The Twenty-first Meeting of the Executive Committee decided:
(a) to take note of the three-year (1997-1999) business plan of the Multilateral Fund;
(b) to note that decision 21/3, subparagraph (b), by which it decided to allocate all of the US $74 million carry-over from the triennium 1994-1996 to the budget for 1997, would be reflected in section III of the 1997-1999 business plan;
(c) that sections III and IV of the plan should be revised, and that section V should be expanded to take into account the comments made during the meeting;
(d) to note the need to improve the business plans for the year 1998 and future years, bearing in mind that, in preparing previous business plans, the most effective procedure had not always been followed, namely, planning of activities first, to be followed by implementation, which would be monitored, and, on the basis of that monitoring, revision and continuation of the activities.
(UNEP/OzL.Pro/ExCom/21/36, Decision 21/4 (para 10).
(Supporting document: UNEP/OzL.Pro/ExCom/21/6).
The Twenty-second Meeting of the Executive Committee decided:
(a) to endorse the targets for ODS approvals and expenditures for the triennium, noting that the 1998 and 1999 figures were indicative only and would be reviewed at the next meeting of the Executive Committee, and taking into consideration the following elements:
(i) the Multilateral Fund, in 1997 and the first half of 1998, would give priority to approving projects with the highest ODP value and short implementation duration for countries that had yet to meet their freeze obligations. This would allow these projects to be implemented before 1 July 1999 in order to curtail the ODS consumption growth in these countries;
(ii) the Fund would continue to provide funding for all ODS consumption sectors to enable all Article 5 countries to maintain the momentum of phase-out according to the strategies in their country programmes;
(iii) halon would continue to receive high priority due to its high ODP value and the cost-effectiveness of halon phase-out projects. This would include consideration of the first sectoral phase-out programme from an Article 5 country in the halon sector;
(iv) the Fund would continue the practice of setting up a special allocation for LVCs. Implementing Agencies should be encouraged to target funds to assist those countries;
(v) funding of full and gradual closure projects in the production sector would be considered during this triennium. Considering that the guidelines for shutting down ODS production facilities would be ready in 1997, and project formulation would be under way in the same year, allocations for the production sector would be made in 1998 and 1999;
(vi) future budgets should include project preparation funds for investment projects under investment, rather than non-investment, allocations;
(b) to request the Secretariat to send letters around mid-year to all countries involved in bilateral activities, asking whether they intended to utilize the full amount allocated to them for bilateral activities. If they did not intend to do so, those funds could be reallocated;
(c) to insert a new line in Table 3 of the three-year business plan of the Multilateral Fund (UNEP/OzL.Pro/ExCom/22/12), after the investment line, entitled "Funds reserved for preparation of investment projects";
(d) to take into account the possible increase in the importance of non-investment projects. (UNEP/OzL.Pro/ExCom/22/79/Rev.1, Decision 22/11 (para 26).
(Supporting document: UNEP/OzL.Pro/ExCom/22/12).