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Veröffentlichung Mineral Resource Governance in the 21st Century(UNEP, 2020) Ayuk, Elias T.; Pedro, Antonio M.; Ekins, Paul; Nuss, Philip; United Nations Environment ProgrammeResources, including minerals and metals, underpin the world's economies for almost all sectors, providing crucial raw materials for their industrial processes. Despite efforts to decouple economies from resource use towards a circular economy, demand for extractive resources will continue to grow on the back of emerging economies. The report maps existing international governance frameworks and initiatives which have overlapping subsets that focus on delivering the 2030 Global Agenda for Sustainable Development. In this report, the International Resource Panel (IRP) of the UN Environment Programme highlights that the mining sector, if carefully managed, presents enormous opportunities for advancing sustainable development, particularly in low-income countries. As discussed in Chapter 5, extractive industries place large demands on natural resources such as land and water. Its activities can lead to polluting water resources, biodiversity loss and ecosystem destruction including land degradation and desertification. Therefore, there is a need to look at the dynamic relationships between mining, and land and water. This calls for a systems-thinking approach that accounts for the nexus between resources so as to steer policy efforts towards integrated natural resource management along the mining value chain. The report maps existing international governance frameworks and initiatives which have overlapping subsets that focus on delivering the 2030 Global Agenda for Sustainable Development. It presents the practical actions required to improve the international governance architecture for mining to enhance its contribution towards sustainable development. It calls for a new governance framework for the extractive sector referred to as the "Sustainable Development Licence to Operate" which includes consensus-based principles, policy options and best practices that are compatible with the Sustainable Development Goals and other international policy commitments. Minerals and metals underpin national economies, provide crucial raw materials for industrial activities, and are inputs to almost every sector of the global economy. Demand for extractive resources will continue to grow on the back of emerging economies with expanding and increasingly affluent and urban populations and a global transition towards low-carbon but metal-intensive energy production technologies. This is despite efforts to decouple economies from resource use and towards greater recycling. The frequently severe and enduring environmental impacts of mining highlight the need to carefully balance such activities with stewardship of other valuable natural resources and the environment including ecosystems and biodiversity, and the rights of local people and communities. Decision-making in the extractive sector is shaped by a complex array of governance frameworks and initiatives operating along highly globalized mineral value chains. There is an urgent need to coordinate and reform this governance landscape to address enduring challenges such as commodity price volatility, lack of linkages between mining and other economic sectors, inadequate management of environmental impact, and socio- and geopolitical risks of mining. The report maps over 80 existing international governance frameworks and initiatives which focus on delivering overlapping subsets of the 2030 Global Agenda for Sustainable Development, but do not currently operate in a sufficiently coordinated or integrated manner. In this context, the report calls for a new governance framework for the extractive sector referred to as the "Sustainable Development Licence to Operate" and includes consensusbased principles, policy options and best practices that are compatible with the Sustainable Development Goals and other international policy commitments. The report discusses practical actions to improve the international governance architecture for mining to enhance its contribution towards sustainable development. The proposals include reaching an international consensus regarding the normative content and structure of the Sustainable Development Licence to Operate informed by expert inputs from a "Highlevel Panel on Mining for Sustainable Development". It further considers the creation of an International Mineral Agency to share relevant information and data. Governments could also reach bilateral and plurilateral agreements regarding security of supply of raw materials and resource-driven development. Periodical reporting of progress towards sustainable development could be enabled through a Global "State of the Extractive Sector" review or equivalent process. Quelle: VerlagsinformationVeröffentlichung Towards more sustainable management of material resources in Europe(2022) Nuss, Philip; Pohjalainen, E.; Bacher, J.; Europäische Union. Amt für VeröffentlichungenRaw materials are essential for modern economies and the transition to a climate-neutral and sustainable Europe as laid out in the European Green Deal (EGD). However, obtaining raw materials can also be associated with adverse environmental and social impacts along the supply chain. Europe is dependent on raw material imports, e.g., for metal and metalloids required for low-carbon technologies or modern information and communication systems. Achieving the ambitious goals of the EGD, therefore, requires robust knowledge and data on primary and secondary material flows and stocks to better manage these and strengthen the competitiveness of European industry. Against this background, the European Commission's (EC) Raw Materials Information System (RMIS) aims at providing a structured knowledge base related to non-fuel, non-agricultural raw materials from primary to secondary sources. Among the RMIS' overarching goals are to facilitate: (1) the availability, coherence, and quality of knowledge required by EU raw materials policies and EC services, and (2) access to key raw materials information from knowledge bases within and beyond Europe. This report summarizes results of an ongoing cooperation between the European Environment Agency (EEA) and the EC Joint Research Centre (JRC) on compiling knowledge around the security and sustainability of raw materials. For this, relevant EEA projects and additional data sources are summarized both at EU-level and in a pilot investigation for four EIONET countries (i.e., Germany, Spain, Ireland, and Portugal), and ideas for monitoring the performance of the EU raw materials situation are presented. Using a country-questionnaire, data and knowledge available at the national level are highlighted and data needs from the perspective of the countries summarized. Results from this study highlight that a wide range of high-quality data and information are already available to monitor the raw materials situation of individual EU countries. EIONET-countries hold detailed information with regard to: (1) mining, supply, and trade, (2) investments and the regulatory (mining) framework, (3) indicators and data about environmental, social and governance, and circular economy/resource efficiency aspects, and (4) pilot studies on emerging topics (e.g., environmental criticality or material stocks). Such information could be taken up by the RMIS in specific sections of the country profiles or dedicated tiles such as on "Member state legislation" or the "RMIS knowledge gateway". However, some of the data and information on mining can be outside the scope of EIONET (with a focus on Europe's environment) and future data collection efforts might involve other relevant institutions such as national geological surveys. Some of the quantitative data needs of the EIONET-countries such as on materials stocks, footprint indicators, spending on repair, or the production of CRMs could be taken up when developing an RMIS indicators dashboard. The dashboard highlights aspects at EU member state level for the thematic areas of security of supply, material & resource efficiency, priority value chains, environmental sustainability, and social sustainability (responsible sourcing) across the EU-27 countries. Future research is required to account for additional data needs by EIONET such as on circular economy skills profiles or the residence time of materials in the economy. It is hoped that the indicator dashboard provides solid background information to complement RMIS country profiles and the EEA knowledgebase on raw materials, and to kick-off a continued exchange within EIONET on specific data/knowledge availabilities and needs. © European Union, 2022Veröffentlichung Analysis of the circular material use rate and the doubling target(2023) Christis, Maarten; Vercalsteren, An; Nuss, Philip; European Environment AgencyThis report analyses the progress made by the European Union (EU) in the circular material use rate (CMUR), supporting a better understanding of the observed status and trends. In addition, it provides a first simplified assessment of the prospects of the EU to move towards its ambition to double the CMUR within a decade, in the context of the Circular Economy Action Plan (CEAP) and the European Green Deal (EGD). Broadening the scope, the report looks also into unaccounted flows of recycled materials, a key driver of CMUR. It also complements the CMUR assessment by quantifying environmental impacts linked to material consumption, the main current driver of CMUR. This analysis helps to understand and interpret the observed status, trends and possible future developments for the CMUR, both on the total CMUR as well as on the CMUR for the four broad material categories as published by Eurostat. The insights are considered in the context of the CEAPâ€Ìs aim of "doubling the CMUR in the coming decade" at the EU level. The integration of the environmental impact from material uses brings in different perspectives into the analysis and interpretation of the CMUR. © European Topic Centre on Circular economy and resource use, 2023