ENVIRONMENT POLICIES EVOLUTION Part 6 1988 Chico Mendes Brasil

Environmental Policies – Part 6

ENVIRONMENT POLICIES EVOLUTION Part 6 António Gonçalves Henriques

1988 Chico Mendes Brasil • Sometimes called "The Ghandi of the Amazon" Chico Mendes was a rubber tapper who lived and worked in Brazil's Amazon region. Largest river basin in the world Area of river basin: 6 300 000 km2 Area of rainforest: 5 500 000 km2

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Amazonia

Area of river basin: 6 300 000 km2 Area of rainforest: 5 500 000 km2 Brazil: 58.4% Peru: 12.8%, Bolivia: 7.7%, Colombia: 7.1%, Venezuela: 6.1%, Guyana: 3.1%, Suriname: 2.5%, French Guyana: 1.4%, Ecuador with 1%.

Amazonia

Amazon basin forest north of Manaus

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Amazonia

Members of an uncontacted tribe encountered in the Brazilian state of Acre in 2009 5

Amazonia

Members of an uncontacted tribe encountered in the Brazilian state of Acre in 2009 6

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Amazonia

Glaucous macaw Ka’apor capuchin Amazon river dolphin Jocotoco antpitta (Anodorhynchus glaucus) (Cebus kaapori) (Inia geoffrensis) (Grallaria ridgelyi)

Bald Uakari South American Jaguar Black caiman (Cacajao calvus) (Panthera Onca) (Melanosuchus niger) Some rare or endangered species of fauna in Amazonia 7

Deforestation of Amazonia

Wildfires in Brazil's indigenous territory, 2017

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Deforestation of Amazonia

Deforestation in the state of Maranhão 9

Deforestation of Amazonia

Fires and deforestation in the state of Rondônia 10

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Deforestation of Amazonia

Impact of deforestation on natural habitat of trees 11

1988 Chico Mendes Brasil • To save the rainforest, Chico Mendes and the rubber workers union asked the government to set up reserves as they wanted people to use the forest without damaging it. They also used a very effective technique they called the 'empate' where rubber tappers blocked the way into rubber reserves, preventing their destruction. • During the 1980's Chico became a political activist interested in protecting the rights of rubber tappers against the invasion of cattle ranchers. His struggle caught the attention of international environmentalists who saw Chico's resistance movement as a fight to save the rainforest.

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1988 Chico Mendes • Chico was murdered by ranching interests in late 1988. • Chico’s murder made international headlines and led to a wave of support for the rubber tappers' and environmental movements. • Mendes believed that relying on rubber tapping alone was not sustainable, and that the seringueiros needed to develop more holistic, cooperative systems that used a variety of forest products, such as nuts, fruit, oil, and fibers; and that they needed to focus on building strong communities with quality education for their children. • Chico and the ecologists worked together for a short period, but then Chico was murdered by ranching interests in late 1988. • Thanks in part to the international media attention on the murder, the Chico Mendes Extractive Reserve was created in the area where he lived. More than 20 such reserves, along the same lines as Mendes had proposed, now cover more than 32 000 km².

1988 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) • The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was created in 1988. • It was set up by WMO and UNEP to prepare, based on available scientific information, assessments on all aspects of climate change and its impacts, with a view of formulating realistic response strategies. • In 2007 the IPCC was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. • The initial task for the IPCC was to prepare a comprehensive review and recommendations with respect to the state of knowledge of the science of climate change; the social and economic impact of climate change, and possible response strategies and elements for inclusion in a possible future international convention on climate. • Today the IPCC's role is “...to assess on a comprehensive, objective, open and transparent basis the scientific, technical and socio-economic information relevant to understanding the scientific basis of risk of human-induced climate change, its potential impacts and options for adaptation and mitigation”.

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1988 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) • IPCC reports should be neutral with respect to policy, although they may need to deal objectively with scientific, technical and socio-economic factors relevant to the application of particular policies. • The scientific evidence brought up by the first IPCC Assessment Report of 1990 underlined the importance of climate change as a challenge requiring international cooperation to tackle its consequences. It therefore played a decisive role in leading to the creation of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). • Since then the IPCC has delivered on a regular basis the most comprehensive scientific reports about climate change produced worldwide, the Assessment Reports.

1988 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) • The IPCC Second Assessment Report of 1995 provided important material for the negotiations that led to the adoption of the Kyoto Protocol in 1997. • The Third Assessment Report came out in 2001 and the Fourth in 2007. • The Fifth Assessment Report (AR5) was released in four parts between September 2013 and November 2014. AR5 provides a clear and up to date view of the current state of scientific knowledge relevant to climate change. • The Sixth Assessment Report (AR6) will be released in 2021.

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1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Bligh Reef, Prince Williams Sound, Alaska • On March 24, 1989, the tanker Exxon Valdez, en route from Valdez, Alaska, to Los Angeles, California, grounded in Alaska's Prince William Sound, rupturing its hull and spilling nearly 262 thousand gallons (42 000 m3) of crude oil into a remote, scenic, and biologically productive body of water. • The tanker was 301 metres long, 51 metres wide, 26 metres depth, with a deadweight of 218 000 tons.

1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill

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1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill

1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Bligh Reef, Prince Williams Sound, Alaska • The oil would eventually impact over 2 000 km of non-continuous coastline in Alaska. It was the largest single oil spill in U.S. coastal waters prior to 2010. • In the weeks and months that followed, the oil spread over a wide area in Prince William Sound and beyond, resulting in a previously unprecedented response and cleanup.

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1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Bligh Reef, Prince Williams Sound, Alaska Ecosystem response • Oil persisted beyond a decade in surprising amounts and in toxic forms. It was sufficiently bioavailable to induce chronic biological exposures and had long-term impacts at the population level. • Three major pathways of long-term impacts emerge: (1) chronic persistence of oil, biological exposures, and population impacts to species closely associated with shallow sediments; (2) delayed population impacts of sublethal doses compromising health, growth, and reproduction; and (3) indirect effects of trophic and interaction cascades, all of which transmit impacts well beyond the acute-phase mortality.

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1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill

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1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill

1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Acute Mortality • Marine mammals and seabirds are at great risk from floating oil because they have routine contact with the sea surface. • Oiling of fur or feathers causes loss of insulating capacity and can lead to death from hypothermia, smothering, drowning, and ingestion of toxic hydrocabons. • Scientists estimate mass mortalities of 1000 to 2800 sea otters, 302 harbor seals, and 250 000 seabird in the days immediately after the oil spill. • Mass mortality also occurred among macroalgae and benthic invertebrates on oiled shores from a combination of chemical toxicity, smothering, and physical displacement from the habitat by pressurized wash-water applied after the spill.

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1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill

California grey whale covered in oil

1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill

A Red Necked Grebe, covered in oil, found about 35 miles from the spill, on March 30, 1989

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1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill

One baby and five adult oil-soaked sea otters lie dead on Green Island beach on April 3, 1989

1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill

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1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill

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1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill

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1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill

On May 5, 2010, oil is shown seeping into a hole dug on a beach on Eleanor Island, Alaska

1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Long-term impacts • The persistent nature of oil in sediments produce chronic, long-term exposure risks from some species. For example, chronic exposures for years after the spill to oil persisting in sedimentary refuges were evident from biomarkers in fish, sea otters, and seaducks intimately associated with sediments for egg laying or foraging. These chronic exposures enhanced mortality for years.

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1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill

1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Economic impacts 1. Recreational Sport Fishing Losses: This loss was estimated based on the impacts of the spill on sport fishing activity. One must consider the impact on the number of anglers, the number and the length of sport fishing trips, the areas fished, the species fished for. For 1989 the loss was estimated to be between USD 0 and USD 580 million; for 1990 the range was USD 3.6 million and USD 50.5 million dollars. 2. Tourism Losses: The major negative effects were: a. Decreased resident and non-resident vacation/pleasure visitor traffic in the spill- affected areas due to lack of available visitor services (accommodations, charter boats, air taxis). b. Severe labor shortage in the visitor industry throughout the state due to traditional service industry workers seeking high-paying spill clean-up jobs. c. Fifty-nine percent of businesses in the most affected areas reported spill-related cancellations and 16% reported business was less than expected due to the spill. The positive impact was strong spill-related business in some areas and in certain businesses such as hotels, taxis, car rentals and boat charters..

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1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill The response of Exxon 1. Exxon acknowledged that the Exxon Valdez oil spill was a tragic accident that the company deeply regrets. Exxon notes that company took immediate responsibility for the spill, cleaned it up, and voluntarily compensated those who claimed direct damages. 2. Exxon paid USD 300 million immediately and voluntarily to more than 11,000 Alaskans and businesses affected by the Valdez spill. 3. In addition, the company paid USD 2200 million on the cleanup of Prince William Sound, staying with the cleanup from 1989 to 1992, when the State of Alaska and the U.S. Coast Guard declared the cleanup complete. And, as noted above, ExxonMobil also has paid USD 1000 million in settlements with the state and federal governments. That money is being used for environmental studies and conservation programs for Prince William Sound. 4. ExxonMobil hired its own scientists to study the impacts of the spill. Exxon's scientists acknowledge the lingering pockets of oil in the sediments, but they argue that they do not pose a serious risk. It is their position that that there are now no species in Prince William Sound in trouble due to the impact of the 1989 oil spill, and that the data strongly support the position of a fully recovered Prince William Sound ecosystem..

1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Legal responsibility of Exxon 1. The settlement among the State of Alaska, the U.S. Government and Exxon was approved by the U.S. District Court on Oct. 9, 1991. It resolved various criminal charges against Exxon as well as civil claims brought by the federal and state governments for recovery of natural resource damages resulting from the oil spill. The settlement was comprised of criminal and civil settlements with Exxon, as well as a civil settlement with Alyeska Pipeline Service Company. 2. Criminal Settlement • Plea Agreement: Exxon was fined $150 million, the largest fine ever imposed for an environmental crime. The court forgave $125 million of that fine in recognition of Exxon's cooperation in cleaning up the spill and paying certain private claims. • Criminal Restitution: As restitution for the injuries caused to the fish, wildlife, and lands of the spill region, Exxon agreed to pay $100 million.

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1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Legal responsibility of Exxon 3. Civil Settlement: Exxon agreed to pay $900 million in ten annual installments. The final payment was received in Sept. 2001. The settlement contains a “reopener window” between Sept. 1, 2002 and Sept. 1, 2006, during which the state and federal governments may make a claim for up to an additional $100 million. The funds must be used to restore resources that suffered a substantial loss or decline as a result of the oil spill, the injuries to which could not have been known or anticipated at the time of the settlement.

1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Lessons learned from the spill 1. Clean-up attempts can be more damaging than the oil itself, with impacts recurring as long as clean-up (including both chemical and physical methods) continues. Because of the pervasiveness of strong biological interactions in rocky intertidal and kelp forest communities, cascades of delayed, indirect impacts (especially of trophic cascades and biogenic habitat loss) expand the scope of injury well beyond the initial direct losses and thereby also delay recoveries. 2. Oil that penetrates deeply into beaches can remain relatively fresh for years and can later come back to the surface and affect nearby animals. In addition, oil degrades at varying rates depending on environment, with subsurface sediments physically protected from disturbance, oxygenation, and photolysis retaining contamination by only partially weathered oil for years. 3. Rocky rubble shores should be of high priority for protection and cleanup because oil tends to penetrate deep and weather very slowly in these habitats, prolonging the harmful effects of the oil when it leaches out.

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1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Lessons learned from the spill 4. Oil effects to sea birds and mammals also are substantial (independent of means of insulation) over the long-term through interactions between natural environmental stressors and compromised health of exposed animals, through chronic toxic exposure from ingesting contaminated prey or during foraging around persistent sedimentary pools of oil, and through disruption of vital social functions (caregiving or reproduction) in socially organized species. 5. Long-term exposure of fish embryos to weathered oil at parts per billion (ppb) concentrations has population consequences through indirect effects on growth, deformities, and behavior with long-term consequences on mortality and reproduction. 6. After the Exxon Valdez oil spill disaster in Alaska in 1989, the US Government required all new oil tankers built for use between US ports to be equipped with a full double hull. It is estimated that if the Exxon Valdez had had a double-hull structure, the amount of the spill would have been reduced by more than half.

1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill The US Oil Pollution Act of 1990 • In the wake of the Exxon Valdez disaster, the US Congress adopted the Oil Pollution Act of 1990 that aims to mitigate and prevent civil liability from the future oil spills off the coast of the United States. • The law stated that companies must have a "plan to prevent spills that may occur" and have a "detailed containment and cleanup plan" for oil spills. • The law also includes a clause that prohibits any vessel that, after March 22, 1989, has caused an oil spill of more than one million U.S. gallons (3 800 m³) in any marine area, from operating in Prince William Sound. • The act also banned single-hull tank vessels of 5 000 tons or more from U.S. waters from 2010 onward.

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1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill The MARPOL Convention • In 1992, two years after the Oil Pollution Act, the International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution from Ships (the MARPOL Convention) was amended to require all newly built tankers have double hulls. • Single-hull tank vessels were banned between 2005 and 2015. EU Regulation 1726/2003 • Oil tankers of 20 000 tonnes deadweight or above • Category 1 phase-out up to 2005 • Categories 2&3 phase-out up to 2010

1990 World Summit for Children United Nations New York City 29–30 September • The summit had the heads of state and government to commit to a set of goals to improve the well-being of children worldwide by the year 2000. • The main result of the World Summit was the joint signing of a World Declaration on the Survival, Protection and Development of Children and a Plan of Action comprising a detailed set of child-related human development goals for the year 2000. • It is recognized that each day, millions of children suffer from the scourges of poverty and economic crisis - from hunger and homelessness, from epidemics and illiteracy, from degradation of the environment. • The heads of state and government commit to apply common measures for the protection of the environment, at all levels, so that all children can enjoy a safer and healthier future.

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1991 Collapse of the Atlantic northwest cod fishery Newfoundland Grand Banks, Canada • Only 2,700 tonnes of spawning biomass are left after a harvest of 190,000 tonnes. • The Northern Cod biomass fell to 1% of its earlier level. • Only 2,700 tonnes of spawning biomass are left after a harvest of 190,000 tonnes. • The Northern Cod biomass fell to 1% of its earlier level. • In 1992 the Canadian Federal Minister of Fisheries and Oceans declared a moratorium on the Northern Cod fishery, which for the past 500 years had largely shaped the lives and communities of Canada's eastern coast.

1991 Collapse of the Atlantic northwest cod fishery

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1991 Collapse of the Atlantic northwest cod fishery • For centuries local fishermen used technology that limited the volume of their catch, the area they fished, and let them target specific species and ages of fish. • A major factor that contributed to the depletion of the cod stocks included the introduction and proliferation of equipment and technology that increased the volume of landed fish. • From the 1950s onwards, as was common in all industries at the time, new technology was introduced that allowed fishermen to trawl a larger area, fish to a deeper depth and for a longer time. • By the 1960s, powerful trawlers equipped with radar, electronic navigation systems and sonar allowed crews to pursue fish with unparalleled Capture of the Atlantic northwest cod stock in million tonnes, success, and Canadian catches peaked apart from Canada in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

1991 Collapse of the Atlantic northwest cod fishery • The new technologies adversely affected the northern cod population in two important ways: 1. by increasing the area and depth that was fished, the cod were being depleted until the surviving fish could not replenish the stock lost each year; and 2. secondly, the trawlers caught enormous amounts of non- commercial fish, which were economically unimportant but very important ecologically: incidental catch undermines the whole ecosystem, depleting stocks of important predator and prey species.

Global commercial capture of Atlantic and Pacific cod in million tonnes reported by the FAO 1950–2010

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1991 Collapse of the Atlantic northwest cod fishery

• With the northern cod, significant amounts of capelin – an important prey species for the cod – were caught as bycatch, further undermining the survival of the remaining cod stock. • In 1993 the moratorium, initially put in place for two years, was extended indefinitely and is still in place. • The moratorium put 40,000 people out of work in 5 Canadian provinces, and required a several thousand million dollar relief package to be disbursed to coastal communities. • Recovery efforts are hampered by the trawling for other species that still goes on in the area, and which often leads to high levels of cod as bycatch. • The collapse of the cod fishery off Newfoundland, and the 1992 decision by Canada to impose an indefinite moratorium on the Grand Banks, is a dramatic example of the consequences of overfishing.

1991 Kuwait Oil Fires Persian Gulf War • The Kuwaiti oil fires were caused by Iraqi military forces setting fire to more than 600 oil wells along with an unspecified number of oil filled low-lying areas, such as oil lakes and fire trenches, as part of a scorched earth policy while retreating from Kuwait in 1991 due to the advances of Coalition military forces in the Persian Gulf War. • The fires started in January and February 1991, and the first well fires were extinguished in early April 1991, with the last well capped on November 6, 1991. • Kuwait contains about 9 percent of the world's total proven oil reserves, and petroleum revenues account for 95 percent of its export earnings. • Area: 17 820 km2 . • Population: 4 044 500 (2014 estimate).

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1991 Kuwait Oil Fires Persian Gulf War • One of the reasons for Iraq's invasion of Kuwait in 1990 was the dispute between Iraq and Kuwait over alleged slant-drilling in the Rumaila oil field was. Rumaila is a super-giant oil field located in southern Iraq, approximately 32 km from the Kuwaiti border.

1991 Kuwait Oil Fires Persian Gulf War

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1991 Kuwait Oil Fires Persian Gulf War • In addition, Kuwait had been producing oil above treaty limits established by OPEC. By the summer of 1990, Kuwaiti overproduction had become a serious point of contention with Iraq. • The Iraq–Kuwait dispute also involved Iraqi claims to Kuwait as Iraqi territory. The UK drew the border between the two countries in 1922, making Iraq virtually landlocked. • In August 1990, Iraqi forces invaded and annexed Kuwait. The Iraqi Army's occupation of Kuwait was met with international condemnation, and brought immediate economic sanctions against Iraq by members of the U.N. Security Council.

1991 Kuwait Oil Fires Persian Gulf War • After a series of failed diplomatic negotiations, the United States led a coalition to remove the Iraqi forces from Kuwait, in what became known as the Gulf War. An array of nations joined the coalition, the largest military alliance since World War II. • The great majority of the coalition's military forces were from the U.S., with Saudi Arabia, the United Kingdom and Egypt as leading contributors.

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1991 Kuwait Oil Fires Persian Gulf War • On 26 February 1991, the coalition succeeded in driving out the Iraqi forces. As they retreated, Iraqi forces carried out a scorched earth policy by setting oil wells on fire.

1991 Kuwait Oil Fires • The Kuwait oil fires burned for more than eight months, consuming an estimated five to six million barrels of crude oil and 70 to 100 million cubic meters of natural gas per day. • Between late February, when the first fires were ignited, and November 6, when the last fire was extinguished, smoke plumes containing a hazardous mixture of gaseous emissions and particulate matter engulfed a downwind area as large as 150 by 1000 kilometers. • The geography and climate of the Persian Gulf region affected the distribution of the oil well plumes, as well as the severity of their effect on human populations and natural ecosystems. • The region's strong prevailing northerly winds ensured that Kuwait bore the majority of the fires' ill effects.

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1991 Kuwait Oil Fires • Uneven heating of the land and sea surfaces created local atmospheric inversions during the summer months that trapped smoke in the lower atmosphere, and occasionally caused the plumes to blanket the Kuwaiti land surface. • Violent sandstorms, driven by intense summer winds, mixed sand and dust with the smoke plumes. • In general, smoke produced by burning unrefined petroleum contains a mixture of gases and particulate matter including carbon

dioxide (CO2), carbon monoxide (CO), sulfur dioxide (SO2), nitrogen oxides (NOx), volatile organics (VOCs), polycyclic aromatic

hydrocarbons (PAHs), hydrogen sulfide (H2S), acidic aerosols, and soot. Soot is composed of solid particles embedded in tar.

1991 Kuwait Oil Fires • Non-toxic carbon dioxide accounted for approximately 96 percent of the Kuwaiti crude oil smoke. The other chemical elements and compounds in oil well smoke, however, can be toxic, carcinogenic, and otherwise hazardous to human health, as well as ecologically and climatically disruptive in relatively small concentrations. • Airborne measurements above the fires found that particulate matter and gases made up equal parts of the fires' non- carbonaceous emissions. • Satellite and space shuttle images showed the plumes extending across the Arabian Peninsula and Persian Gulf. • The smoke blocked the sunlight from large areas for weeks.

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1991 Kuwait Oil Fires • The plumes degraded the air quality in the region for months and generated various potentially hazardous gases. By November 1991 the residue of oil and soot stained the desert immediately south of Kuwait City.

1991 Kuwait Oil Fires • In addition to the burning of the oil wells, approximately 11 million barrels of oil were released into the Persian Gulf creating a devastating effect on the biological ecosystem of the Gulf and the fisheries of the area. • Many people work for the oil industry in Kuwait; however fishing is one other major industry that many make a profitable income through. The devastating effects on the ecosystems of the Persian Gulf had intense effects on the fishing industry. • Prior to the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait the Gulf had yielded harvests of marine life of up to 120,000 tons of fish a year; after the oil spillage, these numbers significantly dropped. • In addition to this degradation to an economic activity, many people living on the Gulf coast depend on fishing as purely a subsistence activity, and the oil spillage has disrupted the spawning of shrimp and fish”.

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1991 Kuwait Oil Fires

• The polluted air also caused respiratory problems for many Kuwaiti citizens. Concerns of lung cancer and birth defects were raised and the death rate was predicted to rise by as much as 10% within a short amount of time. • Thousands were left without homes; oil lakes and smoke covered 5% of the land area of Kuwait making many areas uninhabitable. Hundreds of miles of the Kuwaiti desert were left uninhabitable, due to the accumulation of oil lakes and of soot from the burning wells. • Interestingly, environmentalists have recently raised concerns that 'normal' pollution in the Gulf, caused by frequent spillages of oil and emissions of dirty ballast from passing tankers, poses a greater environmental threat than any damage inflicted by the Kuwaiti oil fires. • Official statistics indicate that the Gulf is polluted by 1.14 million tons of oil per year, equivalent to 25,000 barrels of oil per day, which is dispersed by 40 percent of the more than 6,000 oil tankers which transverse the Gulf each year.

ENMOD CONVENTION The Environmental Modification Convention (ENMOD), formally the Convention on the Prohibition of Military or Any Other Hostile Use of Environmental Modification Techniques is an international treaty prohibiting the military or other hostile use of environmental modification techniques having widespread, long-lasting or severe effects. It entered into force on 5 October 1978. The Convention has 78 state parties.

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ENMOD CONVENTION States parties undertake not to engage in military or any other hostile use of environmental modification techniques having widespread, long-lasting or severe effects as the means of destruction, damage or injury to another State party. Environmental Modification Technique includes any technique for changing – through the deliberate manipulation of natural processes – the dynamics, composition or structure of the earth, including its biota, lithosphere, hydrosphere and atmosphere, or of outer space.

PROTOCOL ADDITIONAL TO THE GENEVA CONVENTIONS OF 1949, AND RELATING TO THE PROTECTION OF VICTIMS OF INTERNATIONAL ARMED CONFLICTS, 1977. Article 55 - Protection of the natural environment 1. Care shall be taken in warfare to protect the natural environment against widespread, long-term and severe damage. This protection includes a prohibition of the use of methods or means of warfare which are intended or may be expected to cause such damage to the natural environment and thereby to prejudice the health or survival of the population. 2. Attacks against the natural environment by way of reprisals are prohibited. Parties to GC I–IV and P I–III Parties to GC I–IV and P I and III Parties to GC I–IV and P III Parties to GC I–IV and P I–II Parties to GC I–IV and P I Parties to GC I–IV and no P

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1991 Convention on Environmental Impact Assessment in a Transboundary Context UNECE, Espoo • Environmental threats do not respect national borders. • Governments have realized that to avert this danger they must notify and consult each other on all major projects under consideration that might have adverse environmental impact across borders. • The Espoo Convention is a key step to bringing together all stakeholders to prevent environmental damage before it occurs. • The Convention sets out the obligations of Parties to assess the environmental impact of certain activities at an early stage of planning. It also lays down the general obligation of States to notify and consult each other on all major projects under consideration that are likely to have a significant adverse environmental impact across boundaries. • The Convention entered into force in 1997.

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