JPAC holds its third Regular Session in Conjunction with the 1999 CEC Council Session in Banff, Alberta

The Joint Public Advisory Committee (JPAC) of the Commission for Environmental Cooperation (CEC) held its third regular session of 1999, in conjunction with the annual meeting of the CEC Council, on 28–29 June in Banff, Alberta.

During the meeting, JPAC members stated that they would continue to follow the specific advice provided to the environment ministers of the three countries on the guidelines for submissions on enforcement matters under Article 14 of the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation (NAAEC), in order to ensure that this process respects the criteria of accessibility, transparency, independence of the Secretariat, balance/parity between party and submitter, impartiality, discretionality and conformity to the NAAEC.

On other matters, JPAC will continue to encourage concrete results from the discussions between environment and trade officials on Article 10(6) of the NAAEC and support cooperation between the CEC and the Free Trade Commission (FTC) on Chapter 11 of NAFTA (relating to the investor-state dispute settlement process). Finally, the issues of involvement of indigenous peoples and the CEC public participation framework will continue to be priorities for JPAC.

One of the important features of the annual Council meeting is to provide the attending public with direct access to the Ministers. JPAC played an important role in this process by facilitating a half-day round table with the public, focused on the CEC's three-year program plan. Very thoughtful and constructive recommendations came forth at this round table, which were then summarized directly for the Ministers at the beginning of their open session with the public.

Sample views included the following: There was a strong call for the CEC to concern itself, within the Environment, Economy and Trade program area, with water issues, as well as with food safety and emerging trends. Within the Conservation of Biodiversity program area, migratory marine species of the Pacific region were identified as a topic requiring attention. In particular, attention was called to gray whales. Public access to information from government and industry was stressed in relation to the Pollutants and Health program area, and it was felt that the Law and Policy program area should continue to focus on improving compliance with existing national environmental regulations.

JPAC met twice with the Ministers and once with their Alternate Representatives. During those meetings, JPAC identified emerging trends and NAFTA environmental effects, strategic directions for the conservation of biodiversity, NAFTA transportation corridors and environmental management systems as areas requiring priority attention in the JPAC work plan for the year 2000.

The Ministers, for their part, requested that JPAC also provide them with advice on methods for evaluating individual CEC projects and ideas on how the public portion of future Council meetings could continue to be improved.

JPAC is composed of fifteen members, five from each of the three NAFTA countries, and is responsible for providing advice to the CEC Council on any matter within the scope of NAAEC.

The next JPAC regular session will be held on 16–17 September in Montreal. On that occasion, the public will be invited to comment on the Final Analytic Framework for Assessing the Environmental Effects of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and on the new CEC program.

The provisional agenda of the next JPAC regular session, JPAC advice to Council and other documents related to JPAC are available on the CEC's Internet homepage <http://www.cec.org> or upon request to Manon Pepin at the CEC Secretariat: e-mail: <mpepin@ccemtl.org>, fax: (514) 350-4314 or telephone: (514) 350-4366. The Summary Record of this meeting and the report to Council on the round table will be available soon.