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: kdubsky@coastwatch.org 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

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