LEAP and ULRMC Launch Project on Information Support of Local Environmental Communities

ULRMC launched a project jointly with the Local Ecological Actions Program (LEAP) aimed to study capabilities for IT application to support the operation of the local environmental committees in Crimea, and Eastern and Western Ukraine.

The role of the ULRMC as the center of advanced information technologies in the project is meant to increase the quality of environmental decisions, optimize the ways to use environmental information and open public access to it.

Complicated access to information, different storage and access formats, and lack of updated cartographic data hinder efficient operation of local environmental committees in Ukraine that consist of NGOs representatives, environmental and epidemiological services, city councils and rayon council deputies.

ULRMC will develop a GIS system for the two local committees in the regions of Balaklava (Crimea) and Kosiv (Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast) that will be integrated into the ULRMC website for remote use by members of these regional communities, local authorities and LEAP experts. The system will operate based on the use of satellite imagery, geospatial data and topographic layers owned by ULRMC, and will include statistical and spatial in-situ data that will be collected by experts of local LEAP committees.

ULRMC will provide consultations on spatial data use and develop thematic maps to support local committees of Eupatoria (Crimea) and Pavlograd (Dnipropetrovsk Oblast). In early October 2002, it is planned to prepare and conduct training on in-situ data systematization and its GIS integration for the committees, LEAP representatives and local experts.

These activities, supported financially by the US Agency for International Development (USAID-Kyiv), are meant to demonstrate to local institutions the appropriateness and efficiency of use of advanced information technologies in tackling environmental problems at the local level.

In 1999, USAID-Kyiv initiated the Local Ecological Actions Program (LEAP) in Ukraine, having developed program concepts, assigned directing agencies and informed the community in cooperation with the Ministry of Ecology and Natural Resources of Ukraine and a number of other organizations. In early 2002, seven pilot local committees were selected to exemplify the implementation of integrated measures for environmental protection at the local level with active community participation. A community group in cooperation with the local authorities will coordinate each pilot community's work to set priorities and create cost-effective measures.

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