Mr. Per Menzony Bakken

It has long been understood that if Parties are to meet the requirements of the Montreal Protocol they must be able to control the movement of ozone-depleting substances across their borders. Indeed, effective implementation of many multilateral environmental agreements depends on effective border controls. The recognition of this need and the joint interest of the various multilateral environmental agreements in this area led UNEP to create the Green Customs Initiative, a pioneering partnership of five convention secretariats and three international organizations 1 that has contriuted to the implementation of the Montreal Protocol through its capacity-building activities for customs officers. By supporting this effort to train customs officers in developing countries, the Multilateral Fund has enabled the Montreal Protocol to play a key part in this cooperative effort, which has had the added benefit of increasing the visibility of the Montreal Protocol among customs services and promoting operational cooperation with other multilateral environmental agreements.

The initiative also helped introduce the ozone issue into the sustainable development arena and into debates on security, and offers a coordinated approach to building the capacity of customs officers to monitor trade in commodities of environmental concern. It has always included the monitoring of ozone-depleting substances as one of its objectives. The initiative has included provision of joint customs training focused on awareness-raising involving the various secretariats and organizations; the development of a training guide for capacity-building; the establishment of a website (www.greencustoms.org); and the conduct of national pilot projects.

The first train-the-trainer regional workshop under the initiative was held at the Shanghai Customs College in China in May 2007. The contributions of two individuals should be specifically recognized: Ms. Donata Rugarabamu (Basel Convention secretariat – Officer in Charge and Senior Legal Officer) and Mr. Stephen Nash (CITES secretariat – Chief, Capacity-building Unit). Both have been instrumental in the successful drafting of the Green Customs Training Guide and have brought their exceptional knowledge of multilateral environmental agreements and of customs to bear for the benefit of the GCI partnership.

By the end of the 1990s, CFC consumption in Jamaica was confined to the servicing of existing refrigeration and air conditioning equipment. The Government set itself an ambitious goal: to eliminate this CFC consumption completely by 31 December 2005, four years ahead of the phase-out schedule applicable to developing countries under the Montreal Protocol. This RMP project, implemented between 1999 and 2002, and the 2002–2006 work on the TPMP, which built on the achievements of the RMP, were the key projects approved under the Multilateral Fund to assist Jamaica in meeting its target of accelerated CFC
phase-out.

The RMP and the TPMP that followed transferred the expertise and technology required, both to reduce reliance on the use of CFCs in servicing refrigeration and air conditioning equipment and to facilitate the enforcement of the CFC import controls instituted by the Jamaican Government. Specifically, under the projects most of the country’s refrigeration technicians were trained in best practices; a code of practice for technicians was developed and made mandatory; CFC recovery and recycling machines were provided to as many technicians as possible; several CFC users who were not able or willing to convert their systems to alternatives on their own were provided with financial incentives to do so; and the safe use and handling of hydrocarbon refrigerants as CFC alternatives were introduced. The particular expertise developed in Jamaica with hydrocarbon refrigerants is now being shared with other countries in the English-speaking Caribbean region.

This project also saw the development and implementation of the first comprehensive training programme for customs officers, based on a draft training manual that had been developed by UNEP, with assistance from Canada and Finland. The experience with the customs officers’ train-the-trainers workshop in Jamaica provided essential information for refining the format and content of the training programme and finalizing the UNEP training manual for customs officers. These resources were then widely used and applied for the training of customs officers in most of the other Article 5 countries. Such training programmes have been key to ensuring that customs officers have the awareness, knowledge and skills necessary to implement the ODS import licensing systems which ensure countries’ compliance with their obligations under the Montreal Protocol.

The efforts of the Jamaican Government and industry stakeholders themselves were fundamental in ensuring that the country did ultimately meet its target of early phase-out and thus became the first country in Latin America and the Caribbean to eliminate CFC consumption completely. From the beginning of Jamaica’s country programme for the phase-out of ozone-depleting substances, the National Ozone Unit provided continuous and tireless leadership to promote the objectives of the Montreal Protocol and forged excellent relationships with key stakeholders in the refrigeration and air conditioning industry.

In this regard, the efforts of the National Ozone Unit, and in particular Ms. Veronica Alleyne, during the implementation of both the RMP and TPMP are particularly noteworthy. In addition, the Government set the framework for CFC phase-out by adopting clear and ambitious regulations (eventually grouped under an Ozone Act) and established a national ozone commission that was also instrumental in providing guidance and ensuring
development and implementation of all projects. Lastly, the association of refrigeration and air conditioning technicians played a decisive role in encouraging CFC users to switch early to alternatives and implement best refrigeration practices.

The total cost of the RMP and the TPMP that made the total phase-out possible amounted to approximately $485,000. The project has achieved its ultimate goals, as Jamaica completely eliminated CFC consumption as of 31 December 2005. The resources, equipment and training skills provided under the RMP and TPMP are now being used to address other refrigerants as the principal technical institutes have incorporated training in best practices within their curricula for training refrigeration and air conditioning technicians.

To date, the Multilateral Fund has supported the establishment of national ozone units in over 140 countries. Among the goals of related projects are the hiring of at least one full-time individual to
enable each country to focus specifically on ozone issues. This individual is most commonly referred to as the National Ozone Officer. National ozone officers are very important individuals who are responsible for advancing the phase-out of ozone-depleting substances in their countries. In that role, they often help prepare regulations or legislation, and help facilitate the development and implementation of projects.

Over time, it became clear that there was a significant turnover in national ozone officers, and that the learning curve for new officers was very high. In an effort to address this, UNEP developed a Guide for National Ozone Officers that was designed to serve as a quick reference tool providing comprehensive knowledge. The Guide was developed using a participatory approach that drew on the experience of many national ozone units. First issued in 2006, it was judged to be a very good and useful tool. It contains the common wisdom of the ozone community and is the only such
document to have been developed to help officers carry out their obligations under the relevant multilateral environmental agreements.

When the Multilateral Fund approved a unique enforcement project for China, it was uncertain how the country would go about training the thousands of local and national authority officials who would be needed to ensure compliance with the Protocol. After due consideration, SEPA developed and initiated an innovative online training system as a supplement to the traditional face-to-face workshop training. The approach is being implemented by UNEP.

The online training system consists of a long-distance e-learning system that is based on web and multimedia information technology including animation, videos and audio materials. This one-of-a-kind project was designed with a general training module that would target general local officials other than customs officers, and another module targeting customs officers specifically. It also includes a database of policies and regulations related to ozone-layer protection.

The integrated national online training programme has been operative since it was launched at the 2005 International Ozone Day Celebration. About 2,000 local officials from 12 provinces and cities in China have been trained using the system since then. The online system has also helped trainees who received face-to-face training, enabling them to upgrade their knowledge using the online system.

The online system has proven to be a very useful and effective method and tool for local officials to acquire knowledge concerning ozone-depleting substances, which is essential for China to
implement its accelerated phase-out plan and maintain compliance after 2010. The online training system delivers training in a more cost-effective way and has become a valuable approach for complementing, communicating and updating information from face-to-face training. SEPA and UNEP have reached agreement with the local information technology company which developed the software to enable it to be used by other countries, and translation into English is ongoing. An extension of the system to provide training on other multilateral environmental agreements is also under consideration. In all, the system has proven to be a unique, innovative approach to promoting capacity-building for local officials and customs officers on environmental issues.

Early on in Mongolia’s participation in the Montreal Protocol, there was an appreciation of the significant risk of illegal trade in ODS resulting from Mongolia’s geographical location and the circumstances surrounding the expected shortage of CFCs in all countries. In addition, it was understood that border controls over ODS movement between China and Mongolia were important from the viewpoint of preventing illegal ODS movement by way of Mongolia to third countries.

As an innovative attempt to address this issue, Japan and UNEP facilitated a bilateral dialogue between Mongolia and China. This initiative was made possible with the exceptional collaboration of the Chinese National Ozone Unit and the State Environmental Protection Administration of China (SEPA), which committed themselves strongly to preventing illegal trade in ODS. This was done at a time when many Article 5 countries had started to voice concerns about illegal trade in ODS but could not find effective actions to take other than demanding
exporting countries to take action, which was difficult in to the light of the requirements of World Trade Organization rules. The Mongolia-China dialogue was one of the first examples to start to tackle this problem on a bilateral basis through the voluntary exchange of information between the parties concerned. This dialogue has been continuing as part of the terminal phase-out programme for Mongolia, and similar dialogues has now been undertaken in other difficult areas. The total cost paid by the Fund for the project was $38,307.

ECOFRIG, HIDECOR and NCCoPP are three consecutive and interdependent projects in the Indian refrigeration and air conditioning sector which demonstrate how the goals of bilateral development assistance combined with bilateral contributions under the Montreal Protocol can effectively strengthen multilateral processes.

ECOFRIG started in 1992 within the framework of Indo-German-Swiss cooperation. The objective of the project was to establish a level playing field for environmentally friendly, “natural” refrigerants in the refrigeration and air conditioning sector. Natural refrigerants such as hydrocarbons do not deplete the ozone layer and have a very low global warming potential compared to hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) and hydrochlorofluorocarbons (HCFCs), whose use was prevalent at that time.

In the late 1990’s it became clear that refrigeration servicing enterprises generally would not be able to adapt on their own and in time to the new and more demanding non-CFC technologies
being chosen by the major producers. At stake was nothing less than the survival of and employment in many small and informal enterprises in an important industrial subsector. Without
well-functioning refrigeration servicing enterprises, the servicing of old and new equipment would be compromised. Enhancing the skills of over 39,000 such enterprises employing over 77,000 technicians was therefore recognized as an important aspect in support of the achievement of the Government’s national CFC phase-out targets.

At that time, the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) focused on refrigeration servicing enterprises from a development policy and environmental protection perspective. As a result, the HIDECOR project was developed by SDC, at first in a pilot phase under the umbrella of ECOFRIG and later as a separate project under Indo-Swiss bilateral cooperation. The
methodologies and infrastructure created under HIDECOR also formed the basis for the formulation of a national strategy for phasing out CFCs focusing on refrigeration servicing
enterprises. This was approved by the Multilateral Fund as the National CFC Consumption Phase-out Plan (NCCoPP). The sequence from ECOFRIG to HIDECOR to NCCoPP is a
remarkable success story of technology transfer and skill development as an integration of bilateral development assistance into multilateral environmental agreements.

As an added benefit, cross-cutting issues between the Montreal Protocol and the Kyoto Protocol could be addressed. Bilateral cooperation is capable of assisting partner countries with the task of integrating actions to enforce and comply with multilateral environmental agreements through support for specific ozone-, climate- and generally environmentally friendly technology options. This positive experience may also be relevant for developing future HCFC phase-out policies which have yet to be formulated for Montreal Protocol Article 5 countries.

Specific Intervention:
In Phase I of ECOFRIG (1994–1996), the main focus was on the use of a hydrocarbon (cyclopentane) as a foam blowing agent, while Phase II (1997–2001) brought hydrocarbon refrigerants (in particular a 50:50 blend of propane and isobutane) into production and also into the servicing of domestic and small commercial refrigeration appliances.

Under HIDECOR, a unique and innovative institutional set-up was developed to provide high-quality training in a very cost-effective manner to a large number of technicians who were geographically widely distributed over various regions of the country. Industry partners were involved from the outset, providing training to technicians from small and low-income service enterprises in the informal sector, alongside their own service technicians. The dissemination and outreach strategy of HIDECOR was based on the principle of technology neutrality: equal weight was given to best practices developed for HFC134a-, hydrocarbon- and CFC-12-based technologies. The project also established close cooperation with the Industrial Training Institute (ITI) system, which revised its training syllabus to include non-CFC refrigerants, emission control measures and retrofitting of CFC appliances. In addition, teaching aids for ITI instructors were developed and 456 ITI instructors received training. NCCoPP was modelled on the HIDECOR project and particular emphasis has been placed on retrofitting CFC-based equipment. A crucial part of the implementation of NCCoPP is the provision of cost-effective and adequate equipment to enable refrigeration service enterprises to adopt in their daily routines the best practices taught in the training courses.

To date, most large manufacturers of domestic appliances in India have opted for the hydrocarbon-based foam blowing technology which was introduced under ECOFRIG, and one of India’s major refrigerator manufacturers converted its entire refrigerator manufacturing line to hydrocarbon-blend technology during the project (supported by Multilateral Fund funding through the World Bank). The training infrastructure created by HIDECOR has been completely integrated into the NCCoPP strategy, and focuses on the important role of CFC- and non-CFC based best servicing practices. While HIDECOR was geographically restricted to selected states in the south of India, NCCoPP provides similar services for the entire country and all remaining refrigeration servicing enterprises, regardless of size, turnover or linkage to industries. NCCoPP will lead to a complete phase-out of CFC consumption in the refrigeration and air conditioning sector in India.