On 15th January in the restaurant "Kaj Chombe" in Probishtip was held in the third regional workshop of the project "Development of regional plans for waste management and strategic environmental assessment for East and North-East Region", attended by representatives of municipalities and public utilities in East planning region, inspection services and non-governmental organizations working in the field of environmental protection.
The project is funded by the IPA instrument of European Union and implemented by the consulting firm ENVIROPLAN S.A. Greece and its consortium partners C&E Consulting und Engineering GmbH – BT Engineering Ltd. Contracting authorities are the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Environment and Physical Planning of the Republic of Macedonia.
European Union finance 1.14 million for the preparation of regional plans for waste management and strategic environmental assessment for the East and Northeast region, and the project will benefit 17 municipalities in these two regions.
On this third workshop of this project, there was presentation of the Assessment Report on the current situation of waste in all 11 municipalities in the East Planning Region, presented by team Leader Mr. Lolos Teofanis from consulting house ENVIROPLAN S.A. from Greece. Then the second presentation focused on research for landfills (municipal utility and dumps, called ilegal dumps) , their current condition and risk assessment of landfills depending on their impact on the environment and human health. Also, for all existing landfills were presented methods of remediation and reclamation, depending on the amount of waste containing. This part of the report was presented by Mr. Emil Kolev, hydrogeologist fro BT Engineering Ltd from Bulgaria.
The workshop ended with a final presentation which concerned the proposal form need to implement strategic environmental assessment and draft decision on implementation of strategic environmental assessment and correlation of the objectives of the plan or other relevant strategic plans and programs in Republic of Macedonia . The presentation by Ms. Menka Spirovska, expert for strategic environmental assessment, and holder of the report for strategic evaluation.
On January 16, 2014, same workshop like this was held in Kumanovo, where all researchs on the situation of landfills in the Northeast Region were presented.
The project is implemented by September 2014, when it will be produced main results – two regional plans for waste management in the two regions and two strategic environmental assessment of plans for waste management. Guidelines on how to manage the waste will be fully compliant with EU directives regarding waste management.
Overall, the impact of the planning documents on the environment are estimated that it will be positive.
Consortium members / experts working on the project said it was very important first to understand what is happening in the regions in terms of the state waste, for make good plans. In the last period there were two analyzed qualitative and quantitative analysis of the waste, and this is done for the first time in the Republic of Macedonia. Comprehensive analysis of all existing landfills are made, than a register of all landfills and calculated risk of each landfill. The main problem of waste management is the existence of illegal landfills that create major problems in the environment and human health. It is important to make a good plan to close illegal dumps.
All past performance of the project in February 2014 will be available on the project website.
Expets said they have very good cooperation with the municipalities that gives confidence to successfully complete the project.
According to the representatives of the Ministry of Environment of the Republic of Macedonia, who attended the workshop in Kumanovo, already submitted applications to the European funds for the next phase of the regional waste management in the first two pilot regions. First, there is need to prepare a feasibility study, and then basic project documentation for the construction of all facilities for waste management within the East and Northeast Region.
By 2017, these mentioned two projects that are already applied by the Ministry of Environment and Physical Planning will be implement.
( N.S / ZH.M )
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