A strategic environmental assessment (SEA) is an approach for assessing the impacts of proposed policies, plans, and programs. It can enhance the mining sector’s contribution to sustainable development, and it can help mining countries to avoid or reduce negative social and environmental consequences.
This publication explains how an SEA for mining can be successfully carried out in practice. It presents the SEA for the Zambezi Valley in Mozambique, where mining plays an important role in the economy. Through a policy dialogue with different stakeholders, the Zambezi Valley SEA brought environmental and social aspects into the region’s planning process.
The report makes the case for mining actors to carry out SEAs in relation to their own policies, plans, and programs. It shows how an SEA for mining can be developed in practice, how they can be included in decision making about plans that are key to mining, and presents core elements of a good quality SEA.
Building on Strategic Environmental Assessment for the Mining Sector: Lessons From Country Case Studies, this report shares insights into how to carry out an SEA and how they can be integrated into the decision-making process.
