Zulfiqar Ali - Asst. Professor, Dept. of Geography, Urban and Regional Planning, University of Peshawar, Pakistan
Rashid Hussain - Monitoring Inspector, Environmental Protection Ageency, Govt. of NWFP, Pakistan

Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) emerged as a popular discipline in response to widespread ills, associated with otherwise the environmentally unsound development pursuits in the past. The human environment witnessed serious manifestations due to inadvertent, persistent neglect of the natural environment in agricultural and technological revolution; especially after the high‐tech advancement in the post WW‐II era. The United Nations conference on the human environment in 1972 was the first commitment at the international level to adopt the principles of environmental conservation in development strategies. Since then, many developed and developing countries showed quick response to adopt EIA as decision making tool to avert the potential disasters associated with environmentally unfriendly development projects. The legal obligations for environmental safeguards in individual states and international donor agencies have led to development of many EIA methodologies for impacts scoping, evaluation and interpretation for the decision making processes. Although, EIA has been a useful tool to provide summary descriptions of the economic costs and benefits at par with the environmental losses and gains of development projects for decision makers and the public, there are practicable challenges towards its effectiveness in the less developed countries (LDCs). Realizing the national and international obligations towards environmental conservation, Pakistan embarked on new institutional and legal measures for environmental preservation. Since the early crudest system of EIA, the country has been consistent to adopt new measures to strengthen the use of EIA as planning tool at the project level for ensuring maximum harmony between the environment and development. The first environment ordinance, 1983 of the country has undergone several changes in this regard during the course of time to the existing Pakistan Environmental Protection Act, 1997. The changes are worth discussion, especially in the context of IEE / EIA Regulations, 2000 aimed at ensuring the minimum possible input of EIA experts and local community in the projects’ review and appraisal. The prospect of EIA in developing countries to foster environmentally sound decision making lies beyond the legal cum institutional reforms to the political commitment, capacity building and public involvement in all necessary steps in EIA studies.

Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA), Initial Environmental Examination (IEE), Human Environmnet, EIA Methodologies, Projects' Review and Appraisal