Aarhus National Implementation Report

Overview

The UK is a Party to the Aarhus Convention, a UNECE treaty which provides for access to information, public participation in decision making and access to justice in environmental matters.

As part of its obligations under the Convention, the UK is required to produce a National Implementation Report once every three years. We are currently preparing the text for the next report, which is to be submitted for consideration in 2014. This Report covers the procedures and mechanisms facilitating the implementation of the Aarhus Convention, and provides examples of the practical steps being taken to implement the requirements of the Convention in the UK.

We welcome feedback on this draft text, and also welcome further examples to supplement those already included. Please send your comments to aarhus.convention@defra.gsi.gov.uk. In your comments, please try to cite paragraph numbers as per the draft text wherever possible.

What happens next

All responses will be considered carefully and the text of the report will be amended as appropriate. The UK has been requested to submit its National Implementation Report by 1 December 2013, in order to allow sufficient time for translation etc. All National Implementation Reports will be made available via the UNECE website (http://www.unece.org/env/pp/reports.htmlhttp://www.unece.org/env/pp/reports.html) in due course.