State of the Environment Reporting Network for
Southern Africa
SOENETSA |
SOENETSA NEWSLETTER
Vol. 1 No. 1, December 1999
Field
study assesses SOE reporting in SADC
A field study carried out
recently as part of the Networking and Capacity Building Initiative for Southern Africa
(NETCAB) has revealed national needs in State of the Environment (SOE) reporting in six
Southern African Development Community (SADC) countries. Lesotho, Malawi, Namibia,
South Africa, Zambia and Zimbabwe were selected for detailed assessments.
“The ultimate aim of this exercise is to build
capacity in SOE reporting and enhance natural resource management in the SADC
region”, says Lovemore Sola from Musokotwane Environment Resource Centre for Southern
Africa (IMERCSA), who participated in the assessments. “But the primary objective of
carrying out these country level SOE assessments was to provide baseline information on
SOE reporting in the region, identifying gaps on which to focus attention for the
development of future reports”, Sola continues.
For each country a half-day workshop was conducted with
the participation of SOE stakeholders. Ideally all SADC countries have to be assessed to
get a true and accurate regional picture, however, resources available made it impossible.
Generally it was found that barriers for effective SOE
reporting include:
·
Data: the quality and consistency of data need to be
scrutinised.
·
Capacity: both coordinators and contributors need adequate
training.
·
Commitment: without commitment the quality of the product
deteriorates.
·
Transparency: a culture of information and data exchange
should be encouraged.
·
Distribution: paths of distribution are generally lacking.
Details on general features and recommendations from the
country assessments are outlined below. For more information on the country assessments,
contact: lsola@imercsa.sardc.net
Lesotho
General features of SOE reporting in Lesotho
At the time of the assessment the first ever report for
Lesotho was about to be published. The process of producing the report started in 1997.
The national SOE reporting in
Lesotho is carried out by the National Environment Secretariat (NES) in the Ministry of
Environment and Natural Resources. The current 1999 report is the first ever report for
the country, and was necessitated by the growing need for baseline environmental
information. The Environment Bill of Lesotho mandates the NES to produce timely SOE
reports every two years to update the nation on the status of its environment and natural
resources.
A look into the SOE future
Various lessons were learnt from the 1997-99 SOE
process in Lesotho. Interviewees generally agreed on the following:
·
No
single institution was capable of adequately contributing to all aspects of the report.
·
Employing
contributors from different sectors without proper training in the required reporting
format will yield an uncoordinated report. A close supervision of chapter contributors by
NES is necessary to ensure those reporting requirements are met.
·
There
is urgent need to address the need for accurate data for use in SOE and planning. Sections
with critical data shortages include indigenous knowledge systems (IKS), mountain
ecosystems and their linkages to the environment.
·
A
culture of information and data exchange should be encouraged in all sectors.
·
People
tasked to contribute to important national documents such as the SOE report should be
committed to the process. Most contributors to the SOE report did not meet the set
deadlines, delaying the whole process.
·
There is need to build more
capacity to do SOE within the NES. Capacitating one individual has the disadvantage that
once that person leaves, the whole process is back at ground zero.
·
NES has to put a distribution
strategy in place before the report is published.
Malawi
General features of SOE reporting in Malawi
The first ever report in Malawi was published in 1998.
Malawi
is one of those few countries in the region that has a legal requirement to do SOE
reporting at the national and district levels. The Environment Act stipulates that SOE
reports should be produced every two years.
The
basic objective for the first SOE report was to provide baseline information on the
environment to help address and redress deterioration of the country's natural resources
and environment.
A look into the SOE future
Based on discussions with the Environmental
Department and independent opinions by workshop participants, the barriers to effective
SOE reporting can be classified as:
·
Distribution:
The distribution network for SOE products and other environment materials is generally
lacking. Five hundred copies were produced initially, and these were all distributed, but
there was no proper distribution list.
·
Pricing: The price of the report (it is currently being
sold at MK500.00 or about US$11) which many thought was too high resulted in many people
not affording it.
·
Data:
Data for producing the report still has to be critically scrutinised for quality and
consistency.
·
Expertise:
The Environment Department to date has only one fairly knowledgeable expert who
participated in the previous SOE process. Expertise vested in other ministries and
government departments is still within reach, and can easily be recalled for future SOE
processes. Of concern was the level of external technical expertise that was not
understudied during the process.
·
Centralisation: Practitioners
outside the Environment Department felt that the SOE process could benefit a great deal
with wider participation including other departments.
Namibia
General features of SOE reporting in
Namibia
Namibia has published three sectoral
reports since 1999: Water, Socio-economic and Industrialisation. Four more reports are
scheduled for production by 2000.
The government of Namibia is
currently working on and Environmental Management Bill, which should be presented to
parliament before the end of 1999. Once enacted, the law will, among other things, provide
for the Minister of Environment and Tourism to table before parliament an annual SOE
report.
A look into the SOE future
The following are some of the
recommendations that have been made by the review team:
·
A
two-year training programme should be developed for the project coordinator. This in order
to be able to manage the information flow as well as taking part in the production of
environmental indicators.
·
A
comprehensive training programme for the members of the SOER network should be prepared as
part of its establishment process.
·
The
SOE reports produced should be published as soon as possible while the data is still
up-to-date.
South Africa
General features of SOE reporting in South Africa
The first national report was published 1999 on Internet. There is
currently no legal requirement to produce SOE at all levels in South Africa. In the
previous Environmental Management Act there was a legal requirement to produce SOE reports
but the current Environment Management Act only has an institutional arrangement for the
production of the reports.
A look into the SOE future
While reporting
the environment on the web is generally cheaper and easier to manage, it is not very
convenient if the general public is among the intended audience. Even for relatively
industrialised countries such as South Africa with thousands of Internet connections, the
majority of the population still has to catch up with information technology, and as such,
other appropriate means of getting the word across have to be investigated.
The
lessons learnt:
·
Dedication
is essential for SOE reporting.
·
"Do
not cover too much too soon" i.e. cover the manageable most important issues first.
·
Even
when contributors are provided with guidelines and procedures, follow-up training on their
usage is critically important.
·
Monitoring
the exercise is important, because redoing contributions is more taxing than starting
afresh.
·
Always
provide enough funding for the work to be done. Chapters do not have to be given equal
funding. Overall planning for the process should be thorough.
Zambia
General features of SOE reporting in Zambia
The first SOE report was carried out in 1994. The process
to produce the second report started in 1997, but to date, only a tender for interested
individuals to carry out the work has been made.
SOE reporting is
implied rather than spelt out in the Environment Act in Zambia. The basis for conducting
SOE reporting to date is the requirement by the Environment Act that every Zambian has a
right to information on the environment. The Environmental Council of Zambia (ECZ), whose
mandate includes provision of such information, took it upon them to address this need via
the SOE report.
A look into the SOE future
The
1994 SOE report was published and circulated using normal government channels. The ECZ
sees as important the need to put in place an effective marketing strategy for future
reports. Suggestions by participants, especially from the universities, were that a
marketing and distribution policy for environmental information should include the nation
at large as the primary client. This would mean using all possible outreach tools to reach
the intended audience. Among the suggested extension to the current outreach mechanisms
were the use of leaflets, radio and television, websites and Internet and other
communication channels such as email and CD-ROM.
The lessons learnt in Zambia:
·
Data
for SOE is either lacking, uncoordinated or generally in an unusable form. A deliberate
effort must be made to try and harmonise collection, storage and dissemination of
environmental data.
·
Processes
such as the SOE process needs cross-sectoral stakeholder participation and the processes
itself should have an in built monitoring and evaluation component to ensure that the
report produced is what is needed, and not just what is possible.
Zimbabwe
General features of SOE reporting in Zimbabwe
Zimbabwe has published two reports to date, 1992 and 1998. Zimbabwe produced
its first SOE report in 1992. The report was used to raise environmental awareness and to
highlight important environmental issues. To a larger extent this report was done in order
to fulfil the requirements of the Agenda 21 and no legal or policy binding was there in
terms of producing the report. The second national SOE report was done in 1998 and the
process of putting together the report involved a number of stakeholders drawn from the
government, local government, private sector, and NGO sector. This compares to the first
report that only got contributions from the government. A more participatory approach was
thus applied in the second SOE report.
A look into the SOE future
SOE
reporting in Zimbabwe is in its infancy stage. Many opportunities exist to improve the
collection, analysis and dissemination of factual, accurate and timely information. To do
this effectively and efficiently, the SOE reporting process must involve a wide range of
participation. Partnerships are essential, as government alone does not have the adequate
expertise in one place. Furthermore, participation will lead to greater use of the report
and acceptance of its analyses and assessments.
SOE
should be established within the normal operating framework of government programmes.
Through the proposed management act, an opportunity exists to determine how and where SOE
reporting fits into the long-term picture for the country's information needs. SOE
reporting should have a recognised place with an on going programme to continually improve
and develop the reporting process.
