1. Aarhus Clearinghouse Progress Report
Michael Stanley-Jones
Environmental Information Management Officer
Aarhus Convention Secretariat
Sixth Meeting of the Working Group of the Parties
5-7 April 2006

2. Clearinghouse’s Renewed Mandate
DECISION II/3 On Electronic Information Tools
and the Clearing-house Mechanism adopted in Almaty at Second Meeting of the Parties
(May 2005)
“Welcoming … the establishment of a clearing-
house mechanism and the launch of the UNECE Aarhus Clearinghouse for Environmental Democracy”

3. In Almaty, the Meeting of the Parties…
2. Invites Parties, Signatories and other interested States to develop a national node of the clearing-house mechanism with legal and practical information on issues related to the Convention at national level, linked to the UNECE Aarhus Clearinghouse for Environmental Democracy, and invites other stakeholders to submit relevant information to the clearing house; …

5. AARHUS CLEARINGHOUSE: CENTRAL NODE
National nodes of the Clearinghouse
NATIONAL NODE
NATIONAL WEB SITE
AARHUS CLEARINGHOUSE: CENTRAL NODE
NGO
IGO
ACADEMIC

6. Aarhus CH national nodes have so far been designated
“ 19 ”
Aarhus CH national nodes
have so far been designated

7. The Resource Directory holds 830 separate entries
The Resource Directory holds 830 separate entries. Each entry is ‘tagged’ with one or more thematic attribute:
Access to Information 566
Public participation 385
Electronic Tools
Access to Justice
PRTRs
Strategic Decision-making Convention Compliance 127
GMOs

8. Resources entries by activity:
Research 414
Legislation 337 
Projects 296 
Policy 227 
Procedures 201 

9. Source of entries by organizational type:
NGOs
IGOs
Government
Academia

10. Leaders among Parties and Signatories
1. United Kingdom + — 69
2. European Community + — 34
3. Armenia — 22
4. Kazakhstan — 21
5. Georgia — 20
6. Kyrgyzstan +/ — 19
7. Azerbaijan — 17
8. Germany — 14
9. Ukraine — 11
10. Ireland — 10
Belarus +, Denmark, Italy +, CH — 9 *
Bulgaria +, R Moldova +, Tajikistan + — 8 *
Czech Rep, Finland, Norway — 7 *
Belg.+, Estonia +, FYRM +, Romania — 6 *
France, Latvia, Spain + — *
All others (19 States) — *
__________________________________________________
* entries each + designated Aarhus website / not operational

11. Visits Total Visits 2006 (Q1) 121,988 2005 (Q4) 69,322
21 month total
387,465

12. Traffic more than doubled in 2006
65.000
31,000
26,000
January February March

13. Next Steps … Ongoing outreach with resource providers
Fresh News features
Engage intern to build resource database
Upgrade web calendar of principle 10
related events
National node capacity building workshops
Draft guidance for national nodes
Integration of capacity-building information

14. E-mail: aarhus.clearinghouse@unece.org