Environmental Impact Assessment

The Attorney Generals Office, assisted by NCSA, has drafted a framework legislation to introduce a legal requirement of environmental impact assessment (EIA) of projects, programmes and policies. Parliament is expected to adopt the legislation before the end of year 2001.

The draft legislation on EIA only specifies the general framework and has to be implemented through Statutory Orders and guidelines from the Minister of Local Government, Lands and Housing. One of the crucial points in implementing legislation is to identify the proper implementing agencies and ensure that adequate administrative procedures are in place.

A central task for EPP is to support NCSA in the preparation for the implementation of the EIA legislation. For this purpose a short-term expert with long term experience with the Danish EIA procedures has been employed.

The first activity of the EPP programme was to prepare a detailed study of the present administration of various types of projects and identify the primary stakeholders. An analysis of the draft bill resulted in a number of recommendations for improvements and clarifications.

The EPP –team has further supported NCSA in drafting a general manual explaining the procedures and giving administrative guidelines for implementation. Part of this second phase is also to identify and describe the role of NCSA in relation to both line ministries and local authorities and describe the procedures for involvement of NCSA in reviewing of EIA’s.

The third phase of the work will be to develop a guideline for EIA on industrial activities. This work has been initiated by a working group with members from Department of Industrial Affairs, BOCCIM, NCSA, EPP and other relevant parties. 

Training | Planning and project cycle | Improvement of linkages | Management of Environmental Data | General advisory activities