UNEP.Net Country Portals ELECTRONIC ENVIRONMENTAL INFORMATION FOR DECISION MAKERS AND PUBLIC IN THE CIS Workshop B: Construction of environmental information network St. Petersburg, May 2004

Division of Early Warning and Assessment UNEP strategic framework “ Further efforts to strengthen the scientific basis of UNEP and the credibility of environmental data through supporting the development of improved data systems and development of scientific capacity at national and regional levels will be essential”

Division of Early Warning and Assessment Current feedback from donor countries  UNEP should do much more at the national level  Traditional normative (policy-making) role of UNEP needs to be supplemented by execution of practical projects (policy implementation)  Donor funding will become increasingly focussed on national level project implementation

Division of Early Warning and Assessment Environmental Information Many different sources of definitions  European Union Council Directive 90/313/EEC  Europe’s Environment – The Dobris Assessment, 1995  Aarhus Convention on Access to Information, Public Participation in Decision-making and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters (1998) Any information in written, visual, aural, electronic or any other material form on: (a) The state of elements of the environment, such as air and atmosphere, water, soil, land, landscape and natural sites, biological diversity and its components, including genetically modified organisms, and the interaction among these elements; (b) Factors, such as substances, energy, noise and radiation, and activities or measures, including administrative measures, environmental agreements, policies, legislation, plans and programmes, affecting or likely to affect the elements of the environment within the scope of subparagraph (a) above, and cost-benefit and other economic analyses and assumptions used in environmental decision-making; (c) The state of human health and safety, conditions of human life, cultural sites and built structures, inasmuch as they are or may be affected by the state of the elements of the environment or, through these elements, by the factors, activities or measures referred to in subparagraph (b) above;

Division of Early Warning and Assessment Characteristics of Environmental Information Multi-thematic (Content) air, water, land, biodiversity, chemicals etc. Amorphous (Format) text, audio-visual, map, image, electronic Multi-stakeholder (Demand) User community (Government, Academia, NGOs, Civil society, Business) Multi-stakeholder (Supply) Provider community (Government, Academia, NGOs Multi-access points (User- Provider linkages) Internet, institutional networks, public access centres

Division of Early Warning and Assessment Country portals – the vision An integrated information and data service on environmental matters, provided by a national network of key information providers and web- accessible via a GIS interface (In Europe, the portal concept addresses information pillar of UNECE Aarhus Convention)

Division of Early Warning and Assessment Country portals – the practice  Portals with multiple links to other websites  Portals that have multiple links and harvest information from existing databases and/or websites  Database-driven portals that search other websites in an organised manner  Portals with GIS interfaces that harvest information and data from multiple databases

Division of Early Warning and Assessment Country portals – examples  China  India  Cuba  Germany  Sweden  Norway  UK 1_introduction.asp  USA

Division of Early Warning and Assessment

Division of Early Warning and Assessment Thematic Portals Geographic Portals UNEP.Net - Global Environmental Portal

Division of Early Warning and Assessment Profile to portal evolution NGO Govt. Administrator NGO Administrator Country portal Country profile Decentralized administrators Min of Env. UBA Austrian Ecobureau (Ökobüro)

Division of Early Warning and Assessment Another perspective - a virtual portal extracted from disparate thematic portals Thematic portalCountry profile / Portal GEO data portal (indicators) ECOLEX (conventions) Global coverageNational coverage GEO3.GRID.UNEP.CH ? Environmental conventions Environmental indicators

Division of Early Warning and Assessment

Country portals – the challenges  Data & information is fragmented across different institutional providers  Data may not be available or may be outdated  Political will to cooperate and share resources  Technical capacity may vary across institutions  Development cost and cost recovery mechanisms