Hubei Huanggang Urban Environment Improvement Project-External Environmental Monitoring

Client: Huangang Project Management Office

Duration: 2016-2020

Location: Huanggang City, Hubei Province, PRC

Contract Value: USD 43,900

Loan Project Value: USD 252.60 million

Funding: Asian Development Bank

Catalogue: Environment

Project Description

The Government of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) has received a loan of $100 million from Asian Development Bank (ADB)’s ordinary capital resources to help finance Hubei Huanggang Urban Environment Improvement Project. The project aims to promote environmentally sustainable and socially inclusive urbanization in Huanggang, Hubei Province by improving the urban environment. The project will improve the lakes and rivers’ water quality, flood-retention capacity, and aesthetic value contributing to economic prosperity and enhanced livability in the lakeside urban area. The ADB Board approved the loan in September 2014.

The Huanggang project management office (HPMO) engaged an experienced external environmental monitoring entity to provide assistance to Huanggang municipal government (HMG) (the executing agency), HPMO, and Huanggang Urban Construction Investment Company (HUCIC) (the implementing agency) in monitoring project implementation in compliance with the environmental management plan (EMP) and ADB’s safeguards policy; verifying the project’s environmental performance; identifying the necessary corrective actions, and reflecting them in a corrective action plan.

Services Provided by NAREE

NAREE was engaged to provide the external environment monitoring for the entire duration of project implementation. The external environment monitoring work includes:

• Conduct independent verification of EMP implementation status and environmental monitoring conducted by the Huanggang environmental monitoring station (HEMS), to verify that issues reported in the internal environmental monitoring report and semiannual environmental progress report are in compliance with ADB’s safeguard policy statement and PRC policies;

• Make recommendations to resolve any issues or problems on implementing the EMP and provide advice to HPMO and HUCIC;

• Compare the predicted with the actual environmental impacts, assess the effectiveness of the mitigation measures, and suggest enhancement measures, as required; and

• Submit external environmental monitoring verification report to ADB and HMG with quality acceptable to ADB on semiannual basis during project implementation period in both Chinese and English.