The Global Marine Oil Pollution Information Gateway

Origianally posted at http://oils.gpa.unep.org/about/about.htm

The Global Marine Oil Pollution Information Gateway is the result of a co-operative effort of the UNEP GPA Clearing-House Mechanism and the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency.
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UNEP GPA and Clearing-House Mechanism
Major threats to the health, productivity and biodiversity of the marine environment result from human activities on land — in coastal areas and further inland. A large proportion of the pollution load in the oceans originates from land-based activities, including municipal, industrial and agricultural wastes and run-off, as well as atmospheric deposition. These contaminants affect the most productive areas of the marine environment, including estuaries and nearshore coastal waters. The marine environment is also threatened by physical alterations of the coastal zone, including destruction of habitats of vital importance to maintain ecosystem health.

In response to these major problems, 108 governments and the European Commission in 1995 declared their commitment to protect and preserve the marine environment from the adverse environmental impacts of land-based activities. The UNEP Global Programme of Action for the Protection of the Marine Environment from Land-based Activities and the Washington Declaration were adopted in 1995 and UNEP was tasked to lead the co-ordination effort and to establish a GPA Co-ordination Office.

The GPA targets major threats to the health, productivity and biodiversity of the coastal and marine environment resulting from human activities on land. It is an integrated, multi-sectoral program, premised on serious commitment for action at all levels: local, national, regional and global. It recognizes the need for improved, regular co-operation at the regional level, as well as partnerships with international organizations and major groups that contribute to the pollution and degradation of the coastal and marine environment. The GPA is designed to be a source of conceptual and practical guidance to prevent, reduce, control or eliminate marine degradation from land-based activities. Action at the national level, supported by regional and global action, is recognized as the major guarantee for the successful implementation of the GPA.

Effective implementation is an essential step forward in the protection of the marine environment, and contribution to the objectives and goals of sustainable development. It relies ultimately on the political will and determination of Governments to take concrete action in addressing the underlying causes of marine degradation originating from land-based activities. It is, inter alia, recommended that the States identify and assess problems related to the severity and impacts of contaminants including sewage, persistent organic pollutants, radioactive substances, heavy metals, oils, nutrients, sediment mobilization, marine litter, and the physical alteration, including habitat modification and destruction (the GPA Pollutant Source Categories). At the regional level one of the major objectives of the GPA is to support and facilitate the implementation of land-based sources/activities components of the various UNEP Regional Seas Conventions and Action Programmes.

One important part of the work of the GPA Co-ordination office has been the establishment of an information and data Clearing-house as a means to mobilize experience and expertise, including facilitation of effective scientific, technical and financial cooperation, as well as capacity-building. The GPA Clearing-house Mechanism provides a rapid and direct referral system to relevant information and data. In effect, it provides a mechanism for responding to requests from Governments on a timely basis. The Global Marine Oil Pollution Information Gateway is one of nine pollutant source category nodes of this Clearing-House mechanism. The GPA Clearing-House mechanism is intended to provide "a one-stop method that promotes the advertising, discovery, access, dissemination and use of GPA related information and data held by numerous organizations using the decentralized capabilities of the Internet".

Swedish Environmental Protection Agency

The Swedish Environmental Protection Agency (Naturvårdsverket) is the central environmental authority under the Swedish Government and the expert body in the Swedish public environmental organisation. The Swedish EPA is to co-ordinate, prompt, and take the initiative in environmental protection work in co-operation with other national institutions. The Agency is also very much involved at international level, within the European Union as well as in negotiations preparatory to international conventions and in co-operation with international organisations. The objectives of the Swedish EPA, according to the instructions laid down by the Government, are to co-ordinate, promote and lead environmental work nationally and internationally. The Agency's most important tasks are
Development of environmental work: to propose targets, measures and control instruments for environmental policy and environmental protection activities;
Implementation of environmental policy: to carry out environmental policy decisions on government grants, application of law etc.;
Follow-up and assessment: to follow up and assess the environmental situation and environmental efforts.
In 1999 the Swedish Parliament adopted 15 new objectives for environmental quality, which describe the quality that the environment and common natural and cultural resources must have in order to be ecologically sustainable in the long term. For the future, Local Agenda 21, sector integration, biological diversity, sustainable development and international co-operation are key words in the Swedish work for environmental protection.

The problem of oil pollution in the marine environment is one of the areas of responsibility of the Swedish EPA. On a national level the Agency is co-operating closey with, among others, the Swedish Maritime Administration (discharges of oil from shipping), the Swedish Coast Guard (surveillance and combatting at sea), the Swedish Rescue Services Agency (land-sea interface combatting), and regional and local authorities in the efforts to prevent oil pollution in Swedish waters. On an international level, the Agency participates in the work of the UN International Maritime Organization (IMO) and the MARPOL Convention, as well as in the work of the Bonn Agreement and the OSPAR Commission, executive body of the Convention on the Protection of the Marine Environment of North-East Atlantic, and in the work of the Baltic Marine Environment Protection Commission (Helsinki Commission, HELCOM), the executive body of the Convention on the Protection of the Marine Environment of the Baltic Sea Area, in the efforts to prevent and combat oil spills in Swedish waters. The Baltic Strategy on Port Reception Facilities for Ship-generated Wastes was adopted in March 1996 by all the countries around the Baltic Sea as a means of international co-operation to stop discharges of wastes from ships in the Baltic Sea. It was adopted as HELCOM Recommendation, and the implementation of the Strategy is co-ordinated through the framework of HELCOM.

The Global Marine Litter Information Gateway, another of the GPA Clearing-House nodes, is also result of a co-operative effort of the UNEP GPA Clearing-House Mechanism and the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency.