Policy Development
For many years, environmental development assistance focused
on projects. Over the last decade environmental policy development
and implementation, alone or in concert with these projects
has achieved greater, more enduring gains in sustainable use,
effective management, conservation of natural resources, and
environmental quality.
Like other types of sector policies, environmental policies
establish the rules that guide environmental decisions of
firms and households in rural, agricultural, and urban areas.
They employ a variety of incentives and disincentives to encourage
firms, farms, and households to make decisions that promote
environmental goals. Environmental polices are designed and
implemented for the express purpose of making an impact on
environmental quality or natural resource use, or reducing
pollution put into the environment. Environmental policy reforms
set or change the “rules of the game” that guide
the behavior of firms, farms, and households related to pollution
and natural resource use.
Well-designed environmental policy reforms can cost-effectively
achieve environmental objectives if they are based on sound
economic principles, establish local ownership through participation,
and create institutional roles and responsibilities which
are consensual during the implementation process. However,
participatory policymaking does not make unnecessary the need
for and resources to monitor and enforce policy reforms. For
donors, environmental policy reform can both increase and
sustain the benefits of donors’ assistance resources.
For example, policies that are more able to ensure full-cost
pricing of environmental services will increase the likelihood
that investments in environmental infrastructure will be properly
operated and maintained.
Environmental policy reform is not without its challenges.
Often it involves fundamental reconsideration of deep-seated
traditions. While the benefits of well conceived environmental
policy reforms are substantial and easily recognized, policy
changes often require institutional reforms and affect established,
politically well-connected economic interests. As a consequence,
donors and their partners require a good understanding of
development diplomacy, the complications and difficulties
of the policy reform process and policy dialogue, and an appreciation
for the local context for policy and institutional capabilities.
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