Project Introduction

The Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI), and International Environmental Management Co., Ltd. (IEM), together with the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), Ward & Associates, Ltd., Jaakko Pöyry Consulting, Global Aquatics Corporation Pty Ltd, and RAMBOLL are now initiating a study to assist the Greater Mekong Sub-region (GMS) by preparing a Strategic Environmental Framework. The GMS encompasses Cambodia, Lao PDR, Myanmar, Thailand, Vietnam, and the Yunnan province of China. This Asian Development Bank (ADB) project will be carried out in collaboration with the Mekong River Commission Secretariat (MRCS) and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). The Swiss Development Corporation (SDC) is also supporting this project with financial assistance.

The project’s objectives and scope are to produce a "strategic environmental framework for the GMS" that recommends a program of technical, policy, and institutional solutions required to overcome obstacles to sustainable development. Particular attention is to be focused on the identification of "hotspots" at the development-environment nexus. These hotspots will be defined and analysed from a number of different perspectives – geographically, thematically, sectorally, and ecologically. The cumulative environmental impacts of infrastructure development projects in the GMS is of key concern, for example, electricity production and transmission, railways, roads, and ports, as well as forestry and agricultural projects.

This project has been designed to promote the integration of environmental considerations with economic development planning and implementation, in order to improve environmental protection by helping to ensure that economic development projects are environmentally sustainable.

Four ADB-assisted projects will be selected as case studies and their effectiveness assessed in such areas as: public participation, involvement of indigenous people, institutional co-ordination, environmental management, and capacity building. The results of the case study assessment will feed into the analysis and recommendations to strengthen environment/economic development planning and management systems.

The project was initiated on December 1, 1998, and will run for 22 months. The approach will build on previous work and endeavour to establish regional consensus on GMS development scenarios and environmental management needs. The Bank has emphasised that the countries within the GMS are to be the direct beneficiaries of the project, primarily through the GMS Working Group on Environment and the GMS Ministerial Group. The GMS Program provides the focus for the project, but consideration will be given to all major planned and ongoing development and conservation initiatives.

An inclusive, participatory process during the project implementation is essential. A series of national and regional workshops and public consultation meetings will be organised to receive inputs to the strategic framework and to define the national perceptions of – and priorities for – protecting the region’s environment. Indigenous people will be given special consideration.

President of IEM, Mr. Ron Livingston, is the project Team Leader. Other expatriate professionals on the team come from Australia, Canada, Denmark, Sweden, and the USA. Senior GMS professionals come from China, Thailand and Viet Nam. This 16-member consultant team of experts will work closely with designated counterpart agencies in each of the six GMS countries.

The outputs of the project will be distributed widely, not only to government offices responsible to manage national socio-economic planning, infrastructure, natural resources, and environment, but also to technical institutions, universities, funding agencies, NGOs, and local communities.