BALTIC SEAENVIRONMENT PROCEEDINGS No. 59 - Helcom

Some of the special topics have been devoted to Lead Countries. Seal matters are a good
example of this kind of approach. The Lead Country collects information on the actions taken
by all Contracting Parties and based on the national information makes a compilation with
proposals for further actions for consideration of the appropriate working groups or straight
for the Committee for further submission to the Commission. In order to get good results this
approach requires, however, a very active role of the Lead Country and maybe also a
considerable contribution by fewer experts to the work compared to the working group
approach, where the duties can be more easily divided between the experts from several
countries.
The 1992 Helsinki Convention brings a whole new aspect to the activities of the Commission
and its Environment Committee namely, the nature conservation and biodiversity issues.
Earlier this year the 14th meeting of the Commission endorsed the proposal for the work
programme for nature conservation which will be the bases for the duties and activities of the
special working group under EC, i.e. EC-Nature.
All subsidiary bodies of EC represent special expertise which is definitely needed also in
future in order to be able to cover the very wide multi-disciplinary activities, More detailed
description of the recent activities of the groups will be provided during this seminar.
Working Structure
-5
. reports
Lead country
4
I
October every year
. work programme EC/working groups/lead country
draft recommendations for HELCOM
r_______-__-_
:EC chajrman I - November TClMClCC
:meetin& _____-_______ : PITF
J
V
)-IELCOM] - February
. adoption of report
terms of reference
. work programme
V