EEPFE held a half-day meeting with representatives from four of the major government-level stakeholders working on environmental issues- the Ministry of Water and Energy, Environmental Protection Authority, Ministry of Agriculture - Natural Resource Directorate and Ethiopian Wildlife Conservation Authority - to discuss priority research and training needs on May 3, 2012.
Needless to say, lack of empirical research on environmental issues and scarce expertise contribute to the challenges associated to making practical and efficient policies in Ethiopia. Realizing this gap, one of the targets set by EEPFE for this year is to make its researches more policy oriented by interacting more closely with policy makers. Accordingly, this meeting was a successful start in bringing together researchers and policy makers to discuss priority research areas and training needs in environmental economics. Over 20 key personnel representing each directorate in these ministry offices participated thus producing a productive and interactive session.
EEPFE, Center Director and Senior Research Fellow, Dr. Alemu Mekonnen, addressed the invited guests with a welcome note and briefly introduced the forum - its objectives and activities. After elaborating the purpose of the meeting, the floor was open for discussion and a Q&A session.
According to the participants, the need for natural resource valuation has been marked as a common interest research area by almost all the ministries. This has been identified as the major gap existing in environmental research and a possible topic for training to enhance expertise and narrow the knowledge gap. In addition, various topics in forestry, climate change, agriculture, water management, pollution, and the energy sector were suggested as priority research topics for these offices.
The new Climate Resilient Green Economy (CRGE) strategy adopted by the Ethiopian government in November 2011 also came-up as priority research concern. The next task being the translation of the CRGE initiative into investment-ready projects, conducting researches on selected environmental topics while building the capacity of local experts through trainings could contribute in delivering these tasks in time. In relation to this, another research priority highlighted on the meeting was on the water sector. The CRGE emphasizes water management as the key to achieving a green economy, since the availability and efficient use of water will be critical in developing hydropower and agriculture sector. Studies on the value of water and wastages in the irrigation, industry, and household sectors are lacking and hence necessary to promote water use efficiency.
Impact assessment of various technological adoption programs were suggested in terms of their importance for policy making, further implementation, and replication. Other research topics mentioned as priority areas include feasibility studies on new energy sources being adopted such as biodiesel and biofuel, forest accounting techniques, estimating the price of pollution for policies on taxation, wildlife migration and natural resource conservation, and socio-economic impact assessment of hydropower dams.
Besides environmental pricing and valuation techniques, other major training needs mentioned on the meeting included environmental policy instruments, impact assessment techniques, and building capacity on energy policy development. Basic courses on the core concept of current global environmental discourses including policy instruments on climate change and global warming were also mentioned as important areas.
In addition to the discussion, a questionnaire was distributed to participants to assess their research priority areas and training needs further. The questionnaires allow the respondents to list down their priorities in a chronological order of importance. Once the questionnaires are collected, the deadline being set for end of May, the next step for EEPFE will be to analyze the findings and mobilize resources to conduct researches on topics related to its mandates and deliver the results to these offices. Similarly, EEPFE will analyze the common training needs and facilitate in-service training for environmental researchers in these offices.
While this initiative is a good start in integrating evidence-based research in policies, the fact remains that the limited financial, time, and human resources restrict the forum from acting on all the priority research areas stated. Furthermore, some of the researches suggested are beyond the scope of the forum's mandates. These facts necessitate the need for collaboration with other research centers and funding organizations. However, discussions from this meeting gave good indication of the level and extent of the research required in order to bridge the gap existing between evidence/facts and policies.
For more information on the meeting and the status, please contact eepfe@ethionet.et