Providing financial assistance for hazardous waste emergencies

Description

Providing financial assistance for hazardous waste emergencies involves rapidly mobilizing and allocating funds to support immediate response, containment, and remediation efforts when hazardous waste incidents occur. This strategy ensures that affected communities and response teams have the necessary resources to mitigate environmental and health risks, restore safety, and prevent further contamination. By addressing funding gaps, it enables swift action, reduces long-term damage, and supports recovery from hazardous waste-related disasters.

Context

This strategy features in the framework of Agenda 21 as formulated at UNCED (Rio de Janeiro, 1992), now coordinated by the United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development and implemented through national and local authorities. Agenda 21 recommends studying, in the context of the Basel Convention and relevant regional conventions, the feasibility of providing temporary financial assistance in the case of an emergency situation, in order to minimize damage from accidents arising from transboundary movement of hazardous waste or during disposal of those wastes.