UNEP showcases computer database

UNEP showcases computer database

JAKARTA (JP): The United Nations Environment Program (UNEP)
showcased a computer database yesterday aimed at helping
facilitate the transfer of green technology from industrialized
to developing countries.

UNEP Deputy Director Lilia G.C. Casanova said the database
provided access and transfer of scientific and technological
information concerning environmentally sound technologies (ESTs).

Casanova said information accessible through the so-called
maESTro program was "on institutions promoting ESTs all over the
world, on sources of information about sustainable development
all over the world, and on specific green technologies".

More than 80 countries around the world, mostly industrialized
ones, use the information system which has been developed since
1995 by the UNEP-International Environmental Technology Center,
she said.

"It's still an improving software program ... and it's
provided for free to all, governments, academics, NGOs,
etcetera," Casanova told a media conference at an international
seminar on the EST information system in Serpong, West Java,
yesterday.

Delegations from seven countries; Malaysia, Indonesia, China,
The Philippines, Vietnam, Thailand, and Japan, were participating
in the three-day seminar co-organized by UNEP, the Environmental
Impact Management Agency (Bapedal), and the office of the state
minister of environment.

Casanova said the maESTro program could help the government
gather necessary information needed for formulating effective
sustainable development policies.

"Many governments cannot formulate effective policies on
sustainable development because they lack the access to
information on ESTs," she said.

The transfer of ESTs, as identified in Chapter 34 of Agenda 21
-- a document resulting from the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de
Janeiro, Brazil -- is one of the indispensable elements for
achieving sustainable development.

Bapedal Deputy Chairman Brig. Gen. (ret) Sukardi, who was
representing State Minister of Environment Sarwono Kusumaatmadja
at the media conference yesterday, said the Indonesian government
had started using the program in the agency's command post.

"It's just a matter of time (before it is developed further),"
Sukardi said, reiterating Casanova's earlier statement that
maESTro was still a long way from perfection.

Bapedal's director for technical development, Liana Bratasida,
said Indonesia was committed to the implementation of ESTs.

She said 20 of more than 60 companies -- including textile,
pulp, plywood, cooking oil and steel firms -- which have
voluntarily developed cleaner production strategies have gained
ISO 14001 certification, recognizing their technologies'
environmental friendliness. (aan)