INECE Co-sponsors EIA Training Held in Gulf Region

INECE, the U.S. Middle East Partnership Initiative, and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) sponsored successful workshops in Bahrain and Oman in September 2006.

The four-day course, "Principles of Environmental Impact Assessment", provided a framework for defining and designing an environmental impact assessment process for sustainable development.

Facilitators described a hypothetical development project that "grew" as the course progressed. The attendees had to identify (and re-identify) relevant issues, prepare public participation plans, scope the environmental analysis, designate a preferred alternative, set up the technical team, and negotiate mitigation.

A total of 20 environmental specialists and officials from Bahrain, Tunisia, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, Jordan, and Algeria, took part in the workshop in Manama, Bahrain. Thirty-four participants from Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Yemen, Kuwait, and Oman attended the training in Muscat, Oman. The participants were professional engineers and scientists from each country's Environmental, Defense, and Transportation Ministries, as well as representatives from the Petroleum Development Oman, private industry, NGOs, and academic institutions. The diversity of participants greatly contributed to the richness of the course and information exchange.

For more information, contact the INECE Secretariat.

Maghreb Network Launched To Promote Compliance and Enforcement
By Mohamed Rida Derder, INECE Special Counsel to the Maghreb Region, rida@inece.org

The Network for Environmental Compliance and Enforcement in the Maghreb  (NECEMA) was launched on 21 February 2007, fulfilling a commitment made at the 7th International Conference of INECE in Marrakech, Morocco, in April 2005, to continue to promote environmental compliance and enforcement issues in the region.

NECEMA is working to develop links among the countries of the Maghreb , emphasizing implementation, compliance, and enforcement issues with regard to domestic environmental laws. NECEMA will also seek out opportunities to engage in capacity-strengthening activities with countries of the Maghreb to promote uniform environmental law standards, among other issues. And NECEMA will promote information exchanges on compliance and enforcement strategies both within the Maghreb region and globally through INECE.

As part of its early efforts, NECEMA has engaged in the following activities:

• The first NECEMA Conference, entitled “An Assessment of the Environmental Control and Inspection Systems in Force in the Maghreb Countries” was held in Rabat , Morocco , on 30-31 October 2006, drawing delegates from Tunisia and Mauritania and more than 120 other experts and participants from other countries and international organizations.

• The first meeting of the NECEMA Regional Planning Committee was held on 31 October 2006 , to examine, adjust, and approve the network’s triennial action plan from 2007-2009.

• NECEMA published its first newsletter NECEMANEWS in June 2006 to introduce the new network and to deliver environmental legal information within the region.

Further information on NECEMA is available through the INECE Web site at http://inece.org/mena/necema/.

Jordanian Project Addresses Hazardous Waste Management in Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises
By Mr. Nelson Sabogal, Senior Program Officer, UNEP, Nelson.Sabogal@unep.ch

The project “Hazardous Waste Management in Industry with the Context of Integrated Life Cycle of Materials” was carried out by the Ministry of Planning and International Cooperation in cooperation with the Ministry of Environment of Jordan, the Royal Scientific Society (RSS), Sustainable Business Associates (SBA), and the United Nations Institute for Training and Research.

It was funded under the Strategic Plan of the Basel Convention with additional financial support from the Swiss Agency for Development (SDC). The project addressed the problem of hazardous waste management in small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in Jordan. The majority of the SMEs are concerned with the production of hazardous wastes as part of their operating procedures. A guide was produced based on on-site tests in selected companies. The guide, with its case studies, will be used as a tool by SMEs to effectively manage hazardous materials and wastes by supporting identification processes among others. The guide is available in Arabic, English, and French on the websites of the participating organizations.

For more information, visit the web site of the Basel Secretariat or contact Mr. Nelson Sabogal, Senior Program Officer.

Kenya’s Tourism and Wildlife Minister, Morris Dzoro, launched an anti-wildlife crime course supported by International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) for high-level law enforcement officials drawn from Kenya Wildlife Service, The Kenya Police, and the Lusaka Agreement Task Force.

The two-week course at the Kenya Wildlife Service Training School in Naivasha comes in the wake of contraband ivory seizures in Asia late last year suspected to be from elephants illegally killed in East and Central Africa.

Mr. Dzoro lauded the initiative, saying it would help to curb illegal trafficking of ivory, rhino horn, and other live animals such as reptiles within the region. He said, “Wildlife crime had been worsened by the current drought which has exacerbated the bushmeat trade and killed many wild animals whose trophies now lie in the wrong hands.”  In his message, Interpol Secretary General Ronald K. Noble termed the training, “an investment in the future of Kenya Wildlife Service, Africa and the planet’s biological integrity.” 

“Environmental crime is a growing problem that is increasingly linked to other crimes such as smuggling, fraud, money laundering, weapons offences and drugs. Just a month ago, authorities in Cameroon rescued an infant chimpanzee and seized 50 kg of marijuana in the same incident. Poaching endangered species is an increasingly lucrative and relatively easy activity and we need to tackle this international problem on an international scale,” he said.

Last September, Philippine officials seized six tons of ivory at Ninoy Aquino Airport, Manila. The haul is suspected to have originated from land-locked Zambia and transited through the Port of Dar-salaam, Tanzania. Twenty days later, in two separate incidents at the same airport, authorities seized 806 kilos of ivory on flights originating from Entebbe, Uganda, and Nairobi.

James Isiche, Regional Director for IFAW in East Africa, said, “The fact that such cargo passes undetected across national borders indicates complex, extensive networks that support and sustain illegal trade in wildlife and wildlife products. “

“Wildlife crime is a matter of serious global concern - its magnitude is considered second only to illegal drug trafficking. Its transboundary nature requires collaboration both between states and within national law enforcement agencies. This also calls for the deployment of substantial resources which are more often not available to developing countries,” he said.

The law enforcement training is supported by IFAW. Last May, IFAW awarded the Kenya Wildlife Service an Ecomessage Award for best practices in fighting environmental crime. Ecomessage is a system for gathering data concerning incidents, trends, and perpetrators of environmental crime. Ecomessage data is maintained by the Interpol General Secretariat in Lyon, France. The database is at the disposal of detectives across 179 member states.

Visit IFAW for more information.

Zimbabwe Cites Enforcement Concerns in Phasing Out Ozone Depleting Substances

Zimbabwe raised concerns over compliance and enforcement in its efforts to phase out all ozone-depleting substances by 2009.

Cde Francis Nhema, Zimbabwe’s Minister of Environment and Tourism, said that a complete phase-out by 2009 would allow his country to comply with its obligations under the Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer, which requires all developing countries to phase-out CFCs, a leading ozone-depleting substance, by 2010.

Mr. Nhema said that the major challenge to succeeding with the planned phase-out is controlling the black market for illegal CFCs. The Environment and Tourism Ministry has engaged in extensive training programs for customs officers at Zimbabwe’s major ports.

“This training is aimed at controlling and monitoring illegal trade in ozone-depleting substances and equipping the customs officers with the skills and expertise to detect concealed, mislabeled or smuggled consignments of these controlled substances,” he said.

For more information, visit AllAfrica.com.