EXISTING EFFORTS TOWARD SEIS IN CENTRAL ASIA Almaty, September 13, 2012

CAREC IN PROMOTING SEIS FOR CA CA –AoA: To ensure involvement of CA to the process of the EE-AoA for assessing the state of the environmental governance and performance, needs and opportunities for SEIS EU AWARE- SEIS: To raise awareness of stakeholders on SEIS and obtain their support as for the prospective area of future EU- CA cooperation on water and environment BILATERAL SEIS: To gradually (country-by-country) support CA countries in addressing SEIS oriented recommendations of the CA-AoA

CA-AOA KEY FINDINGS Except Kazakhstan other CA countries depend of ODA for SoER and water assessments and use assistance of UN agencies for reporting to MEAs SoE assessments in CA are mainly focused on the State, Pressure, Impact and less on Drivers and Responses The regularity of SoERs is an issue for CA countries, except Kazakhstan No national reporting on the state of water resources Environment and water statistics exist but with limited access in most of CA countries The set of environment and water indicators exist not in all CA countries and there are no RE/GE indicators yet in CA Easy on-line access to environmental information, including SoERs and environmental indicators and statistics for general public is an issue for some of CA countries

CA-AOA KEY RECOMMENDATIONS Unification and increased compatibility of assessments in two dimensions: –within the CA sub-region for interfacing and scoping them through transboundary cooperation; –within the EU-CA cooperation framework for necessary information and data sharing; Ensuring a system for regular water-resource assessments and further strengthening and cross-sectoralisation of SoERs, development environmental indicators based SoER; Consult with relevant national authorities to explore opportunities for introducing regular national reporting on the state of water resources as a commitment to improve sub-regional cooperation on water resources in CA; Development of compatible information and data collection systems is needed, also in the two above dimensions. In this context the SEIS could be the basis for future EU-CA cooperation and improved data accessibility;

CA-AoA KEY RECOMMENDATIONS (2) The basis for greening the CA economies is to encourage businesses to be green, provide a creative environment and incentives for green jobs, practices and ensure consumers rights, including through the increased role of Civil Society; Targeted awareness-raising among governmental officials, experts, the business community and civil society is needed to address gaps for RE/GE mainstreaming in CA countries; Building capacities of responsible national institutions for the establishment of compatible assessment systems and process, and the expert capacity in national institutions in order to request only ODA funding, but not expertise through ODA.

EE-AOA PRODUCTS FOR CENTRAL ASIA Virtual Library: – –Around 200 sources, –81 were uploaded by CAREC Country Fiches: – caucasus-and-central-asia/central-asiahttp://aoa.ew.eea.europa.eu/tools/country-fiches/country-fiches-consultation/eastern-europe- caucasus-and-central-asia/central-asia –two subfolders for each of 5 countries Review templates: – –31 national, 8 sub-regional, and 12 regional Pan-European assessments on Water and Water Related Ecosystems (51 total) –31 national, 7 sub-regional, 20 regional Pan-European and Asian-Pacific, 4 global assessments on Resource Efficiency and Green Economy (62 total) Report: – assessment-reportshttp:// assessment-reports – assessment-of-assessments-ee-aoa/ assessment-of-assessments-ee-aoa/

SCOPE OF THE AWARE –SEIS To obtain official support from CA Governments along with nomination of experts To commission the review of CA-AoA recommendations for respective countries focusing on opportunities through SEIS To employ international expert with experience on ENPI-SEIS for sharing expertise and lessons learnt To hold 5 national awareness raising seminars on SEIS in CA countries To obtain written official support for particular follow up activities on SEIS

UP TO MOMENT OUTCOMES 4 nominations of AWARE-SEIS focal points (Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan) 4 national CA-AoA follow up reviews (Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan) presentation of the ENPI-SEIS experience and lessons learnt for promotion of SEIS in CA, which was developed by International expert employed in consultations with EEA National AWARE-SEIS seminar held in Kyrgyzstan Recommendations of the national seminar in Kyrgyzstan

SCOPE OF THE BILATERAL SEIS To support improvement of the national environment and natural resources statistics in Kyrgyzstan To establish the inter-agencies working group (SEIS WG) and facilitate the dialogues to identify the most vital areas for improvement To commission review and analysis of the situation on the base of recommendations of SEIS WG To discuss with SEIS WG and approve the ToR for particular activities toward improvement of statistics and ensure endorsement of activities To ensure participation of AWARE-SEIS focal points in AWARE-SEIS national seminars

UP TO MOMENT OUTCOMES National SEIS WG established and 3 meetings held Expressed interest of OECD, UNDP and Finish Environmental Institute (FEI) to be involved in the activities Recommendation to work on improvement of water and waste statistics by: –Assessing the opportunities and needs for transferring the water statistic reporting from the central level (DWR) to the NSC to local level from entities to the NSC’s district departments –Piloting/testing the transfer at district level (possibly by FEI) –Assess needs for collection of waste statistics to report to Basel, Rotterdam and Stockholm Conventions Analysis of statistical gaps in SoER developed under UNDP assistance and in use of UNECE Guidelines on indicator-based reporting Analysis of relevant activities of NSC and DWR ToR for assessment of water statistics transfer opportunities and needs Letters to NSC and DWR for needed approval

SEIS AND EU MONECA Opportunities, rational and benefits: To mobilize stakeholders and build capacities for fulfillment various reporting obligations to MEAs, including on statistics To address recommendations of the EfE Ministerial Decisions on SEIS to ensure environmental information and data from CA to be understood and used as a platform for future cooperation of EU and CA To ensure fulfillment of Rio Pri nciple 10 by CA countries

Thank you for your kind attention! Talaibek Makeev, CAREC,