WECF celebrates 15 year anniversary with International Conference in The Hague
“Innovation for sustainability – the crisis as opportunity” – WECF invites you to a debate with global and local leaders in sustainability
>> 20.05.2009 | WECF Press Release
AWHHE Greetings to Marie Kranendonk, WECF first president and founder:
Dear Marie!
You opened a new planet for us offering an opportunity to make the world better. People like you are unique leading the world to progress.
May God bless you and your family with a good health and a long life!
AWHHE Staff
GAIA Founding meeting in Johannesburg 2000 December. The small informal meeting has grown to the Alliance Against Incineration with more than 500 member in over 80 countries.
Pregnant women can unknowingly pass on their body burden of hazardous chemicals to their developing foetus.
At the moment Marie feels herself like Armenian woman
On March 27, 2009 at 4:00 p.m. from the residence of the President of the Republic of Armenia launched an action “SOS Sevan” aimed at saving Lake Sevan.
The action is against the “Geopromining” company that has an intention to build a gold-reprocessing enterprise which poses a threat to the national security of Armenia .
The “SOS Sevan” initiative group (Eco-Alliance) calls the Armenian authorities in the person of the President of Armenia, RA National Assembly, the Government, National Security Council, as well as all political parties, non-governmental organizations, international community, legal authorities to support the public campaign to save Sevan Lake, one of the major stocks of drinking water of Armenia and the whole Caucasus region, to show good will and make the “Geopromining” Company stop its illegal activity. We are appealing to the state authorities to review the contracts with the mentioned company and declare the given licenses invalid.
Sevan Lake is a peculiar ecosystem with volume of 33mlrd.m 3 fresh water. Despite the operative Legislation of Armenia, RA Law on Sevan, UN Ramsar Convention, Aarhus Convention, the “Geopromining” company is going to construct in the basin of Sevan Lake a gold reprocessing plant that comprises a gold-mining plant, cyanides’ and pesticides’ stock, and a dump-tail of the cyanide wastes.
In the document entitled “Conceptual decision on safe construction of the gold-mining plant in the territory of Sotk mine taking into account the ecological risks” the company makes the following conclusion.
• The construction of a gold mining factory and a safe dump-tail is possible due to such solutions that exclude any danger to the nature.
• The construction of a gold mining factory and a safe dump-tail excludes the pollution and degradation of the ecosystem of Lake Sevan .
• The construction of a gold mining factory and a safe dump-tail excludes the pollution of surface and ground waters.
• The construction of a gold mining factory and a safe dump-tail is possible without doing any harm to the local flora and fauna.
• The existing international rich experience and conclusions on modeling prove the ecological safety of construction of a gold mining factory and a safe dump-tail under the local geographic and climatic conditions.
This document was discussed during the meeting held on March 2, 2009 in the Ministry of Territorial Administration under the chairmanship of Deputy Prime Minister Armen Gevorgyan, with participation of high-ranking officials from RA Ministries of Nature Protection, Jurisdiction, Economy, Energy and Natural Resources, the administrations of the Center of Eco-noosphere, Institute of Geology, Institute of Hydro-ecology and Ichthyology of RA National Academy of Sciences, as well as the administration of the “Geopromining” company.
The document does not reflect such hazards like 100 tons of toxic waste, hundreds of hectares of dead areas, a cyanide burial site with cyanide compounds, arsenic, antimony, pyrites and etc. These toxic elements will penetrate into the ground waters that pour into the water basin of Lake Sevan .
Besides this, no one can guarantee a security against natural disasters: earthquakes, landslides, as well as other uncontrollable external factors, such as terrors, military actions especially if we take into account the fact that Sotk borders on the territory of Kelbajar .
“SOS Sevan” initiative group
Alliance of Ecological Organizations of Armenia
A session of the National Council for Sustainable Development took place in the Government under the presidency of the Prime Minister Tigran Sargsyan.
In the Council are involved ministers, deputies of the National Assembly and leaders of non-governmental organizations (Elena Manvelyan represented “Armenian Women for Health and Healthy Environment” NGO). The Office of Public Relations and Information of the Armenian Government informed that among the participants were also representatives from the Yerevan Municipality and the National Academy of Sciences of the republic.
The Prime Minister noted that henceforth the problems of ecology, urban development and many other issues would be put for discussions during the sessions of the Council, and this would result in finding proper and acceptable solutions for the implementation of the principles of the National Program of Sustainable Development.
Afterwards, the issues related to the ecological status of Yerevan , the main causes, effects, ways of improvement and also the problem of waste disposal were discussed by the Council.
In their reports on ecological condition of Yerevan Karine Danielyan, the President of the “Association for Human Sustainable Development” NGO and Avet Martirosyan, the Chief of Ecological Management Board of the Yerevan Municipality, touched upon the questions concerning the urban-industrial environment and water basin of the city Yerevan, the status of the green zone, zones of seismic activity, environmental impact on the health of the population, possible scenarios of ecological development policy and other issues. The problem of waste disposal was presented by Gagik Khachatryan, the chief of the Public Services Department of the Yerevan Municipality .
The participants of the session shared their opinions about the questions raised in the reports.
The Prime Minister underlined not only the importance of analysis of the existing problems, but also of the suggestions for their solution. He stated that during the next session there would be discussed the problem of Lake Sevan and at the same time he instructed the reporters to present their suggestions on this subject to the Council.
Tigran Sargsyan agreed with the opinions of the leaders of NGOs and the deputies of the National Assembly who said that no work could be estimated positively unless there remained even one unacceptable, illogical and reprehensible phenomenon.
According to the words of the Prime Minister the current problems should be fundamentally solved and the NGOs should assist in these activities as much as possible.
26 January 2009 [10:04] – Day.Az
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Healthy Environment for Our Children – Healthy Generation for Armenia
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Supported by Eco-Accord and IPEN
The information campaign, organized by the AWHHE NGO in the framework of the project supported by IPEN, is a part of the global international campaign aimed at establishing support to the actions within the civic society directed to the improvement of the production, usage and regulation of chemical substances for the purpose of minimizing and liquidating the damage currently caused by toxic chemical substances.
In order to raise public awareness on the impact of chemicals on health and the environment in 4 Aarhus centers in Armenia (in 4 provinces) AWHHE conducted 4 workshops with the involvement of representatives from NGOs and local authorities. The aim of the workshops was to strengthen the partnership and cooperation between stakeholders in order to find more efficient solutions to the problems connected with chemical safety at national or local level. To disseminate information AWHHE involved mass media in the workshops.
During the workshops was introduced the SAICM concept as a global strategy to gain a toxic-free future, and also as an instrument that civic societies can use in their efforts to promote the chemical safety.
Besides that, there is much concern about such problems like “hot spots”, reproductive health, women’s health, children and chemical safety, as well as chemical substances in foodstuffs. All these issues are of prime importance for Armenia as chemicals are widely used in agriculture and public health. Nowadays, the uncontrolled use of chemicals is going on in agriculture and everyday life. Hence are the problems of pollution with agro- and industrial chemicals, neglected stocks of hazardous wastes, toxic wastes, non – adequate handling of chemicals, contamination of food and other products with dangerous chemical substances. All these issues were touched upon during the workshops. A special attention was paid to vulnerable groups of population, particularly to women and children.
In the opinion of many NGOs in Armenia the pollution with heavy metals is a major problem for the republic. Unfortunately, the NGOs of Armenia do not deal with this problem that is explained by the lack of information on these issues at national level, also by the absence of interest on the part of donors and the national government.
AWHHE conducted 4 workshops in 4 Aarhus centers in Armenia.
Much alarm in the province is caused by mineral resource industry, for example, shaft mining of polymetals, the waste of which pollute the riverside territories of the river Dzoraget in the region of Armenia that flows farther into the river Debet. And though the NGOs of this province have raised this problem for many times unfortunately they have not achieved any success yet.
The participants of the workshop expressed their concern about the ecological situation in the region of Hrazdan of Kotayk province.
According to monitoring data of the Hydro-meteological Service in the water of the river Marmarik that flows through the region of Hrazdan and flows into the river Hrazdan, are constantly observed different chemical elements, also heavy metals in amounts exceeding the permissible limited concentrations. So far twice were organized public hearings about the opening mining and processing of iron, that is pregnant with additional pollution and worsening the ecological conditions of the water basin.
The existence of the cement factory in this region is another trouble for the region. The laboratory studies testify about sixfold surpassing of concentration of cement dust in atmospheric air.
There exists information based on laboratory studies of water samples for the pollution of water with selenium, vanadium and chromium at the inlet and outlet of the Hrazdan Hydroelectric Power Station. However, official data for public are not available and the mentioned issues are not settled yet. ]
During the workshop the participants expressed their concern about the lack of information about stockpiles of obsolete and unused pesticides and the risks associated with this problem. It was mentioned that there are private trade houses of agricultural toxic chemicals, where the employees are very often incompetent and do not give the instructions and methods of use to the purchasers of chemicals.
Also was raised the issue of dumps. Wastes are constantly incinerated there and the winds take away the polluted air to the south-eastern settlements. Because of the location of the dump the waste waters from the dump together with precipitation flow into reservoir of the river Akhuryan whose waters are used for irrigation purposes of several regions. Here are poured all sewage waters from the city Gyumri, and also the wastewaters from leather processing plant of Turkey .
One of the major problems for Gyumri after the earthquake in 1988 is the existence of districts with campers for temporary residence, where due to distress people burn in their stoves plastics, tires and other hazardous things to heat their rooms. Public representatives have put these issues before the city administration for many times but the problem still remains unsettled.
The workshops showed a low awareness on SAICM process and other conventions on chemicals. Low public awareness on risks related to industrial produce such as toys, construction materials, cosmetics, household chemical goods, electronic industry and its wastes is also worth mentioning. The absence of the monitoring and notification system causes a public anxiety.
AWHHE offered its methodic aid and as a result the Aarhus center of Hrazdan province organized a series of seminars with the involvement of the expert from AWHHE to educate the young teachers from schools of this province on chemical safety, ecology and health. The first w Among the highlighted problems the important problems referred to:
- Lack of studies and the monitoring and notification system on presence of hazardous chemicals in products
- Lack of control and information about small productions and their releases and wastes whereas they are considered to be the main pollutants of the environment, particularly with heavy metals (mercury and its compounds, lead, cadmium, molybdenum, and etc)
- Lack of information about nano-materials and the risks associated with nano-technologies
- Environmental pollution with wastes from mining industry
- Weak legislation on chemical safety and weak control over its execution
- Low public participation in the field of chemical safety of the republic mainly due to the lack of interest and finances on the part of the government
- Weak cooperation between civic and governmental sectors
WE express our gratitude to Olga Speranskaya, the head of the Chemical Safety Program for EECCA countries for continuous information support and consultation, as well as to the secretariat of IPEN for assistance to carry out this campaign.
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Prepared by Anna Colozyan Script idea by Varuzhan Danielyan
Produced by
“Armenian Women for Health and Healthy Environment”
Financed by
Women in Europe for a Common Future and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Development Cooperation, The Netherlands
