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What is the EAP Task Force?
The Task Force for the Implementation of the Environmental Action Programme
for Central and Eastern Europe (EAP/CEE) was created in 1993 at the Lucerne "Environment for Europe" ministerial conference. The EAP Task Force
assists CEE countries and the Newly Independent States (NIS) in promoting
and facilitating the integration of environmental considerations into the
processes of economic and political reform, upgrading institutional and
human capacities for environmental management, broadening political support
for environmental improvement and promoting the mobilisation and
cost-effective use of financial resources. The OECD and the REC serve as
secretariat for the Task Force.
NEWS
Balkan reconstruction
The need to take action on the Balkan environment was one of the key issues
discussed during the Task Force's 11th meeting. Keynote guests to the meeting included Marc Franco, leading
the European Commission's (EC) Task Force to establish an Agency for
Reconstruction in the Balkans, and Pekka Haavisto, head of the United Nation's
Balkans Task Force. As a result, the EAP Task Force endorsed a proposal that
had been developed by the REC to initiate a Regional Environmental
Reconstruction Programme (REReP) for South Eastern Europe (SEE).
The REReP was formally launched on Jan. 27 by high level representatives of the SEE countries and formally endorsed by the Stability
Pact. The Environmental Task Force, established under
the Pact, will be modelled after, and will work in close cooperation with,
the EAP Task Force, with the REC as its secretariat. The Project Preparation
Committee will facilitate cooperation between international financing
institutions and donors to accelerate environmental investments in SEE.
REReP priority areas will include: institutional
strengthening and policy development; environmental civil society building;
emergency assistance for combating war damage; reinforcement of existing
cooperative mechanisms and structures and development of regional
cross-border projects; and support to priority national and local
environmental projects.
New business
The new Aarhus Business and Environment Initiative (ABEI) will pool the
expertise and knowledge of a variety of businesses and organisations for the
benefit of the Central and Eastern European (CEE) business sector. This will
include promoting the wide-scale application of a range of management
concepts and practices to increase company profits while reducing
environmental impacts, especially cleaner production, eco-efficiency, EMAS
and ISO 14000. ABEI will liaise with governments to reward such practices
and will prepare CEE businesses and economies for the challenges and
opportunities of an expanded EU. CEE businesses will be assisted in adopting
EU directives and increasing their competitiveness
in an expanded European market. Furthermore, by bringing business,
government, trade unions and appropriate stakeholders closer together, ABEI
will try to ensure that future policy and legislation are environmentally,
fiscally and socially sustainable. ABEI is funded by the Danish EPA and the
EC's environment directorate.
Strategic assessment, CEE
transport
The REC has been asked by the Task Force to implement a strategic
environmental assessment of transport policies in Central and Eastern Europe
and present the results to the Ministerial Consultation in Szentendre this
June. This decision was supported in a parallel process attended by
representatives of the transport sector at a recent OECD/European Conference
of Ministers of Transport on strategic environmental assessment for
transport.
A Netherlands-funded project has since been launched to
provide a preliminary assessment
of environmental impacts
associated with planned transport
infrastructure for a Warsaw-Budapest corridor. The
assessment will focus on
screening projects planned for
the corridor, scoping environmental
issues, and providing
suggestions on policy measures
to deal with the most
important transport/environment
issues in the region.
It is expected that a wide discussion
with all stakeholders will
take place before June through
workshops, Internet and e-mail.
PAST MEETINGS
Economic instruments/environmental
financing, NIS
March 22-24, 2000,
Tashkent, Uzbekistan
Officials and experts from
the NIS, OECD and CEE countries
working in the area of
environmental economics and
financing gathered together to
discuss the use of economic
instruments and environmental
financing in the NIS. The main
objective was to agree on key
recommendations for increasing
the effectiveness of using
economic instruments for pollution
control and natural
resource management in the
region. Another objective was
to endorse a draft survey on
this subject in the NIS, building
on similar surveys for Western countries, prepared by OECD,
and CEE countries, prepared
by the REC.
The subsequent meeting of
the NIS Environmental Financing
Network will focus on
increasing financial resources
available for environmental protection
in the Newly Independent
States. This will include better analyses of environmental
expenditures, developing
realistic environmental financing
strategies for the implementation
of environmental policies
and National Environmental
Action Programmes (NEAPs) as
well as identifying and recommending
best practices for integrating
environmental finance
into public finance.
Commercialising
urban water
services, NIS
March 14-15, 2000,
St. Petersburg, Russia
The workshop was held to present
and discuss the findings of a study
conducted by the Environmental
Resources Management (ERM)
consulting company. This included
the current state of urban water
services in the region, options for
restructuring and reforming these
services to increase their effectiveness
and the existing barriers
(institutional, regulatory and financial)
to commercial reform. Another
objective was to develop actions
to support the process in the
short- to medium-term, and to
identify associated actors. Participants
included senior managers
from water utilities, policy-makers
from appropriate governmental
regulatory authorities across the
Newly Independent States (NIS)
and representatives from the United
Kingdom's Department for
International Development, the
EAP Task Force and international
financial institutions and organisations.
The Task Force's work in the
water sector includes projects
aimed at preventing accidents
such as the 1994 spill of gasoline
which flowed from Ukraine to Slovakia
and Hungary via the Latorca
and Bodrog Rivers.
EAP TF Bureau
Jan. 27-28, 2000, Skopje, FYR Macedonia
NIS environmental managers #2
November 9-11, 1999, Tbilisi, Georgia
The first meeting, organised in May in Odessa, Ukraine, provided the representatives of
national, regional and municipal environmental authorities from the NIS with an opportunity
to discuss common problems
and possible solutions. This second meeting of the network of regional and local
environmental managers from the NIS aimed at deepening the dialogue, working toward
the preparation of best practices for decentralising environmental management.
EAP Task Force #11
October 18-19, 1999, REC Szentendre, Hungary
Attracting some 110 representatives, the 11th meeting focused on the implementation
of the Task Force's work programme adopted a year ago. The programme consists of
three main areas: environmental policy/NEAP implementation; environmental financing;
and environmental management in enterprises. The establishment of a Network on
Enforcement and Compliance for the NIS, with a secretariat at the OECD and linked to similar
networks in Europe and internationally, was added.
Participants discussed how four (soon to be five) "New Regional Environmental
Centres,"
recently established in the NIS, could assist in implementing the Task Force's work
programme. It was agreed to focus cooperation in the areas of local environmental action
programmes and the development of consultative mechanisms between environment
ministries and the public.
The OECD report entitled Environment in the Transition in the Market Economy was
presented, summarising the status of Task Force projects to
date. Results from the October 15-16 Indicators for Environment in the Economic Transition
workshop were discussed. It was also agreed that the next Task Force meeting will be in
Almaty, Kazakhstan, October 18-19, back-to-back with the NIS Ministerial Consultation.
Environmental indicators
October 15-16, 1999,
REC Szentendre, Hungary
A meeting on environmental indicators was organised by the European Bank for Reconstruction
and Development (EBRD), the OECD and the Japan Special Fund. Participants agreed that further work
is needed, especially in the NIS, to prepare a set of "headline indicators" for the 2002
Kiev "Environment for Europe" ministerial conference, to be coordinated by the European
Environment Agency (EEA) and United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).
Enforcing NIS environmental requirements
September 23-24, 1999, Chisinau, Moldova
Over 80 officials and experts - representing all of the NIS as
well as several CEE and OECD
countries - met to discuss how
to make compliance and
enforcement of environmental
laws and regulations in the NIS
more effective. It was decided to set up a network on environmental
compliance and enforcement
in the NIS to strengthen
existing institutions, support
future building and develop
new tools. The proposed network
will build on the experience
of other global and European
enforcement and compliance
networks.
UPCOMING MEETINGS
CEE environmental ministers
June 19, 2000,
REC Szentendre, Hungary
In conjunction with the 10th
Anniversary of the Regional
Environmental Center, a meeting
for CEE country environment
ministers will be organised.
Main topics will be the
adoption of a regional Balkan
environmental action programme,
transport and environment,
biodiversity and
landscape diversity.
NIS environment and economics/finance
ministers
October 16-17, 1999, Almaty, Kazakhstan
The goal of this meeting will
be to facilitate the integration
of environmental considerations
into economic development
in the NIS and to identify
ways of developing, or
strengthening, domestic financing mechanisms and utilising
external finance more
effectively. Participants will
include NIS environment and
economics/finance ministers as
well as ministers from selected
donor countries, senior representatives of international
financial institutions and representatives from the private sector and environmental NGOs.
The economic and policy challenges
of the water sector, a
priority area for NIS governments, will be the main focus.
More specific objectives relate
to: examining the economic
costs of inadequate environmental
(e.g. water) management
policies; identifying ways
of reforming (urban) water utilities
to overcome policy, institutional
and financial obstacles;
and identifying ways of
strengthening financing for
water sector investments.
A special session for the
region's environment ministers
will also be organised to discuss
the main NIS environmental
policy objectives that
should guide the work of the
EAP Task Force through to the
Kiev Inter-Ministerial Conference
in 2002.
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