The SEA for the Strategy for the Socio-Economic Development of the Zabaikalsky Region (hereinafter also the ‘Strategy’) was initiated in September 2015.

The Workshop will be conducted as part of measures for the implementation of the SEA pilot application in Zabaikalsky Region and aims to review approaches to the analysis of the impact of the implementation of strategic planning documents, identification of alternatives and development of measures for mitigation of environmental impacts. This stage aims at assessing the significant adverse and positive effects of the plan or programme, and – following the conclusions from impacts analysis – at considering alternatives, and formulating measures to prevent, reduce and as fully as possible offset any likely significant adverse effects of implementing the plan/programme. This stage is the core analysis of SEA, as one of the main outputs of the SEA process is to analyse the potential significant adverse and positive effects of the proposed plan/programme. One of the main benefits of SEA is that it enables the identification of environmental effects for a number of proposals included in the strategic document and thus it can address likely cumulative effects, which can result from individually minor but collectively significant actions taking place over a period of time.

The Workshop is organized by the Ministry of Natural Resources and Industrial Policy of Zabaikalsky Region and WWF Russia with the support of the UNECE.

The event aims to:
- raise awareness about various approaches and methods used in the analysis of impacts and identification of alternatives within SEA

- facilitate debate about approaches and methods used to analyse consequences and identify alternatives within the pilot SEA project in the Zabaikalsky Krai and incorporation of SEA recommendations into further decision making process.

The participants of the event will get familiar with the various approaches and methods used in the analysis of impacts and identification of alternatives, and development of measures for mitigation of environmental impacts.

The event will gather representatives of sectorial ministries, in particular those responsible for economics, industry, environment, agriculture as well as environmental authorities, practitioners, civil society, SEA team members.