In deciding whether to ratify the UNECE Convention on Access to Information, Public Participation in Decision-making and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters (the Aarhus Convention) – and the extent to which the State should implement the Convention’s various provisions – the Republic of Croatia undertook a cost-benefit analysis of three implementation scenarios:
- the fullest implementation of the Convention, which was the most demanding (the “upper” scenario);
- minimal implementation of the Convention, which was the least demanding (the “lower” scenario); and
- a middle approach that included implementation measures midway between the upper and lower scenarios (the “medium” scenario).
These three scenarios were formulated by the project team, consisting of the Department for Resource Economics and Environmental Policy of the Croatian Institute for International Relations (http://www.imo.hr) in cooperation with COWI (http://www.cowi.dk). It was undertaken as part of a project on “Implementation of the Aarhus Convention in Croatia (2001-2002),” under the auspices of the Danish Environmental Agency, Division for Central and Eastern Europe.
The consultants’ final report indicated that the costs of implementing the Aarhus Convention would not be very high since the Republic of Croatia had already fulfilled many of the Convention’s obligations. Accordingly, the report suggested that the Republic of Croatia should choose either the upper or medium scenario to properly fulfill all the obligations of the Convention.
The Government has been reviewing the recommendations of the report. There are two particularly challenging aspects to the assessment. The most demanding question was how to motivate regions and local administrative units to implement activities envisaged under the upper and medium scenarios, which local authorities might not consider obligatory. Second, the third pillar of the Convention (on access to justice) was also challenging to implement in the Republic of Croatia. As of 2006, the Republic of Croatia has not yet ratified the Aarhus Convention.
For more information, contact Ms. Nataša Kačić-Bartulović at natasa.kacic-bartulovic@mzopu.hr