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Expert Working Group Meeting: Third Meeting, Bonn, Germany, 1-3 November 2000
Conclusions and follow up
The reports
The Expert Working Group reviewed in detail the draft reports and recommendations for modifications were made. The authors revised the reports following the meeting and presented the revised texts to the Division for Sustainable Development. the revised reports were then sent to the group for final comments. These final reports will be published by the United Nations and made available to the Commission on Sustainable Development and the international community.
The group decided that the reports would be published in two volumes. Volume one will include the report on EMA principles and procedures. The second volume will contain the report on policy options and the report on links between EMA and other management and information systems.
The group also decided to publish a “quick and dirty” guide to EMA to be drafted by the Division for Sustainable Development using the executive summaries of the three reports.
Future work
The Expert Working Group decided to establish several working teams to explore the potential of the group’s work to influence other international activities related to EMA.
Working teams were established for:
§ An international EMA website
§ Linkages to ISO 1400l standards
§ Linkages to Agenda 21
§ Linkages to other international organizations
§ Linkages to accountancy organizations
The group also decided to explore the possibility of commissioning a number of sector-specific case studies:
§ A case study of a pulp and paper company was proposed by Environment Canada with support of the Danish EPA. This case study is now under development
§ EMA guidelines and principles for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). This report was proposed by the participant from the Slovak Government
§ Links between EMA and Quality Management Systems, proposed by the USEPA and the participant from the Government of Hungary
The group also agreed to pursue the possibility of organizing an International EMA Conference for Industry. This conference would consist of a series of training modules geared to corporate managers and accountants. The participants from Siemens, the German EPA and the Government of Egypt volunteered to look into this possibility.
The group also decided that whenever possible the future meetings of the group would be hosted back to back to a one-day symposium on EMA for local industry. The meeting in Tokyo will be the first to include such a symposium.
The group discussed future work and priorities for the way forward. The results of these discussions are reported above.
The group agreed that the next meeting would be planned for Tokyo in June 2001, and that the fifth meeting would be planned for the UK in January 2002.
The group also supported the inclusion of EMA in the documentation to be presented to the ninth session of the Commission on Sustainable Development under the theme “Information for Decision Making”.
Mr. Chipman and Mr. Grablowitz then closed the meeting and thanked the participants, and especially the authors of the draft reports for their excellent work in the preparation of these documents and their presentations during the meeting.