The Local Agenda 21 Planning Guide - Democrats Against UN ...

The Local Agenda 21 Planning Guide
In practice, the actual consultation methods varied from city to city, based on local institutional and cultural traditions. In Accra,
Jakarta, Katowice, and Sao Paulo, the above-described process was more or less followed. In addition to the priority-setting and
political-momentum objectives mentioned above, the consultations worked to obtain feedback on the draft profiles and
questionnaires and to obtain further information. In Accra, a special questionnaire was completed by 33 public and private
organizations to identify priorities and to define “a vision of the city in the year 2010.” Multi-stakeholder thematic meetings were
also held, focusing specifically on water, housing, and air quality issues.
Conclusions
The RUEA process has been found to be an efficient and relatively low-cost method, due to the access of local experts to local
information. The local costs for research, writing, and organization ranged from US$16,000 in Accra to US$27,000 in Jakarta.
The questionnaire and profile outlines provide useful checklists to use in developing audits. The questionnaire is particularly
sensitive to the different and interrelated issues of environmental management on the levels of the city, the metropolitan area, and
the urban agglomeration. It facilitated the collection of an extensive amount of data from multiple sources. While the process of
consultation used in preparing and reviewing the environmental profile did draw together the diverse conclusions and opinions of
key stakeholders about problems, no specific methods were established to ensure that systemic problems and complex cross-sectoral
issues could be clarified. According to the Urban Management Programme, the methodology generates purely descriptive
information. It provides some guidance as to what might be a priority problem, but little or no indication as to what might constitute
the range of possible solutions. The approach relies on existing sources of information. Results are confined by the range and quality
of work that has already been done. The reverse side of this coin is that the methodology identifies gaps in knowledge.
The principal drawback of the profile is that it is a static document. Each profile has a relatively short lifespan, and no provisions
have been made to institutionalize the updating of the profile.
Finally, while the results of the consultations and the priority-setting exercises were not linked to any formal planning or decisionmaking
processes, the results of the REUAs were used by the municipalities to support existing or new projects. Nevertheless, the
engagement of local stakeholders at the end of the assessment process, while contributing to speed, may well sacrifice in-depth
stakeholder analysis and ownership of the process. Stakeholders were used to provide and validate information, but were not
engaged as partners in developing and, ultimately, implementing solutions.
References
Leitmann, Joseph. Rapid Urban Environmental Assessment: Lessons from Cities in the Developing World, Volumes 1 and 2.
Washington, DC: The World Bank, 1993.
This summary also relies upon discussions with persons involved in the trial use of the methodology. All quotes are drawn from the
above publication.
Contact
This publication and copies of the questionnaire can be obtained by contacting the Urban Management Programme Coordinator (at
UNCHS in Nairobi, Kenya. Tel.: +254-2/623218; Fax:+254-2/624264,6) or a regional UMP office. Materials are also available from
The World Bank, Urban Development Division. Tel.:+1-202/473-1015; Fax: +1-202/522-3232.
3.2.3 APPENDIX 3.
RISK-BASED PRIORITY SETTING AND COMPARATIVE RISK ASSESSMENT
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