19-22 September 2004, Tunis, Tunisia

Within the framework of the Mediterranean Environment Protection Technical Assistance Programme (METAP), this Train-the-Trainers Workshop was organized by the Tunis International Centre for Environmental Technologies (CITET) in cooperation with UNEP-ETB and UNEP’s Post Conflict Assessment Unit (PCAU). The train-the-trainer workshop targeted METAP countries in West Asia and brought together EIA experts from Syria, Lebanon, Palestine Authorities, Albania, Egypt, Jordan and Iraq.

The entire workshop was based on UNEP’s EIA Training Resource Manual and each country had to prepare one training topic and present it to the other participants. The training reconfirmed the need to improve EIA systems in the region in order to really integrate environmental aspects into decision-making. Countries face similar problems, including donor-driven EIA systems, strong influence of other sector ministries to ensure investments and increase employment, insufficient public involvement, lack of personnel resources and weak monitoring systems.

The trainers trained in this workshop will be able to train different stakeholder groups in their countries such as government officials, consultants or civil society representatives on the benefits and procedures of EIA. Following this training workshop, CITET and UNEP-PCAU jointly organized a workshop based on the EIA Training Resource Manual in Amman, Jordan from 8-12 January 2005 targeting particularly Iraqi government officials.