UN Environment aims to increase the knowledge of key stakeholders of environmental law and conventions through enhanced accessibility of information, and to support efforts to bring greater coherence to the implementation and enforcement of international environmental law. Effectively addressing global environmental challenges depends on a well-functioning and coherent governance framework and on a common understanding of each actor’s role and mandate. Collective Intelligence on knowledge systems among Multilateral Environmental Agreements (MEAs) and organizations can greatly assist in overcoming institutional fragmentation.
Over the past decade, UN Environment has supported InforMEA, the United Nations Information Portal on MEAs It is a one-stop portal for information on Multilateral Environmental Agreements – or MEAs - searchable by key terms across treaty texts, COP decisions, national plans and reports, laws, court decisions and more.
InforMEA further has a free of charge self-paced e-learning tool comprising of over courses, a joint MEA calendar, and an easy to use search mechanism to better search, locate, and retrieve information. Through the enhanced use of InforMEA and from the evaluative feedback obtained by the target audience of InforMEA, countries and stakeholders involved with the implementation of international environmental law and MEAs have enhanced access to information and enhanced knowledge which they feel supports them in their respective roles and areas of work, which has in turn contributed to the capacity of countries to develop and enforce laws and strengthen institutions to achieve internationally agreed environmental objectives and goals and comply with related obligations.
The MEAs contributing to InforMEA cut across environmental issue areas, from Chemicals and Waste (Basel, Rotterdam, Stockholm, and Minamata Conventions); to Biodiversity (CBD); Trade in Wildlife (CITES); Plants (IPPC and Plant Treaty); Ozone (Vienna Convention); Air Pollution (LRTAP); Wetlands (Ramsar Convention); Migratory Species (CMS); World Heritage (UNESCO-WHC); Deserts (UNCCD); Climate Change (UNFCCC and Paris Agreement); Marine and Freshwater (Regional Seas Conventions, UNCLOS, Water Convention, and IWC) and Environmental Governance (Aarhus Convention and Escazu Agreement). This dispersed environmental legal data comes together on InforMEA, searchable across topics in an intelligent and accessible way.
For more please visit the InforMEA website.
