United Nations Environment Programme

1. United Nations Environment Programme Economics and Trade Branch Second Meeting for the Network of Institutions for Sustainable Development 19 September 2005

2. Objectives of the Economics & Trade Programme Enhance countries’ capacities to adopt a balanced and integrated approach to economic, trade and environmental policies, and maximize the contribution of trade to reducing poverty and achieving sustainable development

3. Main Activities • Promote integrated policy design and implementation with emphasis on sound environmental management, sustainable trade and poverty reduction • Strengthen environmental management and implementation of multilateral environmental agreements through the use of economic instruments and subsidy reform • Promote mutually supportive trade and environment policy

4. Promote integrated policy design and implementation • Continue to promote analytic tools that strengthen integrated assessment and its effectiveness in influencing policy-making • Support countries in the formulation of poverty reduction strategy papers (PRSPs) • Support countries in the implementation of the findings and proposed policy packages resulting from the assessments

5. Promote integrated policy design and implementation • Initiate an intergovernmental process to develop an international framework for integrated assessment and planning • Mobilize international effort to promote the use of integrated environmental and economic accounting (IEEA) as a more accurate measure for economic development and sustainability • Develop partnerships with Trade Unions, major transnational corporations to promote the incorporation of environmental concerns in their operations - fisheries, agriculture

6. Strengthen environmental management and implementation of MEAs • Promoting the use of economic instruments for environmental policy • Promoting the use of economic instruments for MEA implementation • Promoting subsidy reform and sustainable resource management

7. Strengthen environmental management and implementation of MEAs • Initiate an international process to internalise environmental costs on a sectoral basis - fisheries, agriculture (cotton, rice, wheat), forestry (timber, biodiversity), energy and water • Initiate in close collaboration with MEAs an international process to encourage the use of economic instruments to achieve MEA objectives

8. Promoting mutually supportive trade and environment policies • Assessments of trade-related policies • Coherence between MEAs and the WTO • Environmental goods and services • Regional trade agreements • Sustainable agriculture – organic agriculture • Conservation of biodiversity

9. Promoting mutually supportive trade and environment policies • Advisory Group on Trade and Sustainable Development • Trade and Sustainable Development Forum

10. Forthcoming Events • Meetings this week: • Network meeting • International workshop on Rice Sector • Review Meeting: Trade & Poverty projects • Integrated Assessment Framework • Side Event in Hong Kong