Edy Blom
Technical secretary
In the Sankarani river basin in Mali various (opposing) developments take place, including artisanal mining of gold. To face all challenges, the local authorities in Baya, Sankarani and Tagandougou inititated the joint preparation of an integrated sustainable development plan for their territory. To make it an inclusive process with all stakeholders involved, they decided to integrate the elaboration of their plan with the SEA to which it is subjected. During the scoping phase, four more neighboring municipalities joined them, their territories now fully covering the Selingue lake and its banks.
Significant details
These municipalities are supported by VNG International through the IDEAL programme and its follow-up SDLG programme. The NCEA and VNG international have been asked to support this process. Inspired by the Sourou case, they want to ensure that the process for their plan and its Strategic Environmental Assessment will go through an inclusive approach with all stakeholders involved. The first step was to elaborate together a 'scoping document' of the 'process' that needs to be implemented. This also includes the scale of the strategic plan and the decision-making process. The NCEA provided independant advice on the preliminary and final versions of the scoping document and was asked to act as coach on the remaining process.