The Access Initiative

Environmental Democracy

Published: 2006

An Assessment of Access to Information, Participation in Decision-making and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters in Selected European Countries; The Access Initiative European Regional Report

This report was conducted using the assessment method developed by The Access Initiative, a global network of civil society organizations. Unless otherwise noted, the opinions, interpretations and findings presented in this document are the responsibility of the authors and not of The Access Initiative. For additional information about The Access Initiative, including its members and leadership, please see www.accessinitiative.org.

Supported by The European Commission, Directorate General Justice, Freedom and Security Sole responsibility for this publication lies with the authors, and the Commission of the European Union is not responsible for any use that may be made of the information contained therein.

Highlights from the TAI Global Gathering

By Monika Kerdeman (Posted: March 6, 2009) 

50 people representing 29 countries participated in the second TAI Global Gathering, held in Sligo, Ireland at the Sligo Institute of Technology. The gathering was the largest international conference held at Sligo Institute of Technology. Highlights from the meeting include:

  1. Jeremy Wates, from the Aarhus Convention Secretariat in Geneva, opened the conference by discussing the importance of access work in the role of shaping environmental policy.

  2. The deputy leader of Seanad Eireann (the Senate of Ireland), and Green Party chairperson, Senator Dan Boyle, addressed the gathering. He spoke on Ireland’s need to ratify the Aarhus convention and the importance of access to information in a mature democracy.

  3. TAI partners shared ideas, stories, successes and solutions for moving the network to more action on the ground.

  4. Latin American partners agreed on next steps for a collaborative regional advocacy plan.

  5. The TAI Secretariat shared major themes and messages from its publication, Voice and Choice: Opening the Door to Environmental Democracy.

  6. Partners discussed case studies on access rights for the poor carried out by five TAI partners and next steps for including poverty-access rights analysis in all future TAI assessments.

  7. The Thailand Environment Institute (TEI) introduced partners to a draft citizen’s toolkit.

  8. New sectors were explored in the context of TAI, including climate change, forestry and aid effectiveness.

Click here to read the full report from the gathering.

TAI Global Gathering 2008

Published: 2008

This report is a detailed account of the objectives and outcomes from the second TAI Global Gathering, held in Sligo Ireland. At the gathering more then 50 TAI partners from 29 different countries met to discuss network activities and share access rights success stories.

Formación de Capacidades en Acceso: El caso ecuatoriano

Published: 2008

Este video muestra el proceso de fortalecimiento de capacidades que inició el Centro Ecuatoriano de Derecho Ambiental en el 2005, como resultado de la evaluación realizada por la Iniciativa de Acceso, donde se detectó que uno de los grandes vacíos existentes era justamente la falta capacidades en la ciudadanía y en los funcionarios gubernamentales respecto de los derechos de acceso.

Nuestro proceso de formación de capacidades aplica metodologías participativas apoyadas de materiales desarrollados con enfoque pedagógico, así como también con actividades de difusión y discusión de los temas de acceso en la agenda publica.

Citizen Voices in Water Sector Governance

Published: 2005

The Role of Transparency, Participation and Government Accountability

This brochure gives a summary of the findings of case studies chosen specifically to address a range of issues in the water sector. TAI partners started a new activity to evaluate access in the context of water sector governanceTAI will facilitate pilot application of TAI indicators to water sector cases in order to determine how they need to be modified or supplemented to capture sector-specific issues. TAI partners will share their findings this spring at the TAI global meeting and the World Water Forum in an attempt to influence the global dialogue on water governance and help countries work to achieve Millennium Development Goal 7, Target 10 (Millennium Development Goal 7 is to ensure environmental sustainability, Target 10 aims to reduce the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water).

UNEP Governing Council to Decide Future of Access Principles in Nairobi

By David Heller (Posted: February 6, 2009) 

At the upcoming United Nations Environmental Program (UNEP) Governing Council meeting in Nairobi, Kenya, delegates will have the unprecedented opportunity to extend the adoption of important principles – a peoples’ right to access information, participate in their government’s decision making process, and seek redress in matters affecting the environment – to states around the world. But in preliminary negotiations, not all delegations were sanguine about committing to spread the codification of these principles globally.

In 2008, a select group of high-level external experts and judges, in consultation with the UNEP secretariat, was formed to draft principled guidelines that direct developing countries in the creation of national legislation protecting these access rights.

But alone, these guidelines can not compel state action. So the UNEP secretariat also drafted a complementary resolution, on how the Council should act upon the principles and work to ensure states reflect them in new law.

As it’s currently written, the draft resolution is that the Council:

Decides to adopt the guidelines for the development of national legislation on access to informationpublic participation and access to justice in environmental matters as set out in the [guidelines]… [Emphasis added]

Adoption of the guidelines by the Council would be a very positive, symbolic step for UNEP and the spread of the access principles. But, this language is not immune from alteration, and indeed, has already been compromised.

During preliminary discussions, several delegations, allegedly including the American contingent, expressed interest in replacing “adopt” with “take note of,”a subtle proposal with profound implications for the strength of UNEP’s commitment.

It is imperative that this change not occur.

If the Council were to merely “take note of” the guidelines, then they would be sending the wrong message to member countries: that it would be sufficient for all to do the same. While “adoption” implies an unequivocal recognition that the guidelines are desirable and binding, “taking note of” is pleasantly ambiguous and leaves far too much room for them to be ignored. The Council, by “taking note” of the guidelines, would simply be recognizing that they exist; a far cry from guaranteeing that the guidelines serve their namesake’s purpose and direct future action: a small but far from trivial distinction.

This proposed change will not go unopposed. The Access Initiative (TAI) has been working hard to leverage its influence and keep the language unmolested. Attending the meeting in Nairobi and advocating on TAI’s behalf will be Mr. Augustine Njamnshi, TAI coordinator in Cameroon, and part of the official UNEP Cameroonian delegation.

TAI has also harnessed support from its allies in the Irish and Argentine delegations, who share its concern over the dilution of the original language and will be advocating for the Council to remain committed to adoption, as the initial draft explicitly recommends.

The American delegation’s alleged complicity to the proposed change was particularly alarming. Given the Obama administration’s newfound commitment to promoting transparency and public participation in its own government, it appears as though the sea change in U.S. politics has not yet filtered down to affect the composition nor stance of its Nairobi delegation. But surely they must have been briefed on their new boss’s priorities. It’s baffling as to why the State Department Officials, representing the new administration, might be willing to water down stronger language when they arrive at the negotiating table.

Not only would U.S. support of weak language be inconsistent with its existing commitments, the U.S. delegation should consider its snowballing effects. Other nations, particularly China, will be emboldened by any U.S. disapprobation of the existing recommendations, making efforts to spread access principles beyond parties to the Aarhus Convention that much more challenging.

If any change is to be made to the initial draft of the proposed action document, it should include language that commits delegates towards creating a proper convention in the future – similar to the existing Aarhus Convention, but global in scope. Because the Aarhus parties are strictly European and Central Asian in origin, creating a similar scheme in Nairobi, where both developed and developing countries will have a presence, would be a step towards globalizing access principles. And that is an ideal that all delegations ought to be striving towards.

The Calabash Project

Published: 2005
Tools for Effective Participation in the EIA Process

 

Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) has existed for 30 years. During its evolution, public involvement in the EIA process has become a key criterion that distinguishes EIA as a participatory decision support tool. Consequently, EIA is a suitable and appropriate platform from which to build participatory decision making approaches for the southern African region. Environmental Impact Assessment is one window through which the public has the opportunity to engage a government in decision-making.

However, in southern Africa, there is insufficient public access to information and there are inadequate or weak mechanisms for public participation in decision-making. The Southern African Institute for Environmental Assessment (SAIEA), through support provided by the World Bank TFESSD (Trust Fund for Environmentally and Socially Sustainable Development) and Canadian CIDA, undertook 2-year project to develop a process to enhance participation in decision-making in the SADC region Africa. Calabash was not designed to actually do public participation, but rather was structured so that regulators, private sector, practitioners and civil society had the capacity, knowledge and tools to better undertake respective public participation programs on individual projects and programmes.

Governance in its simplest forms describes the relationship among institutions, processes and ideas. It is about the exercise of power, accountability and relationships in pursuit of an organization’s mission or a nation’s goals. In Africa, achievement of a country’s goals are severely challenged due to such issues as resource degradation, HIV/AIDS, water scarcity and conflict. EIA of projects and Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) of policies plans and programmes, are evolving rapidly to address wider sustainability objectives beyond biophysical concerns. The evolution of these planning tools is recognizing that the public has a significant role to play in the EIA or SEA process to assist a government to achieve its objectives, while at the same time advancing democratic reform and good governance practices. How a respective government engages civil society with respect to decision-making is one measure of how a government is reforming its governance and democratic reform processes. The recent Commission for Africa report concluded that governance is one of the key issues to be addressed by Africa if poverty reduction is to occur.

Many African countries have well written EIA statutes that require the involvement of the public or civil society in the project decisions that affect them. To date, the application and success of public involvement in EA has been most variable due to lack of capacity, information, knowledge and networks in many stakeholder groups. Regardless, EIA presents a very effective and practical tool for African governments to show to the international investment community and the African democratic review teams that democratic principles at the project/programme level are being applied. EIA is one big “window” through which democratic reform can be realized by more participation.

Furthermore, while democracy has been widely embraced by many African governments, regional bodies and international gatherings, it is difficult to assess the extent to which democratic practices have genuinely taken root One fact is clear – a county’s citizens rather than outsiders are best placed to undertake a comprehensive and critical identification of the challenges confronting their country on the path of democracy development and consolidation. And their participation in decision-making is key to democratic reform. Citizens, informed and active EIA can act as advocates for its use in decision-making processes affecting their lives to their political leaders who will then require it of regulatory bodies. Sustainable development can hardly be achieved without stakeholder involvement in the EIA process. EIA with public consultation is an essential part of the process and system needed to make sustainable development happen.

The Calabash project is one step of many to assist the SADC region to move forward on democratic reform by using EIA as a catalyst for participatory decision-making by providing appropriate tools, knowledge and networks to regulators, civil society, practitioners and industry of the SADC region.

Assessing Access in Yunnan, China

Posted by Monika Kerdeman

The Yunnan coalition started their TAI assessment process during a training workshop from Jan 13-15, 2008, led byTAI core team partner Thailand Environment Institute. The coalition of civil society groups includes Eco-WatchYunnan Academy of Social Science (YASS)Yunnan Institute of Environmental Science (YIES)Yunnan Environmental Science Society (YESS) and Centre for Mountain Ecosystem Studies ICRAF-China, the coalition’s lead organization.

At the workshop, coalition members were trained on the TAI Assessment Toolkit. Since the training, the Yunnan TAI coalition translated the indicators in the TAI Assessment toolkit into Chinese, and gathered information and relevant documentation, laws, regulations and guidelines for review.

As part of their research, Yunnan coalition members met with the Provincial Water Bureau, Yunnan Provincial Environment Protection Bureau, Agricultural Bureau, Yunnan Provincial Forestry Department, Vegetative Protection Station, Air Quality Monitoring Station, local agricultural stations, environmental protection stations and other related sectors to acquire more information. Interviewees included experts, villagers, and consumers as well as local authority staff.

The Assessment in Yunnan examines eight case studies on access to information. These studies are on various environmental issues including; the state of environment report of Yunnan Province, air quality monitoring in Kunming city, accidental explosion at a sulfur depot and vitriol factory of the Sanhuan chemical company, noise quality monitoring in Kunming city, environmental information of Yuntianhua International Chemical Company in Yunnan, monitoring of drinking water quality in Songhuaba reservoir in Kunming, GMO information monitoring in Yunnan, and paraquat herbicide accidents in Yunnan.

Five case studies on public participation are: public participation in environment protection decisions in eco-tourism policy in Diqing prefecture, public participation in the urban agglomeration development plan in south of Yunnan, public participation in the extension project of the 2nd hospital of Kunming, public participation in the water saving regulatory of Kunming city, public participation in decision-making of Provincial Forestry Development Strategy and public participation in the environmental impact assessment of the construction of Honghe Steel Factory..

The research also looks at access to justice. The access to justice case studies are on pesticide residue information in food – claimed by people to the people’s congress, public’s claim on the dam building on Salween River, local residents’ collective claim on old trees felled by a company in Baiyu Village, Xishan District of Kunming, and the claim on the pollution accident of Longma Phosphorous Chemical Company in Xundian, Yunnan.