Environmental Impact Assessment: Enforcement of EIA Requirements
Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) refers to both a decision making process and a document that provides a systematic, reproducible, and interdiscliplinary evaluation of the potential effects of a proposed action and its practical alternatives. Proposed actions may include projects, programs, policies, or plans.
As a decision making process, EIA provides a means for decision makers to better integrate environmental, social, and economic concerns. It provides the opportunity for all stakeholders in a proposed action, including the public, to participate in the identification of issues of concern, practical alternatives, and to identify opportunities to avoid or mitigate adverse impacts.
EIA requirements are perhaps the most widely adopted environmental requirements by both individual countries and international organizations.
The enforcement challenges for EIA include: construction without EIA approval; illegal construction in protected areas due to faulty information on project location; lack of enforceable language for key environmental management provisions; and inadequate detail on proposed project, mitigation and monitoring.
INECE helps build capacity for improving compliance with requirements for the environmental impact assessment process and with commitments which result from decision-making related to EIA through exchange of international good practice, specifically in the monitoring and follow-up aspects of EIA and through global and regional networks in cooperation with the International Association for Impact Assessment (IAIA), the World Bank, and regional development banks.
Selected Articles on Enforcement of EIA Requirements
CAFTA-DR Regional EIA Technical Review Guidelines and Example Terms of Reference
Three regional EIA Technical Review Guidelines for the review and preparation of EIAs for energy, mining and tourism projects were prepared by relevant experts from six CAFTA-DR countries and the United States in both EIA and the mining, energy and tourism sectors respectively supported by U.S. Agency for International Development’s Environmental and Labor Excellence Program and the Central American Commission on Environment and Development. The Guidelines are an outgrowth of environmental cooperation between the governments of five countries in Central America and the Dominican Republic and the United States associated with the CAFTA-DR free trade agreement.
They were developed to better ensure proposed projects undergoing review by government officials, NGOs, and the general public successfully identify, avoid, prevent and/or mitigate potential adverse impacts and enhance potential beneficial impacts throughout the life of the projects. From the vantage point of enforcement, the guidelines emphasize auditable commitment language, monitoring and follow up, as well as compliance with EIA procedures and existing environmental performance requirements which are benchmarked in Appendix C for many different countries and international organizations. Volume 1 contains the guidelines which track with internationally recognized elements of environmental impact assessment with a glossary and references; Volume 2 contains Appendices with detailed information on the applicable sector, requirements and standards, predictive tools, and international codes; and Volume 1, Part 2 contains example Terms of Reference cross-linked to Volumes 1 and 2 for different types of mining, energy, and/or tourism projects respectively for use by the countries as they prepare their own EIA program requirements.
- EIA Technical Review Guidelines for the Mining Sector
- EIA Technical Review Guidelines for the Tourism Sector
- EIA Technical Review Guidelines for the Energy Sector
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