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Nearly a year after the end of fighting in Kosovo and
the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, the international community is finally
beginning to take concrete action to rebuild the infrastructure and
institutions damaged throughout the Balkans.
By Jennie Braswell From March 29-30, over 25 donor organizations, including the governments of most Western European countries, convened in Brussels at a Regional Funding Conference sponsored by the EU-led Stability Pact for South Eastern Europe (SEE). Participants discussed the funding of various projects and activities aimed at revitalizing the devastated economies, societies and infrastructure of the seven countries of the Balkan region including Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, FYR Macedonia, Romania and, as much as politically possible, Yugoslavia. The result was the unexpectedly large commitment of EUR 2.4 billion toward SEE reconstruction. The conference also marked the first time when international post-conflict efforts in the Balkans specifically addressed the environment in the overall reconstruction process. This was achieved through the official adoption, by the Stability Pact, of the Regional Environmental Reconstruction Program for South Eastern Europe (REReP), which was presented to international donors as a method for addressing specific environmental problems. This is critically important for the SEE countries, all having experienced some form of environmental damage from the wars of the past decade. The wars left problems such as the direct contamination of natural resources, destroyed water and sanitation infrastructure, unsustainable refugee inflows, and debilitated environmental management systems - all of which continue to negatively affect the lives and well-being of people and communities throughout the Balkans today. The concept for the REReP was first launched by the Regional Environmental Center (REC) in the fall of 1999, in an effort to raise awareness about the dangers to SEE communities if environmental consideration are not integrated into the reconstruction process from the outset. The program promotes the idea that the development of viable institutions in the SEE countries is an essential first step to enabling investments that are sustainable and beneficial in the long-term. Another key point is that an active and sustainable civil society is a prerequisite for a stable democracy and regional stability and security. Therefore, projects should be generated that promote public awareness raising and political participation. Perhaps the most key concept of the REReP is that environmental considerations should be integrated into all activities that will be undertaken as a part of the overall reconstruction process. There is a good deal of concern that large-scale infrastructure projects or industrial investments in South Eastern Europe will be conducted without following proper environmental precautions, such as environmental impact assessments, before moving forward. Failure on the part of the international community to uphold these standards jeopardizes the possibility for long-term sustainable development in the Balkans and further threatens the well-being of the communities and natural environment throughout the region. Furthermore, the environment can play a leading role in generating trans-boundary agreements, cooperative networks and early consensus-building. The REReP message first struck a chord with the European Commission's (EC) environment directorate last year. Soon after, the EC presented the REReP to the Stability Pact in October 1999. The Commission then asked the REC to help develop the idea further by creating a task force made up of environmental officials from work throughout the Balkans. Last March 15, environment ministers from the six SEE countries met in Skopje, FYR Macedonia, to discuss this work (representatives from Yugoslavia did not participate due to technical reasons). They agreed that environmental projects in the region should be classified under five priority areas: institution building; civil society development; remediation of immediate environmental damage caused by the wars; support to cross-border cooperative projects; and support for national priority projects, including the development of national and local environmental action plans. Within these five areas, a list of priority environmental investments and "quick start" projects was compiled by the ministers, for implementation within the next twelve months. This list was favourably received by the international donors at the March 30 funding conference and formal funding pledges for environmental projects were made by the European Commission, Denmark, Germany, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Slovenia and Switzerland. In response to this positive reaction, a follow-up meeting was held in Brussels on April 19 to discuss the REReP among interested donors. On the basis of that meeting, the process of finalizing funding agreements for selected projects is currently underway with the hope that many of the "quick start" projects can begin as soon as early June. Among the projects to be realized in the short-term is a regional conservation project that will identify key cross-border areas in the Balkans that are biodiversity-rich. It will also establish cooperative regimes among the countries involved for the management of these areas. Another project that received financial support from the Stability Pact donors is the remediation of the four environmental "hotspots" that were identified by the UNEP Balkan Task Force after the NATO bombing campaign in post-war Yugoslavia (see April 2000 issue of The Bulletin, page 12). Interestingly, this clean-up work, which has been pledged in the name of humanitarian aid, is the only reconstruction activity that will be implemented in Yugoslavia under the Stability Pact. The political embargo on Yugoslavia's Milosevic regime has barred other related activities. At the same time, the Yugoslav province of Montenegro did receive financial aid of some EUR 10 million from the EU at the March 30 meeting, in support of Montenegro's favourable political stance, reported the Balkan Economic Bulletin (Week 12, 2000). The funding conference of March 30 followed closely on the heels of a controversial report jointly released by the European Commission and Javier Solana, the EU's chief of foreign and security policy. While insisting that EU aid efforts in the Balkans are beneficial, the report adds that they are hampered by poor coordination among a plethora of international bodies, bureaucracy, duplication and slow decision- making. After the report was discussed by EU heads of government during their summit meeting in Lisbon, they placed Solana and Chris Patten, EU commissioner for external relations, in charge of revamping all EU Balkan aid programs. In the countries of the Balkan region, annual income currently averages under EUR 2,000 per person and unemployment has soared to almost 50 percent in places like Bosnia and Kosovo. It is therefore up to the international community to ensure that environmental considerations are properly integrated into aid packages and that specific environmental projects are given adequate funding in overall reconstruction efforts. The Regional Environmental Reconstruction Program for South Eastern Europe is now proving to be an effective foundation for these efforts. Visit the REC's REReP website for more information. |
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