Partners agree on 10-year environment plan - 03.09.2010
“We have put together the main goals of the EMPS 2011-2020 in 12 thematic areas. We have agreed on the goals, and this will now help us decide what kind of activities we should be involved in,” said the President’s special adviser Dr Rolph Payet, who led the talks.
The partners at the meeting came from the fields of civil society, population and health, land use, coastal zones and urbanisation, biodiversity, forestry and agriculture, transport, energy, tourism and aesthetics.
“We have looked at all the current trends in the country in terms of construction, overall development, environmental degradation, upcoming industries, fisheries waste management and others to give us a clear picture of what is happening,” said Dr Payet.
He said consultants will now work on the action plan over a period of two weeks, after which they will meet the partners again to review the work.
“A month after that, we will meet the general public and present the ‘roadmap’ to them because it is very important to get the agreement of the stakeholders. This will ensure that the people of Seychelles have been involved,” he added.
A number of workshops have been held to get the views of people involved with specific themes, including government and non-government organisations, and representatives of the private sector.
The first national environment plan ran from 1990-2000, and the one now in force goes up to the end of 2010. It was initiated by the Department of Environment and guided by a steering committee chaired by principal secretary for environment Didier Dogley.
The department did a series of evaluations to measure the progress of the ongoing EMPS. The first phase of this was a review carried out at a recent workshop, and the second part is the drafting of the third-generation plan for 2011-2020.
Weaknesses and strengths of the previous and ongoing EMPS were looked at, and improvements to be included in the next management plan were proposed.
The partners took into account emerging issues such as climate change, which was not recognised as a serious threat during the previous plans.