Environmental and Social Impact Assessment - Gibe III

Gibe III – Environmental and Social Impact Assessment 300 ENV R CS 002 C - A9003099
8 PUBLIC CONSULTATION AND DISCLOSURE
8.1 Objective of Public Consultations
The FDRE Constitution contains a number of articles that are relevant to environmental matters in
connection with development projects, as well as to the environment in general. In relation to public
consultation, Article 92 of Chapter 10 (which sets out national policy principles and objectives), includes the
following on public consultation:
“….. people have the right to full consultation and to the expression of their views in the planning and
implementation of environmental policies and projects that affect them directly”
The Environmental Policy of Ethiopia (EPE) recognises the need for an ESIA to address social, socioeconomic,
political and cultural impacts, in addition to physical and biological impacts, and for public
consultation to be integrated within ESIA procedures.
Public consultation plays a key role in enabling the public to participate in the planning of project that affects
the people directly. As of the beginning of this project, there have been several public/stakeholders
consultation and participation briefings and meetings, which have taken place at the local, regional and
federal levels.
The public consultation process has been carried out based on the following objectives:
• To identify potential negative and positive impacts of the project as well as the associated
appropriate remedial measures that could be identified through the participation of the people;
• To include the attitudes of the community and the officials that will be affected by the project so that
their views and proposals in the formulation of mitigation and benefit enhancement measures; and
• To increase public awareness and understanding of the project and its acceptance.
8.2 Consultation Methodologies
In order to assess knowledge, perception and attitude of the communities about the proposed Gibe III project
and its potential impacts, several meetings and discussion were held with a number of community members
and their leaders from various regional sector offices. A number of household individuals were consulted
privately so that the people were given a chance to express their views freely.
The groups that are chosen for the consultative meetings were selected with great care on the basis of the
location of the project so that their views could represent the entire attitudes of the community as well as the
officials in which the project is located. The sampling groups of the people are taken from the communities
residing with in various villages and kebeles, weredas, zones, Federal Offices and NGO’s. The people that
can best represent the ideas of the people were selected from the directly affected people and from the
administration offices that administer the project areas.
Consecutive field trips were taken to these reservoir and the downstream areas in order to collect the views
and attitudes of the concerned bodies found with in and around the project areas. The field trips to the
reservoir and the downstream places were conducted in the year 2006 and 2007 respectively.
The consultative meetings were undertaken by the team of experts comprising of economists, sociologists,
environmentalists and surveyors having relevant work experience and qualifications in the field.
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