On Tuesday, April 26, the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine adopted a number of important decisions in the environmental sphere – from comprehensive environmental monitoring to strengthening the country's chemical safety and subsequent digitalization of environmental services.
The head of the Ministry of Environmental Protection and Natural Resources Ruslan Strilets spoke about the decisions of the government at a briefing.
Cabinet approved the draft law "On Amendments to Certain Legislative Acts of Ukraine Concerning the State System of Environmental Monitoring", designed to create a unified state system for monitoring the environment.
According to Strilets, when the draft law is supported by the parliament, each component of the environment (water, air, soil) will be subject to systemic monitoring at four levels – from the state to the object.
An effective, transparent and open environmental monitoring system will be created, which will become an important part of state management in the field of environmental safety and will help to quickly identify and respond to environmental threats.
"Regional environmental monitoring centers will be created on the ground, and all environmental data will be collected on a single electronic information platform to be available to every Ukrainian 24/7. Another important aspect of the new system will be its further integration into the pan-European monitoring system for all components environment," the head of the Ministry of Natural Resources emphasized.
The unified system will comply with international environmental management standards, in particular the requirements and directives of the Association Agreement between Ukraine and the European Union.
Also the government approved the Action Plan for the implementation of the Concept for improving the level of chemical safety until 2026.
The document was developed by the Ministry of Natural Resources to implement the Decree of the President "On the decision of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine dated March 19, 2021 "On measures to increase the level of chemical safety on the territory of Ukraine" dated March 19, 2021 No. 104.
"The creation of an integrated chemical safety management system has now become even more urgent. After defeating the aggressor, we will need to eliminate the consequences of environmental pollution with hazardous chemicals. In addition, in the post-war period, the economy and the chemical industry will actively recover, as well as settlements. Therefore, tools for monitoring and control should be in place," Strilets said.
The implementation of the document will create the necessary legal basis and:
- adapt national legislation to international and European in matters of chemical safety and handling of pesticides and biocides;
- improve legislation on health care from the negative effects of chemicals;
- organize a system for the provision of medical care in cases of violations of the requirements of the management of chemical safety and chemicals;
- improve the monitoring system for chemicals in the components of the natural environment;
- develop measures to reduce the release of pollutants into the environment;
- establish a chemical safety and chemicals management information system;
- strengthen human resources and raise awareness of citizens in this area.
In addition, the government simplified the procedure for issuing an opinion on the transboundary movement of waste from the Yellow List by converting it to an online format.
Now business entities will be able to send documents to obtain an opinion on the transboundary movement of hazardous waste online - to the e-mail of the Ministry of Natural Resources.
After consideration of these documents, decisions on granting written consent (notifications) on the transportation of waste will also be made in electronic form and will be entered into the Single State Information Web Portal "Single Window for International Trade".
The online withdrawal will not be sent to the applicant, but immediately to the competent authority of the country of import, export or transit of waste.
“For the first time, we will provide electronic exchange of information with the countries participating in the Basel Convention instead of paper, which took a lot of time yesterday. At the same time, we are getting a qualitatively new level of control over the transportation of hazardous waste across the border,” the minister said at a briefing.
Before EcoPolitics reported that the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine improved the procedure for maintaining the State Water Cadastre by integrating it with the Ecosystem.
