Tehran hosts online meeting on Basel, Stockholm environmental conventions

The Steering Committee Meeting for the Basel and Stockholm Conventions was held in Tehran on December 22. According to the framework agreement, the regional center of Basel and Stockholm Conventions established as an independent center in the field of training, information exchange, and technology transfer in the management of hazardous waste and other wastes in the country.

12 presentations were made by the participants discussing their current programs, plans, and requirements. Other than the BCRC members, there were 17 participants attended the meeting including high officials from the Department of Environment-Iran, three universities whom BCRC has collaborated with them, five private companies who are active in a different kind of waste management, and Iran National Environmental Fund who is providing fund for the waste management projects.

The main and important discussions and decisions made by the members are:

1. There was a high demand from all members to conduct capacity building for their officials;
2. BCRC was requested to organize the meetings frequently;
3. All members of the Steering Committee agreed upon setting up a technical committee;
4. Technical committee was mandated to overview the proposed activities by BCRC for 2021-24 and select those are the demand of either member countries of the region;
5. I.R. of Iran has proper technologies and experiences of waste management, which can be shared for other members;
6. The industries of Iran would be requested to organize and host some programs;
7. The member countries would support BCRC to look for the fund for implementing some programs bilaterally or regionally,
8. The modality of conducting any programs needs to be prepared in advance and shared with members;
9. Regional cooperation among the members was requested by all members;
10. Members were interested to know more about the I.R. of Iran National Environment Fund (IRNEF) and how it is funding the environmental protection projects.
11. BSR secretariat was requested to help BCEC to prepare the high quality of proposal to ensure funding.