European ECO-Forum News Digest

In this issue:
1. IMPROVING DEMOCRACY IN INTERNATIONAL ORGANISATIONS AND BODIES
2. PREPARATIONS TOWARDS INTERGOVERNMENTAL MID-TERM REVIEW MEETING IN "ENVIRONMENT AND HEALTH" PROCESS
3. WORKSHOP ON ENVIRONMENTAL MONITORING AND REPORTING BY ENTERPRISES
4. THE AARHUS CLEARINGHOUSE CELEBRATES ITS SECOND ANNIVERSARY
5. FOURTH JOINT MEETING OF THE EAP TASK FORCE AND THE PROJECT PREPARATION COMMITTEE (PPC)
6. FIFTH INTERNATIONAL ANNIVERSARY SUBREGIONAL CONFERENCE ON EDUCATION FOR SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
7. NOMINATIONS FOR 2007 STOCKHOLM WATER PRIZE

1. IMPROVING DEMOCRACY IN INTERNATIONAL ORGANISATIONS AND BODIES

The consultation process with international forums to obtain their views on the Almaty Guidelines starts under the auspices of the Aarhus Convention on Access to Information, Public Participation in Decision Making and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters.

The Aarhus Convention obliges its Parties to promote the application of the principles of the Convention in international environmental decision-making processes and within the framework of international organizations in matters relating to the environment. At their second meeting, held in Almaty, Kazakhstan, in May 2005, the Parties adopted Guidelines on promoting the principles of access to information, public participation in decision-making and access to justice in international forums. A Task Force to consult with international forums to obtain their views on the Guidelines was established in Almaty.

The Almaty Guidelines will be reviewed by the Parties at their next meeting in 2008. The Task Force now starts the consultation process. A questionnaire (to be responded by 17 September 2006) and a list of international forums invited to consultations have been developed by the Task Force.

The consultation process is to be conducted between June 2006 and July 2007. It is also intended to hold an international workshop with a number of interested international forums and their stakeholders.

Further information is available at:
http://www.unece.org/env/pp/ppif.htm

For more information contact:
John Hontelez
Chair of the Public Participation Campaigns Committee of
the European ECO-Forum
Secretary General of the European Environmental Bureau
E-mail: hontelez@eeb.org

2. PREPARATIONS TOWARDS INTERGOVERNMENTAL MID-TERM REVIEW MEETING IN "ENVIRONMENT AND HEALTH" PROCESS

The European Environment and Health Committee had its 21st meeting in Oslo on 15-16 May 2006. Sasha Gabizon, WECF, represented the European ECO-Forum.

The discussion focused on review of scientific evidence related to CEHAPE Regional Priority Goal 2, "prevent and reduce the health consequences from accidents and injuries and pursue a decrease in morbidity from lack of adequate physical activity by promoting safe, secure and supportive human settlements for all children". The discussion addressed the issues of reduction of accidents, increase of physical activity for children, domestic violence, and obesity.

The Inter-governmental mid-term review meeting will take place in Vienna 14-15 June 2007. The EEHC members were all in favour to keep focusing on Children's Environmental Health and therefore not to have a part in the program of the interministerial meeting looking at a new theme of ministerial 2009 meeting.

There are plans for a 1 day youth pre-conference. This will be organised with the 2 youth representatives now new members of the EEHC. ECO-Forum said to be willing to contribute to the youth pre-conference, mentioning the activities of the youth conference on toxics and health in Greece this year, the youth water parliaments, and eco-schools.

ECO-Forum presented ideas for main and secondary programme of the inter-ministerial meeting. In particular it requested to allow:

The Austrian representative said that there would probably be no space for exhibitions, and no possibility for side events.

The WHO has fundraised with the EU and obtained a project to help a number of countries (Bulgaria, Serbia, Kyrgyzstan, Lithuania, Estonia, Latvia, Slovakia) develop and implement their CEHAPEs. The project has several phases, including situation analysis, case studies, addressing emergency issues, international workshop on strategic environmental assessment, guidelines, comprehensive report for the ministerial conference 2009. The EEHC members welcomed this project. However, some of the other EECCA countries wondered why they had not been asked to take part. This seems to be due to the fact that DG Sanco should focus on EU member states or accession countries mostly. ECO-Forum suggested writing a letter to the Commissioner asking to provide additional funding for more EECCA countries.

The next CEHAPE meeting will take place on 16 - 17 October in Cyprus. Next EEHC meeting will take place on 27 - 28 November in Szentendre (REC's office).

For more information contact:
Sascha Gabizon
Women in Europe for a Common Future
Coordinatior of Health and Environment Issue Group at European
ECO-Forum
E-mail: sascha.gabizon@wecf.org

3. WORKSHOP ON ENVIRONMENTAL MONITORING AND REPORTING BY ENTERPRISES

The Workshop on Environmental Monitoring and Reporting by Enterprises took place on 4-6 September 2006 in Poland, nearWarsaw.

It was aimed to exchange the latest experience gained in subregions of the UN Economic Commission for Europe and to prepare guidelines on legal, normative, institutional, financial and technical measures to improve environmental monitoring and reporting by enterprises, above all in EECCA countries.

The workshop adressed issues of overall organisation of environmental monitoring at enterprises, interrelationship between self-monitoring and monitoring of environmental quality, trends in changing environmental reporting requirements for enterprises, use of environmental reporting by enterprises in decision-making and public information, and
practical steps to reform environmental monitoring and reporting by enterprises.

The workshop consisted of plenary meetings and work in parallel expert groups, in which specific sections of the guidelines were discussed.

The documents of the workshop are available at
http://www.unece.org/env/europe/monitoring/workshops/wksp%204-6.2006.Warsaw.e.htm

4. THE AARHUS CLEARINGHOUSE CELEBRATES ITS SECOND ANNIVERSARY

The Aarhus Clearinghouse for Environmental Democracy (http://aarhusclearinghouse.unece.org) provides a forum for the collection, dissemination and exchange of information on laws,policies and good practices relevant to the rights of access to information, public participation in decision-making and access to justice in environmental matters.

In addition to information related to the UNECE Aarhus Convention, the Clearinghouse also contains other information relevant to the implementation of principle 10 of the 1992 Rio Declaration on Environment and Development.

On the second anniversary of the launch of the Aarhus Clearinghouse (13 July 2006), 3,191 visits were made to the Clearinghouse, the 3rd highest daily usage recorded since its launch in 2004. More than 565,000 visits have been recorded to the Clearinghouse since the launch.

The average number of visits per day stands at 1,500 visits for 2006. More than 50% of individuals have returned to the Clearinghouse after their first visit for further information.

Nearly 50% of the resource entries appearing in the Clearinghouse (463/934) are related to the activities of nongovernmental organisations. 'Access to Information' and 'Public Participation' are the two most referenced topics appearing in the Clearinghouse.

The largest number of resource entries in the Clearinghouse - 208 - are from or address practices in 'Europe' or the 'European Commission'. 181 separate resource entries are from or address practices in Canada, the US or from North America. Beside the UNECE region, the Asia Pacific region leads with 55 separate resource entries.

In the EECCA region, 167 resource entries are distributed as follows:

Armenia (25), Azerbaijan (17), Belarus (9), Georgia (21), Kazakhstan (23), Kyrgyzstan (21), Moldova (9), Russian Federation (24), Tajikistan (10), Turkmenistan (4), Ukraine (14), Uzbekistan (5).

46 news stories have been featured in the Clearinghouse in 2006.

The first capacity building workshop for national nodes of the Clearinghouse will be held at the REC CEE on 5-6 October 2007. The NGOs interested in contributing content and development ideas to the Clearinghouse will be encouraged to attend as well. The workshop will be followed by a second capacity building workshop, to be held in Russian and English and targeting EECCA experts, in 2007. The Clearinghouse will face redesign and scheduled upgrade before the Fifth meeting of the Task Force on Electronic Information Tools, 23-24 November 2006.

Future development of the Clearinghouse will be one of the topics addressed by the workshops. ECO-Forum's input on suggesstions such as creating an interactive calendar and web blog allowing public to communicate news and information directly through the Clearinghouse should be discussed in this context.

Contributions to the Clearinghouse may be channeled through Clearinghouse National Node focal points or sent to aarhus.clearinghouse@unece.org

For more information contact:
Michael Stanley-Jones
Aarhus Convention Secretariat, UNECE
E-mail: michael.stanley-jones@unece.org

5. FOURTH JOINT MEETING OF THE EAP TASK FORCE AND THE PROJECT PREPARATION COMMITTEE (PPC)

The next annual meeting of the EAP Task Force and the Project Preparation Committee will take place in Berlin on 21-22 September 2006. It will be attended by senior officials from environment ministries of EECCA and OECD countries, as well as representatives of international organisations and NGOs. The German Environmental Ministry is the host of the meeting. The goals of the meeting are:

The joint meeting will include a special session to discuss ways to attract funding for environmental projects in EECCA countries. The documentation of the meeting is available at: http://www.oecd.org/document/31/0,2340,en_2649_34291_37305183_1_1_1_1,00.htm

For more information contact:
Olga Ponizova, Eco-Accord (Russia)
Coordinator of the EAP Issue Group of the European ECO-Forum
E-mail: ponizova@leadnet.ru

and

Gevorg Arakelyan, "For sustainable Human Development" (Armenia)
E-mail: argev@web.am

6. FIFTH INTERNATIONAL ANNIVERSARY SUBREGIONAL CONFERENCE ON EDUCATION FOR SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT

The Fifth International Anniversary Subregional Conference on ESD will take place on 23-25 October 2006 in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan in cooperation and with support of the Cluster Office of UNESCO in the Central Asia, European Commission, and OSCE Centre in Almaty.

The preparatory process is leaded by the Regional Environmental Centre for Central Asia (CAREC) in close cooperation with UNESCO, Government of Kyrgyz Republic, and CA WG on ESD. The report "Implementation of DESD in Central Asia" for 2004-2006 will be developed for presentation at the Conference.

The conference will analyze the progress in implementation of the Decade on ESD (2005-2014) and other ESD commitments in 5 Central Asian countries. It will review and present the outcomes of CA EE Programme launched in 2003 and activities of the CA joint Working Group on EE and ESD.

For more information contact:
Tatiana Shakirova
Regional Environmental Centre for Central Asia
E-mail: tshakirova@carec.kz

7. NOMINATIONS FOR 2007 STOCKHOLM WATER PRIZE

30 September 2006 is the nomination deadline for the 2007 Stockholm Water Prize. Nominations are welcome from around the world. The Stockholm Water Prize is presented annually to an individual, institution or organisation for outstanding achievements within water-related fields such as

Visit www.siwi.org for more information or request the
nominating material via e-mail at siwi@siwi.org.