Environmental Information and the Aarhus Centres Michael Stanley-Jones Environmental Information...
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Transcript of Environmental Information and the Aarhus Centres Michael Stanley-Jones Environmental Information...
Environmental Information and the Aarhus Centres
Michael Stanley-Jones
Environmental Information Management OfficerAarhus Convention SecretariatUnited Nations Economic Commission for Europe
OSCE Aarhus Centres Regional Meeting
Vienna, 22-23 January 2009
Convention on Access to Information, Public Participation in Decision-making and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters
(Aarhus Convention)
I. Report from the future
II. Information pillar
III. Clearinghouse
IV. Role of Aarhus Centres
ACCESS TO INFORMATION PILLARPassive (art. 4)
• Broad definition of environmental information (art. 2)
– state of elements of the environment, e.g. air and atmosphere, water, soil, land, landscape, biological diversity etc
– Factors, such as substances, energy, noise
– Activities or measure, e.g. environmental agreements, policies, legislation, plans and programmes
– Assumptions used in environmental decision-making, cost-benefit analysis (Stern Report would be covered)
• Any person has access
– no need to prove or even state an interest)
• Time limit: ‘as soon as possible’,
– max 1 month, plus 1 more month
ACCESS TO INFORMATION (2)
Passive (art. 4)
• Charges not to exceed reasonable amount
• Finite set of exemptions, with restrictive interpretation:
– public interest to be taken into account
– Potential effects of disclosure must be adverse
ACCESS TO INFORMATION (3)
Active (art. 5)• Immediate dissemination of information in cases of
imminent threat to health or environment• Dissemination of international agreements, laws, policies,
strategies, programmes and action plans relating to the environment
• Sufficient product information to ensure informed environmental choices
• Pollutant release and transfer registers (corporate accountability)
• Transparency and accessibility of information systems• Increased access to information through Internet• State of environment reports (max 4-year interval)
“The Internet article”
Article 5, paragraph 3
…each Party to ensure that environmental information progressively becomes available in electronic databases which are easily accessible to the public through public telecommunication networks
Parties at 1st meeting in 2002 decided to launch an online clearinghouse
a clearinghouse is a
place not only to buy and sell goods
but also whereone exchanges information,networks with people, shares projects andfinds resources
The Aarhus Clearinghouse forEnvironmental Democracy
…is a place to exchange ideas, good practices, projects and other information resources forimplementation of the Aarhus Convention,its Protocol on Pollutant Release andTransfer Registers and principle 10 of theRio Declaration globally
http://aarhusclearinghouse.unece.org
20
04
-20
06
Aarhus Convention Parties, at their second meeting
(Almaty, Kazakhstan, May 2005), adopted decision II/3
on Electronic Information Tools and the Clearing-house Mechanism
Annex
Recommendations on the More Effective Use of
Electronic Information Tools toProvide Public Access to
Environmental Information
Clearinghouse Upgrade Project
September 2006 – February 2007UNECE Secretariat and GRID-Arendal
Clearinghouse Resource Directory
Currently 1340 separate entries ‘tagged’ with one or more thematic attribute:
Type of Resource Topic Events Access to Information Experts Access to JusticeFunding Convention ComplianceLegislation Electronic ToolsMedia GMOsPolicy PRTRsProcedures Public Participation Projects Strategic Decision-making Research
Training materials Also by Source
and Geography
‘Aarhusing’ the Official EC Complaint Procedure.
Calls for reform of the European Community (EC) Official Complaint procedure over the past decade have included calls for complainants to participate in open meetings with the EC and government, to clarify and resolve issues faster. Four open meetings dealing with select Irish complaints were held in 2006 as part of a pilot and a model approach to dealing with complainants identified by the NGO participants. A summary and full accounts of these meetings are available on request from Coastwatch Europe Network. Contact Karin Dubsky, email: [email protected] ENGLISH
Coastwatch Europe Network, 2006.
Anatomy of a Resource Entry
TITLE / URL hotlink
BODY OF TEXT
SOURCE OR PUBLISHER YEAR OF PUBLICATION
LANGUAGE
LAUNCH OF BASESWIKI: ON-LINE RESOURCE ON ACCESS TO NON-JUDICIAL REMEDY
8 January 2009
A new Business and Society Exploring Solution (BASES) dispute resolution community – www.baseswiki.org - has been launched by John Ruggie, the Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General for Business and Human Rights
BASESwiki is a resource for all stakeholders - companies, NGOs, mediators, lawyers lawyers, lawyers, lawyers, lawyers, lawyers, lawyers, lawyers, lawyers, lawyers, lawyers, lawyers, lawyers, lawyers, lawyers, lawyers, lawyers, lawyers, lawyers …
[Source: Harvard Kennedy School]
Anatomy of a Convention News feature
HEADLINE
BODY OF TEXT(max. 250 words)
SOURCE
DATE OF PUBLICATION
BRIEF INTRODUCTION (max. 20 words)
Dynamic ranking of 10 top resources for any entry category
Enhanced
Navigation
Expanded News
RSS FeedArchiveSearch
National Implementation Reports (NIRs) Online
Build and launch NIRs database to facilitate access to National Implementation Reports online
Contributing to transparency of implementation
Promoting sharing of good practices
Facilitating comparative analysis of national and sub-regional gaps and needs
Online reporting system integrates 2008 reports into online database in the Aarhus Clearinghouse
Features
The database is trilingual
• Allows multiply searches by
language
year of the report (2005 and 2008)
country name
question
Aarhus Clearinghouse is the central node of a network of national and information nodes, many with their own Clearinghouses
Role of Aarhus Centres
• Serve as article 5 community access points and repositories of national and local environmental information (A.4.1)
• Serve as information or, where designated by National authorities, National nodes of the Clearinghouse Mechanism (A.2.1, A.4.2-3 etc.)
• Environmental communicators networks in EECCA
(A.14.1, B.3)• Contributor to Aarhus Convention
Communication Strategy (B.3.1-3)
Role of Aarhus Centres (2)
• Training centres for environmental decision-makers, NGOs, professionals and other stakeholders (A.1.1, A.5.2, A.6.1)
• Sustainable production and consumption / PRTR training for citizens and entreprises
• Public consultation facilitators (A.5.1)
Third party distribution of environmental information:
the example of pollutant registry data
Thank you for your attention
[email protected]://aarhusclearinghouse.org