Extended Abstract

Introduction
The aim of this presentation is to describe the main threads of activities underway at the European Environment Agency (EEA) which could contribute to required improvements in the supply and reporting of environmental information at national, regional (such as in the Mediterranean region), European and international levels. The EEA’s overall mandate and objectives require the Agency to work directly with many the clients and partners, some of whom are attending this conference, to improve cooperation and avoid duplication of effort in the delivery of this objective.

Indicators as streamlining tool for data flows
This presentation focuses on the shared information system concept and in particular the work underway on policy relevant indicators, streamlining data flows and developing common repositories and infrastructures to facilitate the implementation of such a shared system.
The review of reporting processes currently being undertaken by the European Commission as part of the 6th Environment Action Programme (6EAP) is a suitable starting point and in particular, the three purposes of reporting that provide the overarching framework for this review and its future implementation: 1.Checking compliance and implementation of legislation; 2. Assessing environment trends; and 3. Evaluating the effectiveness of policy measures. The Agency’s main focus is in the last two areas.

Indicators are the main tools being used to organise thinking and identify information needs to meet these purposes. To this end a broad consultation process is underway with clients on a core set of indicators to underpin future EEA reporting. This includes cooperation with UNEP/Mediterranean Action Plan which is working on sustainable development indicators for the region, in support to a regional sustainable development strategy, as well as indicators under MEDPOL. Although indicators and their underlying data needs do not cover all the information needs for assessment purposes, they do provide an essential framework for this type of work. In this way they can provide a useful input to the discussions on what should be implemented under, for instance, the new EU Framework Directive on reporting or the revision of data requests within Marine Conventions.

Towards a shared information system
Indicators need data, and this has led the EEA to establish some priority data flows based on indicator needs covering a range of environmental issues. This is done, for instance, for marine data, through an inter-regional forum (IRF) which was established by EEA in 1997 with the view to facilitate the exchange and possible integration of existing data and information produced by regional Marine Conventions/Action plans and to improve working relations and task sharing so to avoid any unnecessary duplication of work. The work has focussed on joint research projects, development of indicators, GIS use and data flows. A core group of representatives of secretariats of organisations (AMAP, BSC, UNEP/MAP, OSPAR, HELCOM, European Commission (DGEnv, JRC), ICES and EEA) steers the activities. The forthcoming signing of a specific memorandum of understanding between the Black Sea Commission and the EEA is part of this approach. IRF is an advisory body which held three major conferences and organised three working groups on marine indicators, data and GIS. A major workshop on marine indicators was held with EEA and Marine Convention member countries in 2001 and another workshop on fisheries/aquaculture and environment integration indicators was held in October 2002 with fisheries organisations. The main focus of the work in 2003 is the streamlining of the data flows necessary for the development of indicators for integration of environment into fisheries policies and the development of a European marine monitoring and assessment programme and related indicators for the 6th EAP Marine Strategy.

This experience, among others, has shown that some of the major barriers to making progress to improve the quality of data flows have been, and still is, the multiple reporting of data to many organisations, in non-harmonised ways, without having always-clear objectives and lack of transparency. This has led the Agency to set a goal to bring some order to the current situation through the development of a Shared Information System. The key principles underpinning the shared information system are: transparency of information management systems enabling access by all; harmonisation of information collection processes to assure comparability and integrity; reporting once for many purposes in order to streamline the reporting effort at national level; common validation and aggregation procedures to enable consistent use of information at the international level and direct links between data and information collection needs and policy objectives (using indicators) to ensure assessments are policy relevant.

To make this work in practice a Common Information Infrastructure is needed which is the framework of data standards, interoperability mechanisms, and other permanent structures that enables information exchange and sharing within and between information systems. The suite of Information Technology (IT) tools needed to support the processes of a data collection network, building on a shared information infrastructure, we call Reportnet. Examples of the different components of Reportnet will be illustrated to show in concrete terms what the development of a shared information system would mean in practice. This approach is still at a very early stage of development, and there are many questions still to be answered, particularly ones which will inevitably come up as implementation progresses. However, some tools are already well underway in terms of development including: a Web page offering the services of a data base on reporting obligations in Europe; the EEA network (EIONET) Directory of contacts; data exchange modules (DEMs); and national repositories. The development of data warehouses at the European level is an area where the Agency has made some progress but still has a lot to learn for example from work done at Eurostat (New Cronos) and from elsewhere with respect to aggregation, validation and presentation.

Conclusions will be drawn, also in the context of the initiative by the European Commission and European Space Agency for a Global Monitoring for Environment and Security (GMES), about what could be done together to facilitate multiple-users monitoring and streamline data flows. This includes defining common policy objectives as the basis for streamlining reporting obligations and data/information flows. In this regard, an important aspect to consider is the need for information on policy state-of-action which is not usually data as we know it, but rather information on policy actions and measures which is used to feed policy effectiveness evaluations including scenario assessments. Joint work is also needed on common standards, methodologies and validation processes to enhance data quality.