GEO Resource Book : Regional Version M. Lal – CESDAC, India cesdac

1. GEO Resource Book : Regional VersionM. Lal – CESDAC, Indiawww.cesdac.org.in

2. Global Environment Outlook • GEO is the first and foremost a participatory and consultative process for environmental assessment; it aims to facilitate the interaction between science on the one hand and policy and decision making on the other. • Each GEO assessment is multi-dimensional in scope, incorporating environmental, policy, geographic and temporal perspectives. Environmental dimensions include: • thematic (related to the state and trends of land, atmosphere, water and biodiversity); • functional (related to the provision of environmental goods and services); • sectoral (relationships between the environment and activity areas such as energy • use, industry, tourism, agriculture and trade); • cross-cutting (relating to issues such as production, consumption, gender, poverty, • human security and vulnerability); and • interlinkages within and among all of the above.

3. DPSIR Framework for GEO Process

4. “IEA - Primary Objective” • IEA is a methodology used for assessment processes and products following the GEO Framework, irrespective of whether it is for a region, nation or a city, for making policy relevant recommendations about the environmental state and trends and their links with human development and thus facilitate the “community with improved access to meaningful environmental data and information, and help increase the capacity of governments to use environmental information for decision making and action planning for sustainable human development”.

5. INTEGRATED ASSESSMENT • Integrated refers to a number of aspects of the assessment:- • linking state of the environment analysis with policy analysis; • incorporating global and regional perspectives, as appropriate; • incorporating historical and future perspectives; • covering a broad spectrum of issues and policies; and • looking at dynamic and complex interactions between the environment and human well-being in place-based contexts (e.g., particular regions, countries, ecosystems, watersheds).

6. IEA & the Regional Assessments Assessments in relation to IEA State of Environment (SoE) : Traditional SoE reporting provides information on the environment and trends. It mainly focuses on the biophysical environment than the pressures humanity exerts on it. IEA: IEA provides a participatory, structured approach to linking knowledge and action. It is a participatory, integrated and multi-disciplinary process Environmental ImpactAssessment (EIA): This is a tool or framework used to assess environmental impacts of an activity. EIA is a process for evaluating possible risks or effects on the environment of proposed activity or development. The purpose is to inform decisions-making and other stakeholders of potential environmental impacts, and to suggest ways to reduce or minimize impacts that would arise from proposed activities. An IEA is intended to drive decisions in the context of a given project. IEA: IEA is used for assessment process to ensure that environmental problems receive appropriate, adequate and timely consideration by governments. The IEA approach is necessary for making policy relevant recommendations about the environmental state and trends and links with human development. The results from EIA might serve as case studies to illustrate. Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA): SEA is a systematic and comprehensive process of evaluating the environmental effects of a policy, plan or programme and its alternatives at its earliest possible stage. SEA represents a body of practice and methodology directly relevant to the policy analysis component of IEA, but does not involve the reporting requirement. IEA: SEA is ideally undertaken before policies, plans and programmes are put in place. It also considers the environment as a system, looking at impacts on the interface between environment and socioeconomic conditions. IEA looks linkage between human well-being and environmental trends. IEA also extends its scope of assessment to the regular reporting.

7. Assessment Reports in Asia and the Pacific • Sub-regional level: Central Asia IEA report (published 2007) • Greater Mekong Environment Outlook (published 2007) • South Asia Environment Outlook (on-going) • National level: Tajikistan IEA report (published 2007) • Cambodia IEA report (on-going) • Lao Environment Outlook (on-going) • Turkmenistan Environment Outlook (on-going) • Kyrgyzstan Environment Outlook (on-going) • Sri Lanka Environment Outlook (on-going) • Bhutan Environment Outlook (published 2008) • Vietnam Climate Change Report (on-going) • City level: Dhaka IEA report (published 2007) • Kathmandu Valley IEA report (published 2007) • Shenzhen Environment Outlook (on-going) • Bangkok Climate Change Report (on-going)

8. Regional GEO Book: Contents • Module 1: The GEO Approach to Integrated Environmental Assessment (IEA) • Module 2: National IEA Process Design and Organization • Module 3: Developing an Impact Strategy • Module 4: Monitoring, Data and Indicators • Module 5: Asia - Regional Training Manual on Reporting • Module 6: Scenario Development and Analysis • Module 7: Creating Communication Output • Module 8: Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning – for Increased Impact and Improvement of the IEA Process

9. The GEO Resource Book focuses on: • securing institutional commitment for an IEA; • identification of stakeholders and defining their roles; • instruments for conducting the process; • allocation of required resources (time, human, financial); and • interactive process design and its benefits.

10. Interactive training elements on case examples, discussion questions and exercises. Key attributes include:- • Participatory, Multidisciplinary and multi-sectoral, Integrated, Multi-product and Institutionalized The number of activities include:- • Establish an institutional framework for collaboration and organization of IEA • Establish and maintain an information base (i.e., set up information system, gather and update high quality data) • Discussion forum (common methodology, trends of the driving forces and pressures, key environmental issues, policies, policy options and scenarios) • Capacity-building activities (workshops and other non-workshop based interactions) • Define and implement a communication and impact strategy

11. The GEO Approach - Key Questions

12. Key questions to be answered in the GEO - IEA framework

13. Generic Institutional Framework

14. Identifying stakeholders, their roles and interests

15. Information Processing, Analysis and Writing (DPSIR logic)

16. Regional Assessment – Driving Forces & Pressures • Dynamics of Demographics • Land & Energy Resources • Economic Activities • Territorial Occupancy • Water Availability & Demand • Air Quality & Atmospheric Emissions • Waste Production & Disposal • Trans-boundary Issues, if any.

17. Importance of data and indicator components A larger number of issues may come up during a stakeholder IEA process. One might find it useful to use a set of criteria to narrow down the issues, using criteria such as the following: • Urgency and immediate impact • Irreversibility • Effects on human health • Effects on economic productivity • Number of people affected • Loss of aesthetic values • Impacts on cultural and historical heritages

18. Framework of Environmental Data Flows

19. Layers of Spatial Data • aerial photography • satellite imagery • country boundaries • protected natural areas • habitat regions • rivers and other water bodies • elevation contours • climate data • land use and soil type data • wildlife populations • administrative boundaries

20. Relationship between Data, Indicators and Indices

21. Geographic Information Systems (GIS) for IEA A useful tool for manipulating and analysing data, particularly to examine spatial relationships among landscape features, and in monitoring long-term changes.

22. Example: Pattern of drying up of the Aral sea between 1977 and 2006

23. Plausible Linkages between Database and Report Development

24. Environmental Assessment: Ecosystem vs. Political Boundaries Case study of a ecosystem-based assessment

25. Indicator Development Process

26. Selecting appropriate INDICATORS to describe environmental states, pressures and drivers START HERE

27. Impact Strategy Steps

28. An impact strategy builds on communication activities in several key respects

29. Linking Values, Issues, Indicators and Performance Criteria in a Participatory Process

30. A legal mandate and requirement to produce an IEA helps initiation of process • legislation may call for collaboration among government(s) and /or agencies that contribute to IEA; • a common methodology for data collection may be identified among the regional authorities, private and public organizations, and scientists or technical experts; • the legislation may refer to environmental reports to be produced by a range of public and private organizations; • legislation may promote exchange of data and harmonization of reporting initiatives; and • the lead agency’s role in preparing the way for consultations and external participation.

31. Policy Analysisfor IEA - Steps • Understanding the issueto determine what is happening to the environment and why, and what the impacts are. • Preparing a policy commitment reviewto understand the array of high-level strategies affecting the environmental issue. • Conducting a policy instrument scanto identify the mix of policies influencing the environmental issue, and the effectiveness of this mix. • Performing a policy gap and coherence analysis to determine if relevant policies are in place and focused on the most important drivers and pressures.

32. Analysis of Existing Policies

33. Framework for Monitoring &Evaluation in the IEA Process

34. Time Delivery - Key Activities & Outputs

35. Summary • A draft GEO Resource Book for Regional Applications has been finalised by a team of experts and will be made available at the end of this workshop for review. • Your constructive suggestions and inputs will go in a big way in early finalisation of this Resource Book. • Deadline at UNEP-RRC for your valuable inputs is Oct 15, 2008 or earlier.

36. Questions please ?? Thanks for your kind attention