The First Eastern Europe Regional Meeting on the 10 Year Framework of Programmes on Sustainable Consumption and Production Patterns (10YFP) was held in Geneva on 27 October, back to back with UNECE 20th session for Committee for Environmental Policy. The objective of the meeting was to provide a global and regional overview on sustainable consumption and production (SCP), to give update on the 10YFP development and to identify synergies and areas of future cooperation for scaling up SCP related initiatives in the region. More than 30 representatives from governments and civil society organizations from Eastern Europe and Central Asia, UN agencies, and international experts shared their experiences in SCP policy development and success stories, and discussed the possible way forward.

In the follow up of the meeting, the 10YFP Secretariat will develop further information and capacity building tools for National Focal Points and Stakeholder Focal Pointss, including clear guidance on how to “join” the 10YFP and its programmes. A meeting for Central Asian countries may be organized to raise awareness on SCP, opportunities presented by the 10YFP programmes, and an initial opportunity for engaging NFPs and other stakeholders.

A second 10YFP multistakeholder meeting for Eastern Europe is to be held in the second semester of 2015, focusing on programme implementation, selecting a subset of the six 10YFP programmes, and on any specific request for new programmes from the Eastern European region.

The Committee on Environmental Policy of UNECE highly praised the meeting and agreed that the regional SCP process should form an important contribution to the 8th Environment for Europe ministerial conference in June 2016 (Batumi, Georgia), in the wider context of green economy. SCP might also be defined as a regional priority under the Post-2015 development agenda.

More information: http://www.unep.org/10yfp/