NGO Tasks for Major Groups Review

1. An inventory or listing needs to be made of the different voluntary initiatives being promoted. This should be done in general and by sector, keeping in mind the four different types of voluntary initiative defined by UNEP (industry-initiated, government-initiated, industry and government-initiated, and third-party initiated), as laid out in Table 1. These can be put into a database so that different listings can be made (with associated companies and industry associations.)

2. An inventory/listing needs to be made of the different evaluations of voluntary initiatives which have already or are being conducted. We know that several evaluations of voluntary agreements have been financed by the Dutch Government, the European Commission, and the OECD, as well as US-PIRG, Benchmarks, etc. These need to be identified and entered into a database. The evaluations also have to be studied and summarized.

Table 1. Types of Voluntary Initiatives

3. Read and summarize the evaluations.

4. Discuss and agree upon criteria for selecting the initiatives to be reviewed.

5. Discuss and agree upon criteria for evaluating the selected initiatives.

6. Identify common NGO goals, concerns, expectations for the review process. These will be inputs into the "NGO background paper."

7. Produce an NGO background paper; this paper will spell out NGO expectations for the other Major Groups.

8. Identify NGO "working groups" or focal points regarding specific sectors and issue areas.

9. Manage communications among groups. (Manage the ToBI strategy listserver, regularly update the ToBI database and umail list, update the ToBI website, make necessary phone calls and email messages to keep people informed and to get input.

10. Organize and maintain ToBI advisory board, especially re: voluntary initiatives, in order to get input from non-NGO groups and individuals (e.g., government and business officials).

11. Organize and maintain communications for the TOBI Planning Committee (or strategy group).

12. Organize ToBI Planning meetings (end of June) to discuss and reach agreement on strategy and aims (as well as prepare for other NGO and Major Groups meetings coming up).

13. Prepare a larger "NGO perspectives paper" containing the input from NGOs, as well as results from the examination of current evaluations.

14. Participate in UNEP conference calls as well as keeping industry and trade unions abreast of NGO activities and position.