Sharing water resources management data on Internet: role of the Council of Europe

Doc. 9101

15 May 2001

Sharing water resources management data on Internet: role of the Council of Europe

Recommendation 1472 (2000)

Reply from the Committee of Ministers

adopted at the 751^st meeting of the Ministers’ Deputies (2 and 7 May 2001)

The Committee of Ministers has considered Parliamentary Assembly Recommendation 1472 (2000) on “Sharing water resources management data on Internet: role of the Council of Europe” and welcomes the fact that the Assembly pays much attention to the use of new information technologies.

The Committee of Ministers has brought this Recommendation to the attention of the Governments of its member States and communicated it to the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities of Europe (CLRAE) and the Steering Committee on Local and Regional Democracy (CDLR) for information, and to the Committee of Permanent Correspondents of the EUR-OPA Major Hazards Agreement, an Open Partial Agreement on the prevention of, protection against, and organisation of relief in major natural and technological disasters for opinion.

At its meeting in Paris on 29-30 January 2001, the Committee of Permanent Correspondents examined Recommendation 1472 and, in reply to item 23.i of the Recommendation, instructed its Executive Secretariat to prepare a conference in Strasbourg - scheduled for Autumn 2001 - on the prevention of risks associated with water management, and specifically, pollution and flooding, and to explore the possibility of monitoring water quality via Internet, using the technology developed in the framework of the EDRIM programme (permanent telecommunications network, using space technologies as an aid to decision-making and co-operation in risk management).

As regards item 23.ii of the Recommendation, it should be noted that the activities of the Naturopa Centre are now restricted to the Naturopa magazine, so the creation of interactive Internet site in the framework of the Centre for raising young people’s awareness on water issues is not possible.

The Assembly also recommended (item 23.iii of the Recommendation) that the Committee of Ministers make the CLRAE and the CDLR aware of the need to consider closely the responsibilities of local and regional bodies in respect of integrated water management, and to envisage the creation of an Internet site for building a knowledge network and exchanging experience.

The Committee of Ministers wishes to inform the Assembly that the Committee on Sustainable Development of the CLRAE Chamber of Regions has already initiated work on transboundary water and territorial authorities, which, in line with Recommendation 1472, will consider the responsibilities of local and regional bodies in respect of integrated water management. A report will be presented on this subject during the CLRAE Session of May 2001.

Issues relating to local water services: distribution of drinking water, drainage and treatment of sewage also fall within the competence of the Steering Committee on Local and Regional Democracy (CDLR). The CDLR adopted in June 2000 a report on “Establishing a strategy on transfrontier co-operation in the field of waste and sewage”. This report describes international standards and practices in this area, but also schemes involving transfrontier co-operation on the establishment and management of services for the collection and processing of waste and sewage. This will soon be available online, both on the CDLR’s Internet site (www.local.coe.int), which is operational since March 2001, and on the LOGIN database (Local Government Information Network), a joint initiative involving the Council of Europe, the World Bank, USAID, the UNDP (United Nations Development Programme) and OSI (Open Society Institute) (www.logincee.org).

If the 2002 budget permits this, the CDLR has decided to launch a future activity on the organisation, management and funding of water services: supply, treatment at source, distribution, drainage and processing of sewage. Depending on the results of this activity and the resources available, the CDLR might explore the feasibility of setting up, on the CDLR site, an interactive sub-site on local water distribution and management services. This sub-site might be used for broad distribution of information on these services, and on-line comparison of the performances of similar services in municipalities of similar size at national and European level.