T R A I N I N G   N E W S

Romanian environmental management guide launched at local Agenda 21 seminar

  The publication, which comes in eighteen volumes, is targeted particularly at helping local authorities who need a reference tool to perform their duties in relation to local sustainable development and environmental protection issues. "The serious problems the environment is coping with nowadays call for increased efforts and active involvement, focussed and coordinated at a local level, in order that they are dealt with and solved," TIMED's Cristina Motoi told Insight.

  A further 16 volumes of the guide have already been trans-lated but could not be launched at this stage. "Of course, we are just at the beginning — we still need to find funds to edit, print and distribute the remaining 16 volumes of the ICLEIs manual," said Motoi.

  The project for an environ-mental manual for local authorities was initiated by the Regional Environmental Center for Central and Eastern Europe (REC) and carried out by the European Secretariat of the International Council for Local Initiatives (ICLEI) in Freiburg, Germany. Financial support also came from a number of other sources in Western Europe and the European Commission. In Romania, the two NGOs, Ploiesti's People and Environment and Targu Mures' Focus EcoCenter, implemented the project.

  Volume one of ICLEI's guide is called the Key to ICLEIs Environmental Guide and volume two is the Environmental Action Planning Guide — the European Local Agenda 21 Planning Guide.

  Around 70 participants attended the seminar, including high-ranking officials in local environmental protection agencies, city halls, local/district councils, representatives of government departments dealing with local authorities and civil society organisations, media and business. The seminar aimed to initiate a dialogue between the main players of Agenda 21 — local decision-makers and various components of civil society. Relevant case studies were discussed and presented.

Czech trainers use local techniques to instruct Uzbekistan environmental officials

  CEA's work was based on a contract from the Asian Develop-ment Bank in collaboration with the Associated Rural Development consultants in Vermont, USA. Trainers delivered the Environmental Impact Assess-ment (EIA) module, which had been developed and adapted to CEE characteristics by CEA. Material was translated into Russian and lectures were conducted in Russian. Marie Ticha of CEA's office shared some thoughts with Insight about how trainers prepared:

  "Immediately after CEA got the assurance from the REC, we started the work on seminar preparation. Three lecturers for the seminar were identified. Two of them were from the CEA staff. The main interest of our potential lecturers focused on the structure of seminar development because the seminar was quite long and it was necessary to elaborate an interesting and precisely structured proposal. Also the manual for participants was considered to be important for the potential success of the seminar.

  "To be sure that the seminar would be delivered in an appropriate way an attested method had been chosen: a combination of lectures and participants in working groups. In the first five days of the seminar the participants met the concept of environmental analysis in general, the history of EIA law, an overview of the EIA process, public participation, threshold issues and expert methods. The sixth day looked at ISO 14000 standards. Many of the participants were grateful for facts about these standards because there is a lack of information concerning this issue. Also training of general knowledge, like brain-storming and facilitation, were explained during the seminar and then used by participants as methods for their work in groups.

  "The theoretical steps of EIA procedure were trained on a case study of housing development. The participants got coincidental basic conditions for designing the houses and paper modules for housing construction. They created several variants of housing. The variants were then assessed and compared with each other by using the EIA methods. The game simulated reality very well and enabled participants to better understand not only the EIA process but also the EIA point.

  "In my opinion the most important and interesting part for participants was the democratic principles on which EIA is based, which is badly missing in Uzbekistan.

  "Cooperation with the participants was very good. They were eager to learn new skills, had a lot of questions concerning our experience in this field and they were very creative and also very cooperative during their work in groups. They were one of the best groups CEA has ever had in its seminars."

Environmental trainers vote for financial independence

  "This indicates that non-profit organisations like those in the EMTC Network are shifting from donor dependence to becoming more self-reliant," REC's Solomon Ioannou told Insight. "It tells us that environmental training in CEE is entering a different stage: Before, Western trainers came and transferred knowhow, now East Europeans are saying they need to stick together to continue address-ing these needs," Ioannou said.

  The decision was reached at their annual meeting in Poland, where participants enjoyed a one-day workshop on fundraising. Ioannou pointed out that international organisations are gradually moving their support further East, which has forced many institutions in the region to become financially independent. The Czech-based Cleaner Production Centre is one example of how regional organisations can work in partnership with other organis-ations, Ioannou said.

Danube workshops train stakeholders in pollution reduction

  "The overall long-term goal of the Pollution Reduction Programme is to stimulate sustainable, institutional and financial arrangements for effective environmental management of the Danube river basin," said a statement from the Regional Environmental Center for Central and Eastern Europe, which is coordinating NGO participation in the project.

  Selected NGOs will participate in a Danube Environmental Forum (DEF) regional consultation meeting in November 13-14 1998. It is seen as an important step towards reviving NGO particip-ation in the project, increasing public awareness-raising and reinforcing cooperation with government agencies.

  Training facilitators used Target Oriented Program Planning (TOPP), which was developed in 1980s and has been used successfully by a variety of bilateral and multilateral agencies. TOPP will be used in all stages of the programme.

Technique could spread green habits to smaller companies

  Large companies would be the driving force behind the scheme, as they would assess which of the five levels of environmental management each supplier needs and would certify them accord-ingly. The step-by-step process allows firms flexibility in develop-ing their environmental management systems but the assistance of a larger firm acts as both guidance and incentive to achieve the standards. Training materials would be provided, which companies would have to learn themselves. Central and East European suppliers often find it difficult to meet the high requirements of large companies. Many firms prefer to import the materials used in production, rather than use local companies. The new system would help to overcome that problem.

Short and sweet

Cleaner consultants   The Budapest Cleaner Production Centre plans to conduct an October training course to instruct consultancy companies on how to implement CP techniques. "Most environmental consultants are technicians with end-of-pipe experience or management professionals. Real CP consultancy is missing," said Miklos Galli, who works at the Hungarian CP centre. More information on Cleaner Production. Bad habits   In a recent article published in Training and Development, Patti Shank argued the five main faults that trainers can be accused of: (i) we don't under-stand the business; (ii) we don't involve the right people; (iii) we get involved in the latest fad; (iv) we deliver instructionally sound but dull programmes or those which are not useful to part of the audience; and (v) we train because that's what we do and don't learn enough about the organisations we are targeting beforehand. For more information contact: poshank@pobox.com Web contacts Eurydice is the European Commission's education information network. The International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives is linked with the International Training Centre.