Office establishes Environmental Advisory Panel

The Gibe III Hydroelectric Project Office established Environmental Advisory Panel (EAP) in a bid to consult on the environmental issues during the project implementation.

 Members of the Advisory Panel were drawn from Ministry of Water Resources, Federal Environmental Protection Authority (EPA), Southern Nations, Nationalities and Peoples (SNNP) regional office, Oromia Environmental Protection Bureau, International Water Management Institute (IWMI), Addis Ababa University and representatives of non-governmental organizations that have direct concerns to the aspects of physical, biological and social environments in case of project implementations.

 

On a half-day meeting held at Gibe III Hydroelectric Office Conference Hall on July 10, 2009, W/ro Azeb Asnake, Project Manager, said that the Advisory Panel has the responsibility of independently reviewing the impacts of the project on the surrounding environment.

The preliminary scope of work distributed to the members during the meeting indicates that the Advisory panel would evaluate and provide guidance for environmental including social issues, review reports to make sure that the document is adequate reflection of the environmental impacts that may result from the construction and operation phase of the project.

The Panel has also a duty of providing full package of reports on the unforeseen impacts of the project with remedial recommendations.

The members paid for a visit on July 31, 2009, to Gibe III Hydroelectric Project site prior to preparing their own terms of references using the distributed scope of work as an initial framework.