Natural Resources and Violent Conflict - WaterWiki.net

132 crossin, hayman, and taylorThe recent Stockholm convention contains detailed provisions toassist developing states in meeting common reporting and enforcementstandards. The Global Environment Facility and UNEP are runningpilot programs with 12 countries to develop national implementationplans for the management of persistent organic pollutants. 15 This is inline with Article 13, which establishes a financial support mechanismfor developing countries and parties with economies in transition, andwith Article 14, which entrusts the Global Environment Facility withthe interim operation of the financial mechanism (until the firstmeeting of the conference of parties). Part of this project involvesthe elaboration of detailed action plans to identify the required nationalresponses, processes, and measures to reduce the release of persistentorganic pollutants. Activities include establishing inventoriesof persistent organic pollutants, identifying management options, andpreparing schedules of estimated costs for remedial and managementactions. 16The existence of a clear financial mechanism to build the compliancecapacity of developing states is highly desirable. In Article 13, theStockholm convention specifically requires developed parties to provideresources to assist in meeting the full incremental costs of meetingtheir obligations under the convention. This mechanism is moredetailed in the Montreal protocol, where the 1990 London amendmentinstituted a multilateral fund to finance technology transfer andcapacity-building programs.Market-based certification programs should also consider equityissues. Frequently such schemes marginalize or exclude the small,community-oriented operations that should be encouraged for sustainabledevelopment. The Marine Stewardship Council, for example,has explicitly developed a community-based certification methodologyto account for the small-scale, complex nature of some fisheries. At thesame time, the MSC program is working to enhance the auditing andcertification infrastructure in more remote fishing regions in Africa.Annual certifier workshops provide a forum for training and updatingcertification skills.There are a number of methods to make capacity-building assistancemore efficient. A cascade approach of training the trainers, forexample, may give greater returns than broader but more shallowseminar programs. Similarly, if funding is limited, it may be most effectiveto set up a specialist administrative or enforcement unit andcreate a culture of empowerment and excellence. With larger funds,mainstreaming compliance into basic training for enforcement agentsmay be possible. Better use of existing technologies and forensics andthe development of new enforcement tools should also be promoted to