The IBRD Bank Implementation Support Mission and the joint meetings with SEM PCU members held in Cairo on October 8th-11th 2016 recommended that the documents prepared for the livelihood micro-projects should be revised to: (a) include the checklist and environmental category in the micro projects documentation, (b) review and upgrade the table entitled assessment of the environmental impact and mitigation measures included in each micro-project document to an actual ESMP by defining concrete and measurable mitigation measures, as well as the costs of these measures and the responsible entity for implementing them, so the ESMP should, include: (i) a short description of the sub-project; (ii) an analysis of the positive and negative impacts; (iii) concrete mitigation, enhancement, protection and compensation measures in each micro-project development phase; (iv) performance monitoring, monitoring the operation and maintenance of mitigation measures and their targeted impacts; and (v) institutional arrangements for implementation, monitoring and report cost estimates; (c) confirm arrangements and measures for the sustainability of the micro-projects and their outcomes.
Following the meeting, the PCU worked with the national teams, including the NCs, NSCs and consultants in Sudan and Egypt pilot sites to revise the micro-projects documents. The revision of the 6 documents was planned to be finalized by December 2016. However, the revision process required supplementary consultation sessions to be held with the stakeholders and relevant government authorities, in order to enrich the ESMP elements and contents, as well, confirming pledges of the relevant government agencies and community NGOs representatives involved in the implementation for each of the 6 subprojects. Missions to undertake supplementary consultations and meeting were executed during 24 Oct-02 November 2016; 10th-16th 2016 December, and 7th-15th January 2017 for the pilot site in Sudan; and during 12th-13th October 2016 and 20-23th December for the pilot site in Egypt, depending on coordination with the NCs and accessibility of stakeholders. These missions facilitated the following:
- Compiling information from the consultant and NCs available in Arabic and/ or raw data, which were translated to English, verified through further consultation, and edited and integrated to in each subproject document.
- Conducting further consultations with key players, especially those essential for sustainability arrangements (government institutes) to pile up some gaps shortcomings in the information that are essential for the ESMP. This had particularly required further consultations to verify responsibilities, and revising the proposed budgets to reconsider extra costs to vendor and consultant contracts that can be incurred.
- Redraft many parts of the documents to put in the recommended format, emphasizing ESMP, screening and consultation procedures, participants, sustainability measures, etc.
The six proposed subprojects documents after revision got approved for NO from the IBRD Bank. Immediately after clearance the subprojects went into implementation. They are all currently in progress
