On the 23-26th of October 2006 in Salekhard Assistant to the Minister for Economic Development and Trade B. Morgunov being a Chair of the Sustainable Development Working Group (SDWG) of the Arctic Council took part in the intergovernmental Ministerial session of the Arctic Council between the Ministers of eight Arctic states. The session was preceded by a three-days meeting of Senior Arctic Officials (SAO). Total number of the Ministerial session and SAO meeting participants accounted for about 200 people.
In 2004-2006 the Russian Federation served as Chair of the Arctic Council and SDWG. During the session in Salekhard there were adopted two main documents submitted to the Ministers: the Salekhard Declaration on the occasion of the tenth Anniversary of the Arctic Council and the Fifth AC Ministerial Meeting and the SAO report to the Ministers. For the Government of the Russian Federation the Declaration was signed by the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Russia S.V.Lavrov.
Particular attention in the adopted documents was focused on the Arctic sustainable development problems, including usage of natural recourses, broadening co-operation in energy sector (including on renewable energy sources and environment friendly technologies), infrastructure development and increasing its reliability in changing climate conditions, information and communication technologies, health of people living and working in Arctic, etc. Environmental issues remained one of the priorities. The importance of tasks on adaptation to climate changes was also emphasised and the major role in these tasks fulfilment within the framework of the Arctic Council was passed to SDWG.
B.A. Morgunov presented to SAO a report on SDWG activities under Russian Chairmanship. During this period there were held four meetings of the Working Group: in Moscow (April 2005), Khanty-Mansijsk (October 2005), Salekhard (March 2006) and Moscow region (October 2006). Under the SDWG aegis the Russian Federation organised a seminar "Priority activities for Arctic sustainable growth promotion" in Salekhard in March 2006. Five SDWG projects were successfully completed, five others are still being implemented. The Ministers approved the following new SDWG projects:
Evaluation of information and communication technologies in Arctic;
Activities aimed at development of information and communication technologies in Arctic;
Arctic energy summit; Arctic statistics; sustainable development of indigenous peoples of the Russian North;
Arctic social indicators; research and plan of activities to reduce health risks for humans in Arctic.
The latest project is a unique experience for Arctic Council as it is a joint project of three AC Working Groups - SDWG, AMAP and ACAP. Apart from Arctic states the project realisation involves International Red Cross and World Wildlife Fund. The project was developed by the Russian Federation, which is appointed to be the leader-country for its realisation.
Ministers noted with pleasure that SAO approved the implementation mechanism for the Action Plan on sustainable development designed by the Russian Federation and called all Working Groups to use this plan as guidelines for identifying gaps and measures to eliminate them as well as to regularly update the database on Arctic Council projects according to the adopted mechanism.
Under the Russian Federation Chairmanship in the Arctic Council the UNEP\GEF project ?Russian Federation ? support of the National Action Plan of the Protection of the Arctic Marine Environment? (NAP-Arctic) started. This initiative was also reflected in the Salekhard Declaration, which emphasised the progress in NAC-Arctic implementation and pointed out that national action plans were important components of the Regional Action Plan of the Arctic Council.
In the end of the Ministerial session Russia passed to Norway its Chairmanship powers in the Arctic Council for 2006-2008.
