Agata Payne, GRDP Project, Environment Agency for England and Wales, Www

Greening the Structural Fund Programmes “Our plan is simple: to learn from each other, so we can do it better.”

Agata Payne, GRDP project, Environment Agency for England and Wales, www.grdp.org, [email protected]

Overview

The presentation aims to identify and recommend the best ways of integrating the environment in the next generation of Structural Fund programmes in 2007-13.

After providing a short introduction about my organisation, as well as the background of the project, the presentation is divided into three parts:  Part 1 – introduces key aspects of environmental integration within the Structural Funds.  Part 2 – summarises lessons learnt in environmental integration, covering the stages of programme development, implementation and evaluation, as well as the role of environmental authorities in this process. It also provides a set of recommendations for future programming period.  Part 3 – mentions the draft guidance documents that have been drawn from the experience of the GRDP Partners, for taking forward environmental integration in the next programming period. It also serves as a concluding section of the presentation.

Introduction

The Environment Agency is the leading public body for protecting and improving the environment. The Agency has offices across England and Wales working on carrying out Government policy, inspecting and regulating businesses and reacting when there is an emergency such as a flood or pollution incident.

The Agency is also involved in various international projects, such as the project which findings will be presented in this session.

Background

The presentation draws upon the experience of the partnership developed within the INTERREG IIIC project ‘Greening Regional Development Programmes, GRDP’. The partnership is a network of 16 partners and 20 associated organisations from nine different countries. The Environment Agency is a lead partner of the project.

The inspiration for GRDP came from the environmental authorities of Italy, Spain and England and Wales. At a conference held in March 2003, they discussed their experience of integrating the environment into programmes backed by the EU’s Structural Funds and decided to develop a project that would enable this experience to be shared more widely, and benefit other regional development programmes.

The partners knew that although the EU’s rules governing the use of structural funds say the environment and sustainable development should be at the heart of development programmes, many regions struggle to make this a practical reality. GRDP is designed to help by promoting the exchange of good practice.

Learning from each other

There is no clear understanding at any level of what environmental integration within Structural Funds programmes is. GRDP partners agree that environmental integration means that such programmes should consider the environment at every stage of the programme – development, implementation and evaluation. In addition, projects that receive Community Funds should deliver environmental benefits and must not have a negative impact on environment.

What do we mean when we say that environmental integration should consider the environment at every stage of the programme – its development, implementation and evaluation? Let’s have a look at some examples:

Programme development: environmental aspects are reflected in a programme’s mission, strategic goals, measures or priorities (an example of such a measure is ‘increasing and developing entrepreneurship which pays attention to ecological and other environmental- friendly solutions).

Programme implementation: projects which have main economic and social goals (e.g. increasing the economic profits of farms) integrate environmental measures to achieve economic goals (e.g. increase the economic profits of farms through better use of energy, water and nutrients).

Programme monitoring and evaluation: environment may be integrated by designing indicators that measure environmental integration (e.g. leading on from the example of farms above, an indicator could measure how better use of energy, water and nutrients contributes to better economic profits for farms).

After having clarified what we understand as environmental integration, we have looked at various practices from the 2000-06 programming period, as well as challenges facing the Member States in integrating the environment in the future. The results of our work were put together in the GRDP Audit Report - ‘Green Growth’

As a result of this work, we have identified a number of lessons learnt - concerns and proposed ways of solving them. Some of them are highlighted below:

Programme development  There has been limited involvement of environmental partners, in particular non- governmental organisations, in programme development in some Member States. Managing authorities should establish transparent democratic procedures for the selection and involvement of partners in programme development .  Strategic environmental assessment is required for Community funded programmes under European Community law. The methodological guidance should be provided for carrying out this process, including examples of good practice from Member States. Member States should be encouraged to share and adopt good practices for strategic environmental assessment of National Strategic Reference Frameworks, Operational Programmes and other development programmes. It is crucial that environmental objectives be considered at the earliest possible stage of programme development.

Programme implementation  The best environmental integration is achieved where programmes have assigned dedicated staff for this process. These staff work closely with their colleagues within the programme to provide tailored support for applicants in developing and implementing projects that deliver both economic/social and environmental outcomes. Managing, implementing and environmental authorities must assign staff to deliver environmental integration within programmes.  Evaluation of project shows that some projects do not follow their proposals and therefore do not deliver the planned benefits. Managing and implementing authorities must keep supporting projects to ensure they deliver the planned benefits. Environmental authorities and partners should be involved in the monitoring of environmental performance of projects from the earliest stage of projects’ development and implementation. Funding should be withdrawn if projects fail to deliver.

Monitoring and evaluation  Environmental evaluation of programmes and projects is often considered by managing authorities as an added procedural burden. Furthermore, it is often considered by socio- economic partners as simply an added cost. Managing authorities should welcome environmental evaluation as a way of improving programmes, rather than an obstacle to delivering economic and social benefits.

 Monitoring systems can fail to collect information on environmental indicators. Managing authorities should ensure that programmes contain sound environmental indicators and project managers should be asked to collect environmental data as appropriate.

The roles of environmental authorities  There is not enough political support for environmental integration and role of environmental authorities in this process at the EU and national levels. EU institutions should refer to the roles of environmental authorities in the context of environmental integration. National governments could also provide more detail of the roles of environmental authorities in the National Strategic Reference Framework documents and procedural guidance.

 Close co-operation between managing and environmental authorities is essential for integrating the environment into programme development and implementation. Managing authorities must establish a mechanism for co-operation with environmental authorities to support the delivery of environmental integration. Managing and environmental authorities must ensure that the mechanism provides detailed arrangements so that sufficient staff and finance (such as technical assistance) can be assigned.

Towards doing it better

Our ongoing work concentrates on the development of:  A Handbook on strategic environmental assessment (SEA) for Structural Funds;  Guidelines on partnership as a tool to greening development programmes;  Guidelines on how to green projects supported by Structural Funds programmes.

We hope that these guidance documents, as well as other activities, will help us and other organisations in moving forward the environmental integration.