIALS

The 2nd Meeting of the Working Group of Senior Officials "Environment for Europe" (WGSO-2) took place on 29-30 June 2006 in Geneva. It was followed by the 3rd session of the Executive Committee (Execom) on 30 June, afternoon.

The main issue of the WGSO-2 discussions and decisions was the agenda of the 6th Ministerial Conference "Environment for Europe" to be held in Belgrade, Serbia, October 2007 (Belgrade- 2007). Besides this, current status of preparations, organizational issues and funding for the Conference were also discussed.

European ECO-Forum was represented by Victoria Elias (ECO- Accord, Russia, Chair of the ECO-Forum Coordination Board), Mara Silina (EEB, ECO-Forum Public Participation Campaign Coordinator, Sascha Gabizon, WECF, ECO-Forum Health Issue Group Coordinator and Andjelka Mihajlov, Environmental Ambassadors, Serbia and Regional FORUM EfE07 NGO Network Coordinator for International Activities).

The meeting was chaired by the WGSO Chair Miroslav Spasojevic, Serbia.
All documentation is available at
http://www.unece.org/env/efe/wgso/Belgrade/WGSOMeetings.htm

MAIN DECISIONS TAKEN

BELGRADE MINISTERIAL AGENDA

After the general presentation of the documents and tasks for the session and approval of the agenda discussion focused immediately on the main item: the actual content and structure of the Ministerial agenda. The first draft was prepared and introduced by the Secretariat
(see http://www.unece.org/env/documents/2006/ece/cep/ac.11/ece.cep.ac.11.2006.3.e.pdf ).

The US delegation referred to the EU proposal at the end of 2005 to held in Belgrade "a Conference of Delivery" and suggested to structure all Ministerial meeting according to 3 main themes: implementation, partnership and capacity building. In this case all Ministers would have a choice what examples to use (water, biodiversity, EECCA, private sector, etc.), while discussing the 3 main proposed themes.

Austria on behalf of the EU also confirmed their support to the main focus on implementation of EfE decisions and above mentioned proposed 3 main themes. They also stressed that EfE should listen to the needs of EECCA and SEE.

Further discussion went along the line of balancing 3 main themes with the wishes to discuss concrete topics and have thematic sessions on the agenda.

Norway supported the new approach and noted that there can be also many other themes, like water and sanitation, Health and Environment, EECCA Strategy implementation, etc. (sectoral list is long), and also a need to discuss the future of the EfE.

Greece stressed very clearly the importance of putting Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) on the agenda, said that UNECE ESD Steering Committee already suggested officially to organise a Joint meeting with Ministers of Education. It was stressed that a significant progress is achieved in the region of the ESD Strategy implementation and there are several pilot countries preparing their reports to Belgrade (using recently developed ESD indicators), so the session within the Conference agenda is extremely important, plus it would also attract more Ministers to Belgrade-2007.

Georgia suggested following the proposal, but also ensuring that no topic would be lost from the agenda, therefore re-drafting the structure and continuing the discussion of the new document in the afternoon or next morning.

It was quite a long discussion with different proposals, pros and cons. Sweden introduced its' initiative on Sustainable Consumption and production (SCP) to be prepared jointly with UNEP. Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia spoke on South Eastern European Ministers regional initiative and interest of the region to have this item on the agenda. EECCA countries expressed interest to review progress in the EECCA Environmental Strategy implementation (this is prepared in the framework of the EAP Task Force). Other issues mentioned were water and sanitation, mountain issues, environment and security, strategic environmental assessment, future of the EfE, partnerships with business and others.

Most difficult issues to agree were ESD and biodiversity. These themes were opposed by the US as they do not participate in ESD and PEBLDS. However a number of countries and organisations supported these themes. On the basis of the first day discussions, the Secretariat made a new draft for the second morning. It was also discussed and the process faced difficulties.

ECO-Forum lobbied for the joint session for Ministers and NGOs on biodiversity (together with PEBLDs). This was supported by Switzerland, Norway, EU, Hungary, UNEP/ROE and some others. We also strongly supported a session on ESD in the framework of the agenda.

Finally, EU (Austria) asked for a short break and all interested parties came together just before the end of the 2nd day (we also were there). The compromise was found in a way to call the 1st afternoon "Parallel Processes" and put ESD and Biodiversity there. This was agreed. However further discussion at the Execom showed that the issue will most likely be re-opened in October.

The current draft of the Belgrade Ministerial agenda is as follows:

DAY 1. Evaluation and Implementation

Morning
Opening Ceremony (Plenary session, 1 h)
Assessment and Implementation (Plenary session with key note
speech; interactive discussion; conclusions, 3 h):
   Kiev commitments
   Belgrade report
   Monitoring and Assessment
   MEAs
   EPRs

Afternoon
PARALLEL PROCESSES
Education for Sustainable Development Joint Session (A joint
session between Environment and Education Ministers that adopted
the UNECE Strategy on ESD in Vilnius in 2005, 2 h)

Biodiversity, including the Kiev commitments on biodiversity
((roundtable between NGOs and Ministers, 2 h, This session will
be prepared jointly by the PEBLDS and European ECO-Forum)

DAY 2: Capacity Building and Partnerships

Morning: Capacity Building (4 h)

EECCA PERSPECTIVES (Plenary session with key note speech;
interactive discussion; conclusions)
   Progress and perspectives in implementation of EECCA
   Strategy
   Central Asia Initiative on SD

SEE PERSPECTIVES (Plenary session with key note speech;
interactive discussion; conclusions)
   based on the Joint Conclusions of SEE Ministerial
   Consultation

Afternoon:
Partnerships (4h) (Plenary session with key note speech;
interactive discussion; conclusions)
   Energy Efficiency
   Water and Sanitation
   Environment and Security
   Mountains Initiative
   Sustainable Consumption and Production
   Partnerships with the Private Sector

DAY 3: The way forward
The future of the EfE (4h)
   The Future of EfE
   Ministerial Declaration
   Chairperson's Summary
   Closure of the Conference (plenary session)

THEMATIC ASPECTS AND OUTCOMES

·   The main outcoming documents of the Belgrade Conference will be a short Ministerial Declaration (negotiated) and a longer Chairman's summary (not negotiated)
·   Roundtable on biodiversity will be jointly prepared by ECO- Forum and PEBLDS
·   Joint Ministerial Session on ESD will involve Minisers of Environment and Ministers of Education
·   Subregional topics will include South-East European prospective and EECCA Environmental Strategy assessment. Central Asia wants also its' sustainable development initiative to be included
·   Sustainable Consumption and Production will be a new thematic outcome prepared and facilitated by Sweden and UNEP (however now it is "hidden" in a "salad" of a number of topics at the afternoon of the 2nd day.
·   Future of the EfE will be one of the important topics of the Conference again

ORGANISATIONAL ISSUES

Participation
·   All delegations are limited up to 10 persons (this is questioned by a number of states)
·   All countries are invited to include NGOs in the delegations
·   NGO registration will be organised by the ECO-Forum (similar to Kiev). Deadline to present a list of registered NGOs is 1 July 2007
·   ECO-Forum will organise a 75 persons' delegation for each session on a rotation basis (similar to Kiev), where 10 persons are from Serbian NGOs, 54 are 1 from each of other UNECE states and 11 are experts and international networks. Participation in the roundtable will be the same as in Kiev - 200 persons, 40 of which are from the host country
·   Major groups will have a separate registration process (may be further discussed whether there will be also some limits introduced)
+   Deadline for media accreditation is 1 September 2007

Documents

·   Category 1 (for decisions) documents should be submitted to the Secretariat by 1 March 2007 and be not longer then 8.500 words (will be approved by the WGSO 5-7 June 2007)
·   Documents category 2 (prepared by other organisations in 3 languages), but reproduced by the UN - we announced that we will have biodiversity recommendations in this category - by 1 May 2007. Those who wish to distribute the documents themselves should inform the Secretariat and send e-version by 10 May 2007 and will receive a distribution list
·   Category 3 documents (no UN symbol) may be produced by participating organisations (should be approved by the WGSO) and distributed at the conference. All further information and details on deadlines see in ECE/CEP/AC.11/2006/5

Interesting information

Please note that there are several interesting papers prepared by the Secretariat to the WGSO session? for example "Possible activities that could provide input to the agenda of the Belgrade Conference" (document ECE/CEP/AC.11/2006/4). There is also a useful list of high level events for a preparatory period (Information paper No 2), which you may use in your work (see at the documentation web-site).

ECO-FORUM POSITION AND INTERVENTIONS

ECO-Forum representatives took the floor several times during these 2 days. Our position was at the beginning to support the initial proposal of the agenda, where significant attention was given to sectoral issues, roundtable was planned for 3 h on the 2nd afternoon, ESD session was 3 h at the first afternoon and SCP (sustainable consumption and production) was planned for the 3rd morning together with the future of the process. We supported the proposed focus on implementation, but lobbied for keeping biodiversity and ESD on agenda with a significant time allocation. ECO-Forum also supported attention to SCP (expressed interest to work on it in consistence to our earlier statements), subregional issues (EECCA and SEE) and need to discuss future of the process. We stressed our interest to be included in the drafting group for the declaration, agenda or other special issues that will prepared.
At the end, when Communication strategy for EfE was on agenda again we said that we are prepared to go ahead, but need support and that we still think that the strategy on this issue is needed.

With the current status of the Ministerial agenda development we consider extremely important to ensure adequate interest to the Belgrade conference at the Ministerial level and keep the EfE process as a pan-European framework for cooperation.

For further information on the EfE process and preparations to the Belgrade Conference visit
http://www.unece.org/env/efe/wgso/Belgrade

Should you have questions on ECO-Forum participation in the WGSO- 2 and its' activities towards Belgrade-2007 contact:
Victoria Elias, Chair of the Coordination Board (ECO-Accord) at velias@mail.ru

2. ECO-FORUM EAP ISSUE GROUPS ACTIVATES ITS' E-DISCUSSIONS TOWARDS BELGRADE-2007

Environmental policy implementation in different parts of the UNECE region will be important part of the Belgrade-2007 Ministerial agenda. European ECO-Forum EAP Issue Group invites all interested participants of the ECO-Forum to take active part in electronic discussion towards the 6th EfE Ministerial
conference. The discussion will focus on several particular aspects and priorities, among those: environmental legislation compliance and enforcement in EECCA, EECCA Environmental Strategy implementation including education for sustainable development, public participation, environmental management, water issues, EAP, environmental financing and other important issues in the EECCA sub-region.

The discussion will be facilitated be the group activists via usual e-lists and results will contribute to the NGO position for Belgrade-2007. Main working language is Russian.

For further information and subscription contact
eap_issue_group@yahoo.com