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INSTITUTIONAL CAPABILITIES AND CAPACITY BUILDING:

The focus of the debate for most participants was how government can exercise positive influence through its many roles as regulator, procurer, employer and partner by: improving regulatory frameworks; encouraging training of managers and technicians at all levels; eliminating obstacles; and using environmental impact assessments. A number of developing countries stressed that while capacity building at the national level was important, the Working Group should focus on international flows of technology transfer and finance that are necessary to support and develop capacity at the national level. Capacity building should not continue in perpetuity, rather it should be geared so that local people to take over. Capacity building should therefore be country driven and locally controlled. Pakistan used the example of its participatory approach to its national conservation strategy. Cuba defined a staged approach: identify national and local needs; identify the extent that new financing is necessary to meet the identified needs; and develop a long-term perspective and plan. Egypt suggested that a limited number of countries, one or two from each region, carry out national case studies on ESTs identifying the real needs for trained personnel; institutional capacity building; international financing; and the technologies themselves. A small group then met to further elaborate such an idea.

Tunisia introduced document E/CN.17/ISWG.I/1994/3, a letter from Amb. Slaheddine Abdellah to the Secretary-General reporting on the establishment of an environmental technology center in Tunisia. Focusing on technology and human resources development, the Center would serve as a national focal point in promoting cooperation and to do the same at regional and international levels. It would deal primarily with issues of water, waste management, coastal protection, and biological conservation and combat desertification. France among others noted the need to ensure conditions for effective capacity building and decision making and urged countries to create national teams to coordinate policy and to act as a focal point for other countries. These teams should cooperate internationally and could be twinned. Denmark asked that the UNDP Capacity 21 program be updated before the next session of the CSD, and other countries commented that existing programs still needed to be better coordinated and streamlined where necessary. The Commission of the European Union noted that regional integration may help considerably in finding cost effective solutions to cooperation for capacity building. [Return to start of article]