Annual Report 1999

GRID-Arendal Outlook 2000

At the brink of the new millennium GRID-Arendal has launched a new strategic plan for the period 2000-2005. We are going to concentrate our contin- ued support to UNEP within three core competencies;

ENVIRONMENTAL INFORMATION

COMMUNICATIONS

UNEPnet, and we are launching a new global programme for State-of-the Envir- onment Reporting for cities on the Inter- net - CEROI.

CAPACITY BUILDING

Working within these core areas we have a geographic focus on the Polar and Baltic regions and Central and Eastern Europe. We are also supporting UNEP's glo- bal activities, in particular GEO, ENRIN, GIWA and

Highlights of the work programme for 2000 which represents the first milestone in our new 2005 strategic plan include:

New GRID-Arendal web site with innova- tive use of multime- dia and improved content.

New innovative ca- pacity building tools for environmental re- porting.

UNEPnet with im- proved voice, fax and video-conferencing capabilities.

Awareness package demonstrating the impacts of use of en- vironmental informa- tion in Central and Eastern Europe.

Support to State-of- the-Environment re- porting in Russian Oblasts in the Baltic Region.

CEROI expanded and integrated with other local networks like ICLEI and GUO.

Arctic multimedia in- put to UNEP's Global Environmental Out- look (GEO) report series.

Development of a new set of indicators to measure our per- formance versus mis- sion and goals.

New user satisfaction feedback system for all major products.

Increased contribu- tion to budget from private sector spon- sorship, web-shop sales and financial income.

Svein Tveitdal Managing Director GRID-Arendal