Electronic information tools in support of public participation under

the Aarhus Convention

Michael Stanley-Jones

Environmental Information Management OfficerAarhus Convention Secretariat

United Nations Economic Commission for Europe

Expert Group on Public ParticipationGeneva, 7-8 July 2009

Decision III/3 on electronic information tools and the clearinghouse mechanism

4. Encourages countries that have not yet taken steps to use the full potential for ICT as a means to significantly improve the involvement of the public in environmental decision-making to develop adequately resourced national programmes and strategies for e-participation in such decision-making, and in particular:

(a) To develop and implement e-government and e-participation applications at all levels, thereby furthering access to government information and services and enabling the public to participate electronically in environmental decision-making;

(b) To strengthen the creation of quality e-content addressing environmental information, at the regional, national and international levels;

5. Welcomes the further development of the Aarhus Clearinghouse for Environmental Democracy and the application of the recommendations in decision II/3 to promote the wider use of electronic information tools as an effective instrument for the implementation of the Convention’s provisions on the dissemination of environmental information and the promotion of public participation in environmental decision-making

through electronic means;

9. Decides to extend in time the mandate of the Task Force on Electronic Information Tools with the following programme of work subject to the availability of financial and human resources:

…

(c) Updating and sharing examples of good practice through:

(i) Further documentation of case studies in the use of ICT to promote public access to environmental information and public participation in environment-related decision-making, e.g. through an updated and expanded compendium;

Status of ratification

Mapping participation in MEAs online

Old:

http://www.unece.org/env/pp/convmap.htm

New:

http://unece.unog.ch/enhs/PP/demo/index.html

National implementation reports online

Old:

as submittedhttp://www.unece.org/env/pp/reports_implementation_2008.htmas released http://www.unece.org/env/pp/mop3/mop3.docII.htm#NIRs

New:http://apps.unece.org/ehlm/pp/NIR/qwery.asp?Quer_ID=NIR8&LngIDg=EN

Status of reporting

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

Compendium of good practice

Compendium of good practice in e-access to information, e-participation and e-access to justice

• REC project under 2008 UNECE grant• Demonstrated at MOP-3• 2nd Int’l Conference on the Theory and Practice of Electronic

Governance (Cairo, Egypt, December 2008)• 7th meeting of the E-information tools Task Force

http://www.rec.org/REC/Programs/PublicParticipation/cases_collection/Default.html

ICT Projects

1. Online preparation and public consultation of national implementation reports – Wiki enterprise application– Promote efficient preparation of NIR – Public consultation on draft NIRs

2. Facilitating Electronic Public Participation and Mitigating Climate Change: Proposed Feasibility Study of Teleconferencing and Webcasting Selected Aarhus Convention Meetings

– Distance participation in Aarhus Convention meeting– Aarhus Centres (Belarus, Kazakhstan, Caucasus)– Sligo Institute of Technology, Sligo (Ireland)

Thank you for your attention

public.participation@unece.orghttp://aarhusclearinghouse.org