NGO Green Home as member of ENV.net in cooperation with NGO Sunce from Croatia, Environment Protection Agency of Montenegro and Public Institution for the Management of Protected Natural Values in the Dubrovnik-Neretva County in Croatia organized five-day training (18 – 22 July) for work in a Geographic Information System (GIS) designed for divers and volunteers who deal with the mapping of species and habitats in the sea.
Usage of GIS technology as a tool, aims to provide efficiently, more economically and modern information management. Among other things, GIS has a wide use and when it comes to the biodiversity research. During the training, participants were acquainted with basics of GIS, its implementation, methods of processing and data entry, as well as how to analyze collected information. In addition to the theoretical part of the training, the participants through practical exercises mastered all the necessary functions of the software, which will enable them to systematically process information and thus provide support for scientific research of areas conducted by the competent institution.
Green Wave, the radio show produced by the Env.netTeam in TEMA Foundation is now sponsored by Env.net for the coming six months. July, 21st was the
9th broadcast of the series.
This week o ur guest for Green Wave was Prof. Kayıhan Pala from “No to DOSAB Power Plant” Platform and Uludağ University Medical School Public Health Department. The topic for this week’s broadcast was the movement against DOSAB Coal Power Plant in Bursa, Turkey.
The platform that Prof. Pala belongs to was formed after the announcement of the DOSAB Power Plant and has 105 member organizations. As he has completed a comprehensive study on the public health effects of Bursa, Orhaneli Coal Power Plant he led the public awareness campaign that was initiated by the Platform. Emphasizing the drastic public health effects that were revealed through the mentioned study like the correlation between PM 2.5 and occurrence of certain cancer types, he suggested that every project that might have an effect on the public health should be investigated and evaluated in frames of a health impact assessment process.
The podcast of the broadcast in Turkish can be listened at the following link: click here
Milieukontakt, which is the organization being awarded the sub-grant for the development of the project “Coordinated Management of Coastal Waters in Vlora Region”, has started to work with local and regional actors related to planning issues. During these two months they have several meetings with representatives of Vlora Region, the Regional Agency of Protected Areas, and the Regional Basin Agency in Vlora Region to discuss about the project objectives and the activities to be developed toward a formalized cooperation in the region, especially in the coastal areas of Ionian Sea. During these time the project team took care to collect every useful document as reports, strategies and studies for the coastal areas in Vlora Region. In the mean time the project team is working closely with the government bodies that are in charge to manage and monitor coastal areas of Ionian Sea to draft the terms of references for the Memorandum of Understanding in the frame of project objectives.
Green Wave, the radio show produced by the Env.net Team in TEMA Foundation is now sponsored by Env.net for the coming six months. July, 14th was the 8th broadcast of the series.
This week our guest for Green Wave was Prof. Ali Osman Karababa from Ege University. The topic for this week’s broadcast was the effects of nuclear energy on human health following the expert examination trip for the EIA of Akkuyu Nuclear Energy Plant in Mersin, Turkey.
Prof. Karababa emphasized the drastic impacts of exposure to radioactive radiation on public health but also environmental aspect. Given the uncertainties that are involved in a possible accident in nuclear power plants, Prof. Karababa noted that previous experiences of nuclear leaks and accidents were destructive enough and should have taught the humankind an important lesson. The impact of these events on the environment are irreversible and uncompensable. Regardless of any accidents Prof. Karababa expressed that recent studies found that various types of cancer occur more frequently in settlements near nuclear power plants. In addition the effects of exposure to nuclear radiation can also be traced in mutation or alteration in DNAs, which can significantly affect future generations.
The podcast of the broadcast in Turkish can be listened at the following link: Click here
Green Wave, the radio show produced by the Env.net team in TEMA Foundation is now sponsored by Env.net for the coming six months. July, 7 was the 7th broadcast of the series.
This week our guest for Green Wave was Batur Avgan on the phone, from the Association for Preservation of Natural Resources and Biological Diversity (DoğaDer), one of the Env.net sub-grant recipients. The topic for this week’s broadcast was the “Tunceli Lynx Communication Network” Project that DoğaDer has completed recently, with the support of the Env.net sub-grant. The project’s major concern of DoğaDer, which also is the main driver of the Project, was the absence of information regarding the habitat and struggles of wildcats. That is why, in the frames of the Project an observation and a communication network was formed to identify the struggles and challenges that lnyxes in Tunceli region were encountering.
In the lines of the projects a group of informants was formed and they were encouraged to provide and collect information on lynxes by interacting with the local people in numerous areas within the region. The ultimate goal of the project is to raise awareness about the importance of lynxes for the ecosystem that they live in, encourage preservation of lynxes and their habitats. In this sense Mr. Avgan suggested communication with the local people was an essential part of understanding the local people’s perception of wildcats and also contributed vastly to take the project to the next step.
The podcast of the broadcast in Turkish can be listened at the following link: click here
Green Wave, the radio show produced by the Env.net team in TEMA Foundation is now sponsored by Env.net for the coming six months. June, 30 was the 6th broadcast of the series.
This week our guests for Green Wave were Dr. Hikmet Öztürk, Head of Forestry and Rural Development Department of TEMA, Ferhat Taze, Project Coordinator from the Forestry and Rural Development Department of TEMA, both experts on forestry. The topic for this week’s broadcast was about the forest wildfires that are occurring more frequently with the coming of the summer season. Dr. Hikmet Öztürk talked about the natural and human induced causes of the forest wildfires and said that natural wildfires may occur due to thunders and other nature events, and they are occurring less frequently, due to increasing drought and high temperatures during the summer times. Hovewer, event though total number of natural causes constitute 10 percent of the all the fire cases, the total area burned during these natural fires are not very large, since thunders are usually followed by rain. Dr. Öztürk emphasized that more than 90 percent of the all wildfires are caused by human activities, especially due to the reckless behaviors by the recreational users. And the area burned due to these human induced fires is much larger.
After Dr. Öztürk, Ferhat Taze continued by explaining the real damage these wildfires are causing to the nature and ecosystem services. He said that the loss area due to wildfires cannot be perceived only as a bulk of trees standing together. The forest is bigger than the sum of individual trees and homes many other lifeforms – animals, insects, birds, microorganisms, plants, and so on. The wildfires are also destroying the habitat of many important species. Furthermore, wildfires have important negative effects on climate change, by destroying the precious carbon sinks and releasing carbon to the atmosphere. Mr. Taze added that the burnt land is more prone to the soil erosion as well. So, wildfires are also affecting priceless ecosystem services that the nature provides to humans.
Both experts then replied the questions about the rehabilitation and legal issues related to the burnt areas. They said that these areas are protected by the law and cannot be used for other purposes and activities such as tourism or buildings. However, we may see some illegal developments in some occasions. The experts warned the listeners to alert the local and national authorities if ever they witness some illegal activites in those areas.
The podcast of the broadcast in Turkish can be listened at the following link: click here
NGO Green Home as representative from the ENV.net Montenegro will take part in the EU Balkans Civil Society Forum Paris.
At a moment of existential crisis for Europe, civil society need to be at the core of a renewed effort and vision to face common challenges. The Civil Society Forum brings together activists and representatives of civil society from the European Union and the Western Balkans to formulate recommendations for the future of the European project, and integration of the Western Balkans countries.
This forum is organised on the occasion of the 3rd intergovernmental summit of Western Balkans and EU countries to be held in Paris on the 4th July 2016. It follows the Civil Society Forum held in Vienna in August 2015, and in Novi Sad and Belgrade in May 2016, where four main policy areas have been identified as priorities for the Western Balkans region. Migration , climate change and green growth , bilateral disputes and youth cooperation will be part of the Paris Forum Programme and are likely to be discussed by the political leaders.
The two days of activities will be structured around workshops, dialogue with European and national parliamentarians, cultural activities and an open public citizen’s summit on European solidarity.
The forum is open to all civil society organization representatives who want to be engaged in a long term process of collaboration across borders and in the making of strong policy proposals for the future of Europe and the region of the Western Balkans.
The forum is coordinated by European Alternatives, ERSTE Stiftung, European Fund for Balkans, Friedrich Ebert Stiftung, Citizens for Europe et de la Fondation Charles Léopold Mayer
On the international day of environment, Institute of Environmental Policies (IEP) and Co-PLAN, in the frame of the ENV.net project organized an interactive training for the newly graduated students “On Protection of Environmental Resources through engaging the young professionals”. The activity aimed to increase awareness on environmental protection against climate change, and also increase awareness on renewable energy resources”. The activity was part of the Youth for Energy Policy network.
The activity took place in the premises of Polis University and it was divided in two parts: i) the first part was dedicated to the presentation of the existing situation Hydro Power Plants, production of electrical energy in Albania through these plants and best practices from different EU countries on using RES for production of electrical energy; ii) the second part was more of a workshop, where the participants were divided in groups to analyse the past, present and future situation for energy production in Albania, followed by an action plan.
The event was very fruitful, where several discussions were raised by the youth representatives, where the main points are listed below:
Increase awareness among the youth on using RES for production of electrical energy
Real analysis on the actual need or not for Hydro Power Plants to produce electrical energy
An exchange policy of electrical energy between Albania and Kosovo during the year, based on the amount of energy these countries have in different times of the years. .
Information and analyses for the environmental impact from the alternative resources to produce energy, as the sun or the wind
This activity proved to be more than necessary for the young professionals, by helping their critical thought toward protection of environmental resources and evaluation of potentials for production of electrical energy through using RES.
Green Wave, the radio show produced by the Env.net team in TEMA Foundation is now sponsored by Env.net for the coming six months. June, 23 isthe 5th broadcast of the series.
This week our guests for Green Wave were Dr. Hikmet Öztürk, Head of Forestry and Rural Development Department of TEMA, Dr. Burcu Güngör Cabbar, Deputy Head of Education Department of TEMA and Nevzat Özer, TEMA’s Rize Representative. Our topic for this week’s broadcast was TEMA’s new project “Sustainable Tea Farming for Better Soil”.
This new project aims to introduce good farming practices in tea agriculture, namely diminishing the effects of faulty and harmful activities associated to tea farming. The project consists of 3 phases: introduction of good farming practices, education, and implementation. The first phase of the project is elimination of fertilizers that contain ammonium sulfate, which raises the acidity level of the soil, and carries great importance for sustainable tea agriculture. When the acidity level of the soil increases, the vital microorganisms in the soil cannot function or even survive. The rising level of acidity of the soil also contaminates ground waters. Second phase of the project aims to raise awareness and educate people who are involved in tea farming, whom they refer to as “tea families”. During the implementation phase, stakeholders from civil society, academia and agricultural sector will be encouraged to share their expertise and cooperate to raise awareness for good agricultural practices.
To sum up, while encouraging sustainable farming for better soil, this project also aims to raise awareness to good farming practices.
The podcast of the broadcast in Turkish can be listened at the following link: Click Here
As a follow-up of the “EU Alignment Process and Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA)“ training and workshop conducted in December 2015, TEMA Foundation published and assessment report, aiming to reveal the problems related to the EIA processes, and to suggest solutions to solve these problems. The first three chapters of the report aims at informing stakeholder participants about the theoretical framework and history of EIA processes in addition to EU EIA legislation and alignment process. In this context, the report starts with short chapters on the theoretical and legal background of the EIA processes by three experts.
Dr. Begüm Özkaynak, from Boğaziçi University provides insights on why and how the EIA reports are needed. Prof. Dr. Özkaynak’s conclusion is that it is crucially important for social and ecological impacts of the projects to be integrated in the EIA process; broad stakeholder involvement would make the project ecologically more feasible.
Richard Filcak from European Environmental Bureau (EEB) examines the application of the EIA legislation in the EU. Filcak emphasizes the importance of quality control for an efficient EIA process, namely vague and general statements on the topic should be avoided in the report. Filcak also pointed out the absence of public participation in the EIA process and the need for a revision in the public feedback article of the legislation.
TEMA Foundation’s legal consultant, Ömer Aykul, writes about the legal framework of EIA processes and their implementations, which are often problematic in Turkey. Aykul argues that the EIA processes have not made significant progress since their introduction; however both the public and legal professionals gained experience and knowledge about the 14 process throughout the years. He suggests development of a new system for spatial plans and EIA processes to be executed jointly. Also Mr. Aykul also emphasizes the absence of public participation in the process and he underlined the importance of the need of Turkey officially signing the Aarhus Convention in this context.
The second part of the report summarizes the results of the group activity organised during the workshop, where the participants were asked to comment on the theoretical framework, develop possible solutions and share their experiences regarding EIA processes. The first group activity was to identify participants’ common problems and categorize them, the identified final categories were: public participation, content, legal processes and monitoring and control. For the second group activity, the participants were asked to come up with a possible solution for one of the identified problems.
Lastly, the report presents TEMA Foundation’s Opinion and Suggestions regarding the EIA processes, which mostly apply to investment in energy, petroleum and mining sectors, which have substantial impacts on environment and public health. TEMA’s suggestions can be summarised as follows:
EIA legislation has not made progress since its implementation in 1993; the legislation and the process need to be revised and improved especially in the following main areas: participation, time frames, monitoring/control and scope.
Participation, especially in developed countries, enables the parties to identify and solve possible problems in the initial phase, which is both ecologically and economically beneficial for stakeholders. In addition, Turkey has not signed the Aarhus Convention (Convention on Access to Information, Public Participation in Decision-Making and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters), which is a significant drawback regarding the legislation on participation.
The changes in the legislation regarding time-frames aim to shorten the given time for feedbacks, which makes it extremely 15 hard to provide a comprehensive reflection on EIA reports. These shortened assessment process may seem like an advantage from the investors’ side because according to the new time-frames, the EIA process are much shorter than the former EIA process. However shortened EIA hinder the process to run steadily. The competent authority can need much more time to evaluate the process.
Designated screening criteria for the process should also include the following impacts of the projects: physical/socio-economic, direct/indirect, long/short term, qualitative/quantitative and cumulative. Cumulative assessment carries vital importance for EIA processes, namely the cumulative assessment should evaluate the project to be implemented in relation with the existing and planned projects in the area. The notion of evaluation of alternatives is not included in the EIA process; no-action alternative (also known as zero alternative), as an alternative should also be included in the legislation.
The aforementioned alterations to the legislation will result in more effective implementation processes. In this context, it is important to mention that the EIA processes are executed by institutions that are funded by the investor companies, which makes the process a financial transaction, and to be perceived as a routine procedure. The EIA process should be grounded on the notion of public interest not on financial interest of institutions. Therefore EIA authorized institutions should be economically independent from the investors, as a matter of fact the authorizations should be given to individuals not institutions as it is in the EU.
All in all, in addition to the aforementioned improvements, it is important to note that the EIA process is not a land use decision making process. Land use decisions for projects which are likely to have significant effects on environment, should be developed at regional level by spatial planning process. If the location would merely be determined through the EIA process, without 16 developing the necessary decisions within a higher scale of spatial planning, none of the suggested improvements to the legislation alone would be suffice to solve the existing problems. EIA is implemented at project level, whereas spatial planning is a decision making process for different types of land use.
This week our guest for Green Wave was Batur Avgan on the phone, from the Association for Preservation of Natural Resources and Biological Diversity (DoğaDer), one of the Env.net sub-grant recipients. The topic for this week’s broadcast was the “Tunceli Lynx Communication Network” Project that DoğaDer has completed recently, with the support of the Env.net sub-grant. The project’s major concern of DoğaDer, which also is the main driver of the Project, was the absence of information regarding the habitat and struggles of wildcats. That is why, in the frames of the Project an observation and a communication network was formed to identify the struggles and challenges that lnyxes in Tunceli region were encountering.
This new project aims to introduce good farming practices in tea agriculture, namely diminishing the effects of faulty and harmful activities associated to tea farming. The project consists of 3 phases: introduction of good farming practices, education, and implementation. The first phase of the project is elimination of fertilizers that contain ammonium sulfate, which raises the acidity level of the soil, and carries great importance for sustainable tea agriculture. When the acidity level of the soil increases, the vital microorganisms in the soil cannot function or even survive. The rising level of acidity of the soil also contaminates ground waters. Second phase of the project aims to raise awareness and educate people who are involved in tea farming, whom they refer to as “tea families”. During the implementation phase, stakeholders from civil society, academia and agricultural sector will be encouraged to share their expertise and cooperate to raise awareness for good agricultural practices.
The second part of the report summarizes the results of the group activity organised during the workshop, where the participants were asked to comment on the theoretical framework, develop possible solutions and share their experiences regarding EIA processes. The first group activity was to identify participants’ common problems and categorize them, the identified final categories were: public participation, content, legal processes and monitoring and control. For the second group activity, the participants were asked to come up with a possible solution for one of the identified problems.