Environmental Monitoring
The Environmental Programme for Europe stressed the need
to coordinate environmental data collection and assessment, and to ensure
compatibility of data and reporting standards. It called, furthermore,
for the promotion of the participation of all European countries, particularly
countries in transition, in the work of the European Environment Agency
(EEA) in order to make comparable, harmonize and coordinate existing data
collection and processing systems, as well as to provide the necessary
information for the next pan-European state-of-the-environment reports.
The Ministers at Aarhus recognized that mechanisms for coordinated monitoring, data collection, processing and management in
the European region were still inadequate. They agreed to give high priority to improving these mechanisms as well as the state of environmental information
to support decision-making and to improve the availability of reliable environmental information to the public. The Ministers welcomed the initiative
of the Russian Federation to convene a special meeting in Moscow to strengthening the cooperation in this field.
The Meeting, organized on 8-9 December 1999 in Moscow, recommended the establishment of a new ad hoc working group on environmental monitoring
under the auspices of the UN ECE Committee on Environmental Policy. The Committee's
Bureau discussed these recommendations and agreed to convene an open-ended preparatory meeting (25 September 2000, Geneva) to develop a draft working
programme for a working group on environmental monitoring, including organizational modalities.
Experts from 30 countries and 4 international organizations
and institutions took part in the Preparatory Meeting
on Environmental Monitoring held in Geneva on 25 September
2000. The Meeting prepared the terms of reference
and work plan of the ad hoc working group on environmental
monitoring.
The Committee, at its seventh session in September 2000, welcomed
the results of the preparatory meeting on environmental monitoring, established
an Ad Hoc Working Group on Environmental Monitoring chaired by the Russian
Federation, and adopted the terms of reference and work plan for the
Working Group.
For further information: monitoring.wgem@unece.org