The present Instruction establishes that the purpose for the conduct of EIA shall be to determine the economic, environmental and social consequences of the various economic and management decisions under consideration, to elaborate recommendations for the prevention of degradation of the environment or on ways of reducing to a minimum adverse impacts on that environment. An EIA shall be conducted on the following principles: 1) the social, technical, technological (in the case of a specific EIA), economic and other decisions and indicators of projects decisions should be considered in their interconnectedness; 2) there should be alternative project decisions; 3) the EIA may be used at the very earliest stages of the organization of economic activity and planning (beginning with agreements, contracts, etc.) as an instrument for the decision-making; 4) access to information should be granted to the public at all stages of planning; 5) the commissioner (initiator) of a planned economic activity should be responsible for the consequences of the implementation of project decisions. EIA shall envisage the following stages: 1) review of the state of environment; 2) preliminary impact assessment; 3) impact assessment comprising an analysis of the situation that has come into being, proposals relating to a comprehensive range of nature protection measures and forecasts and concluding with a Statement on environmental consequences (SEC); 4) environmental protection evaluation. The Instruction shall determine the general procedure for the conduct of an EIA in the process of preparation and decision-making on the conduct of economic activities. It shall be mandatory.
Interim Instruction of the procedure for the conduct of an environmental impact assessment (EIA) of a planned economic activity.