ENB @ SIDS Preparatory Meeting for the 10-year Review of BPOA

SIDS Preparatory Meeting for the 10-Year Review of the Barbados Programme of Action (BPOA)
United Nations Headquarters, New York | 14-16 April 2004

ENB (English)
LINKAGES Coverage		ENB SUMMARIES
Editions:	Audio& Photos	HTM	PDF	TXT
Curtain Raiser
14 April
15 April
16 April & SUMMARY

BNT (Français)
Couverture LINKAGES		Les comptes rendu du BNT
Éditions:	Audio - Photos	HTM	PDF	TXT
Levée de Rideau
14 avril
15 avril
16 avril - Compte rendu

Highlights from Thursday, 15 April 2004

On Thursday, 15 April, delegates met throughout the day in informal consultations to continue their first reading of the Strategy Document, concluding sections on waste management, coastal and marine resources, freshwater resources, land resources, energy resources, tourism resources, biodiversity resources, transport and communication, graduation of SIDS LDCs, and trade: globalization and trade liberalization. A side event was also held on The Environmental Vulnerability Index (EVI) was developed in partnership with South Pacific Applied Geoscience Commission, UNEP, New Zealand, Norway, Ireland, SIDS and other partners.

Photo: Enele Sopoaga, Tuvalu, with Jagdish Koonjul, Chair of AOSIS and Spokesperson for the G-77/China (Mauritius), during the informal consultations

Informal Consultations

Jagdish Koonjul, Chair of AOSIS and Spokesperson for the G-77/China (Mauritius), with Facilitator Don MacKay (left) and with Richard Sherman, ENB (right)

Delegates from Norway, the EU and the US during the informal consultations

Facilitator Don MacKay with Mark Ramsden, New Zealand

Delegates from the G-77/China and the EU consulting during the informals

Richard Sherman, ENB, and John Harding, International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (left), and Enele Sopoaga and Ian Fry, Tuvalu (right)

Secretary-General Chowdhury discusses strategy with the Secretariat and others (left) and ENB writers Prisna Nuengsigkapian and Richard Sherman give the ENB to Secretary-General Chowdhury

Side Event: Briefing on the Environmental Vulnerability Index--organized by the South Pacific Applied Geoscience Commission (SOPAC) on behalf of the Pacific Islands Forum

The Environmental Vulnerability Index (EVI) was developed in partnership with SOPAC, UNEP, New Zealand, Norway, Ireland, SIDS and other partners. The initiative is in response to a call made in the BPOA to develop a composite vulnerability index that incorporates both ecological fragility and economic vulnerability to enable SIDS to better understand their vulnerability and move towards more sustainable development. This work now forms part of the Pacific WSSD Type II "Initiative to Develop Capacities in Pacific SIDS to Manage Vulnerability and Build Resilience to Disasters."

The Global EVI is an indicators-based method which quantifies the vulnerability of the natural environment to damage from natural and anthropogenic hazards at national scales. It seeks to provide support to decision-makers by providing a simple pragmatic method for identifying actions that could be taken to increase the environmental resilience of a country. The EVI's focus is on the environment as life-support for all human welfare and therefore concentrates on environmental systems as responders. The logic is that human systems (countries, cultures, economies) are intimately dependent on the welfare of the natural ecosystems that act as life-support systems for them. It is therefore of central importance that we be able to identify and react to any risks to the welfare of our environment.

For more information, visit www.sopac.org/Projects/Evi/index.html or email: uschi@sopac.org or craig@sopac.org.

Jagdish Koonjul, Mauritius, Enele Sopoaga, Tuvalu, and Anwarul Chowdhury, Secretary-General of the Mauritius International Meeting

Adnan Amin, UNEP (right) reviewed decisions relevant to SIDS adopted by the 8th UNEP Governing Council Special Session/Global Ministerial Environment Forum