1. Addressing Water Eutrophication in the Baltic Sea Basin Through Sustainable Watershed Management and Strengthening Institutions for Cross-border Cooperation and Public Involvement
Peeter Unt
Peipsi Center for Transboundary Cooperation

2. Funders: US Environmental Protection Agency REC Participating NGOs: Peipsi CTC and Estonian Fund for Nature Center for Environmental Policy WWF Latvia Chudskoe Project

3. 4 reports on current status of public participation in water management in the respective countries based on case-studies
Case-study regions: Emajõgi River/Lake Peipsi in Estonia Velikaya River in Russia Salaca River in Latvia Minija River in Lithuania

4. 4 action plans for improving the situation with public participation in water management

6. Current practices of public participation in water management in Estonia

7. 1) Legal background analysis + water related cases of Estonian Fund for Nature legal help project 2) Practices of public participation 3) Analysis of expert interviews 4) National action plan

8. TALLINN
16 expert interviews around Lake Peipsi basin and the ministries in February 2003

10. Problems related to the implementation of the Water Framework Directive   1) Actual implementation: legislative principles vs reality 2) Lack of resources: both financial and human – nobody to give wider public sufficient knowledge regarding the idea, consequences and impacts of compiling a water management plan. 3) Conflict of interests. Mostly due to the totally different level of awareness and informedness, not in the favour of the local level. Dissatisfaction and protest is intensified by the feeling that “the state does not give us anything, only demands from us”.

11. Problems related to the public participation: lack of know-how and experience; shortage of both financial and human resources; low awareness level of the population and weak interest towards environmental issues.

12. Recommendations 1) Better communication between sub-basin water management plan coordinators

13. 2) Communication strategies and practical action plans for the involvement of the public should be devised at the ministerial and agency levels.