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Making Earthwatch Work Earthwatch has been defined as "a dynamic process of integrated en- vironmental assessment by which rel- evant environmental issues are iden- tified and necessary data are gathered and evaluated to provide a basis of in- formation and understanding for ef- fective environmental management. "1 It reflects the continuing development of a multitude of research monitoring, information exchange and evaluation activities undertaken by governmental, inter-governmental and non-governmen- tal organizations around the world. One of the activities is an information exchange which is operated by UNEP under the name of the International Referral System (IRS). IRS is designed to facilitate the delivery of information on scientific, technical, economic social and other factors to policy planners and deci- sion makers. IRS was designated as an area of concentration by the Govern- ing Council which, at its 4th session, noted that advances made in monitor- ing and information exchange called for the development and initial imple- mentation of integrated programs in research and evaluation. In 1977 the Executive Director proposed that the objectives of IRS Courtesy: Bakry Tag el Din = In many parts of the Third World, collecting firewood has changed from being the chore of an hour or two to the labour of a day or more -- and it is usually the women who bear the burden. 60 be reformulated as follows: "To promote and catalyze the improved availability of relevant envi- ronmental information for decision makers, planners and others requiring it; to demonstrate the use of this infor- mation as an important tool in making better decisions relating to environmen- tal assessment and management; to as- sist UNEP in getting access to environ- mental information in support of its activities; and to contribute to the flow of such information from source to user within individual countries by assisting IRS National Focal Points in setting up national components for IRS and inter- nationally by the establishment and operation of appropriate inter-govern- mental mechanisms, principally by a global referral network. ''2 With reformulated objectives IRS will carry on its three earlier activities of developing the IRS network, con- solidating the system, and compiling and updating the directory of sources of environmental information as well as adding three new activities, improving communication links between various components, reviewing, evaluating and reporting on the effectiveness of IRS, and developing operational links with other information systems. The Executive Director noted that the participation of government part- ners had simply not been adequate to provide the necessary sources of infor- mation that would make IRS work ef- fectively. Although 60 governments had registered as partners by March 1977, fewer than 300 sources of infor- mation had been received from them. Therefore, the Executive Director sug- gested that governments be asked to accelerate their activities in relation to the IRS and in particular to submit sources of environmental information to UNEP as soon as possible. During 1977 UNEP undertook sev- ern major initiatives to encourage the participation of governments in IRS. It held training workshops in six regions inviting 154 countries and it held study tours which enabled focal points in Ghana, Jamaica and Israel to visit the United States in October 1976 for training in the conduct of IRS work. As a result of these and other efforts, the number of national focal points has risen from 60 to 70 and the number of sources of information has risen from 298 to approximately 1,100. UNEP has been developing materials, brochures and audio-visual presentations to demonstrate the advantages ofpartici- Environmental Policy and Law, 3 (1977)
