Welcome To SCP Maharastra

The All India Institute of Local Self Government, Mumbai has been anchoring the Sustainable Cities Programme in Maharashtra since October 2003 in two phases. Phase I is a pilot phase involving two cities to test and demonstrate the EPM process tools. In Phase II, the programme will be replicated in six more cities of the state. The programme was launched in October 2003 and two cities in Mumbai Metropolitan region viz. Panvel and Virar were selected. Given the background of the judicial mandate on the City Solid Waste Management and the expressed priority of the State and Cities to improve the waste management, the theme of Sustainable City Solid Waste Management was adopted as the entry point of the SCP/EPM process during phase I. The Phase I is now heading towards completion. Based on the experience gained in this phase, the strategy of Phase II is being finalized.

CITY SELECTION CRITERIA

Two cities were selected in phase I, out of the four candidate cities after discussion with the concerned city managers and State Government representatives, based on the following criteria: -

Political and administrative commitment of the cities to own and support sustainable SWM practices and Zero Waste approach.
Readiness of the cities to promote stakeholders’ participation and involve the community in planning and decision-making.
Size of the cities and proximity to Mumbai to ensure active involvement of stakeholders- especially government agencies.

In the second phase, the SCP process will be replicated in six other cities representing different geographical and administrative regions of the state. During the experience sharing seminar on the SCP in Mumbai in March 2005, and the follow up meetings at the policy level, it was agreed that the selection of cities for phase II should be based on the participation and performance of the cities in the Urban City cleanliness campaign which the State of Maharashtra launched in 2002.

Under the above campaign, the State has introduced an incentive based competition on the following parameters

Water Supply Management
Provisioning of public toilets
Solid Waste Management
Waste water management
Social amenities, Women development projects
slums education
Public Health, Family welfare
Provisioning and standard of infrastructure
Town planning and beautification
Human resources and financial management
Community participation

These parameters provide a wide spectrum of urban issues and objective basis for selection of cities in the second phase of the Sustainable Cities Programme.

PROGRESS OF PHASE I

Environmental Profiles -Environmental Profiles (EP) of the two Phase I cities were prepared in consultation with their Presidents (Mayors) and the Chief Officers and several issues were identified for further discussion in the city consultations. In view of the focus of the project on the Solid Waste Management, the EPs were initially limited to City SWM profile of these cities. During the preparatory meetings, however, and as the SCP process unfolded, other issues such as water supply, infrastructure development emerged and necessitated the revision of the EPs. The revised EPs are now broader based. As the SCP anchor, the AIILSG is aware of the fact that the EP is a living document needing periodic revisions along the path of EPM process.

Preparatory Meetings - Prior to holding city consultations, preparatory meetings were held in both the cities i.e. Virar (7th Jan.04) and in Panvel (9th Feb.04). The subject of the Municipal Solid Waste Management was primarily discussed in the preparatory meetings and need to adopt a waste reduction strategy and involvement of the community was underlined. Subsequently, site visits were organized in Mumbai on 17th Feb.04 and 24th Feb.04, for the officers and elected representatives and NGOs of these cities to expose them to the impact of Community based initiatives in SWM and decentralized waste management technology. During these visits decentralized Composting, in the residential colonies (ALM groups) in the eastern suburbs of Mumbai, Vermi- composting project based on the market waste in central Mumbai and bio-gas project of Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) were shown to the city representatives.

Experience Sharing with Chennai – Chennai was the first city in India to implement an SCP project. The SCP team of the AIILSG visited Chennai in January 2004 and held interactive meetings with the officials of the Chennai Metropolitan Development Authority (anchor of sustainable Chennai project) and the Municipal Corporation of Chennai. Improvement of inland water ways, traffic management and sanitation were the three priority areas that emerged in the city consultative process in Chennai. A highlight of that project was the strong presence and support of the celebrities and government functionaries to the EPM process. Backstopping by the State government and the CMDA was conspicuous in the success of the participatory process.

State and City Consultation – City consultations in the two cities were organized in Panvel and Virar in February 2004. On the eve of the city consultations, a high level State consultation of the Presidents, Chief Officers with the Chief Secretary and the concerned Government Secretaries and high ranking official was organized on 22nd February 04 in Mumbai. National Coordinator of Sustainable City Programme in Sri Lanka, Dr. Fahmy Ismail, SCP trainer of Colombo Council, Ms. Inthan Azoor, UMP Regional Advisor, South Asia, and Planner of CMDA, Ms. Usha were also present and participated in the discussion.

The objective behind organizing this event was to apprise the State about the background of the SCP and the project in Maharashtra. The issues raised during the preparatory meetings in the two cities and listed in the Environmental Profile were also explained to the Chief Secretary and other Government officials. The Member of the State Legislative Assembly from Virar area also participated in the consultation. On behalf of the Government, the Chief Secretary underlined the growing problems in urban areas, challenges posed by rapid urbanization and the organizational and attitudinal change required to meet them. He expressed the support of the Government of Maharashtra to the SCP project. Secretaries of Urban Development, Water Supply and Sanitation, Town Planning and Industries Departments attended the consultation and agreed to depute the Senior Officers to the City Consultations in Panvel and Virar, which followed.

During the city consultative process, the following thematic areas were identified as the most critical for city development -

Municipal Solid Waste Management
Water Supply & Sanitation
Infrastructure Development, development planning and Resource Mobilization
Role of Municipal Council in city development and community participation.

Broad Conclusions of City Consultation-

In the area of Solid Waste Management, it was agreed to create awareness among the residents groups to segregate and reduce the waste at source and involve trained and organized waste pickers to promote home composting. It was decided to hold a series of meetings of the residents in the ward and declare incentives and rewards for the residents’ societies adopting waste recycling.
In case of water supply system, the need to expedite the water augmentation schemes in both cities emerged as the most priority issue deserving focus of the consultative process. A consensus also emerged to reduce the leakages and wastage of water and adopt meter based distribution system. The need of water audit was also underlined. Need to have waste water treatment facilities also emerged during the process.
Different options to bridge infrastructural gaps were discussed along with the representatives of both planning authorities and state financial institutions. Consensus emerged in both the cities that the benefits of the capital grants of the Government of India’s scheme for Small and Medium towns be extended to them. Deferred payment based financing model of the State Financial Institution (SICOM) was also well received. The option of granting additional (compensatory) Floor Space Index was identified as an important non financial incentive to forge public private partnership in infrastructure development in these cities. Extra FSI for low income housing was also discussed for slum upgradation. Devolution of powers of the state planning authorities to the ULBs was unanimously demanded in both the cities.
Considering overlapping functional areas of several government agencies in Mumbai metropolitan area, the role of municipal council in city development was debated by the stakeholders. Capacity building of poor and women’s empowerment needs figured during consultations in both the cities.

WORKING GROUPS

The discussion groups formed during the city consultations comprised the elected representatives, government and municipal officials and representatives of local professional groups and educational institutions. The groups were headed by the Chairpersons of the Statutory Subjects Committees in the municipal councils. The same groups were converted into working groups for the follow up planning process. Several rounds of meetings of these working groups were held in the city and also in Mumbai in the presence of concerned government agencies to determine the policy perspective on those issues. The AIILSG played an active anchoring role in these meetings.

OUTCOME OF WORKING GROUP EXERCISE

The result of the working group exercise has been very encouraging.

Both cities evolved “Zero Waste” management plan and started implementing the same.
They adopted resolutions to meterize their water distribution system. They agreed to try out low cost waste water management based on wet land system.
They also resolved to link their poverty alleviation programme to waste management and organize the poor into self help groups for this purpose. Awareness meetings with their residents groups were planned and have actually been initiated. Community development Coordinator of the AIILSG has been supporting the process,
Policy decision to review the Town planning process was announced by the Town Planning Secretary after meeting the working groups of both cities in April 2004, and,
A decision to make municipal council a partner in the water supply project contracting was taken by the Secretary of Water Supply and Sanitation after addressing the working groups of the two cities in January 2005 .
Interactive meetings of the partners involved in the water supply scheme in Panvel ironed out many problems and actually helped in accelerating the commissioning of the new scheme.

ENVIRONMENT POVERTY INTERSECTION- Interactive meetings and the site visits of the working group on solid waste management churned out a strategy to engage urban poor especially women in waste recycling activities. Consensus emerged that the Urban Employment generation programme of the government, which is implemented by the ULBs, could be linked with the waste management. The AIILSG and the Commissioner of Municipal Administration jointly organized a workshop in December last year on this theme in New Mumbai where the modalities were discussed in the presence of the officials of both the cities.

Gender issue – Though poverty and gender issues did not figure as the critical issues as such in both the cities, the needs of working women living in Panvel and Virar and working in the neighboring cities were raised in the working group discussion on the civic amenities. The economy of Virar and Panvel depends largely on the job employment of citizens in Mumbai and in the industrial areas near New Mumbai. Both the cities have excellent connectivity by road and rail network. The requirement of day care centres for the children of the serving women was voiced particularly in Virar.

Adaptation of toolkit- SCP Source Books provided by the HABITAT provide very elaborate Tools for piloting the EPM process in the cities. This toolkit has been adapted and translated for local requirement. The EPM process of Phase I has been documented and published for the benefit of both phase I cities and for the cities to be selected for phase II. It is felt that in addition to the SCP tool kit and the EMIS tool, a few tools of PRA like city walk, mapping, and interactive surveys could help in local planning. Similarly, the Planning, Doing-Checking-Acting approach of the EMS could be useful for action planning and demonstration projects.

Environmental Status Report – The AIILSG has evolved a set of guidelines and format for the City Environmental Status Report. This was prepared through a process of consultation with environment experts, city managers of the phase I cities and with the environment cell of Mumbai and Pune corporation. This has been endorsed by the State Environment department and has been circulated to the ULBs in the state

Experience sharing of Phase I – The results and experience of phase I were shared with other cities and government functionaries in a Regional Workshop on SCP in Mumbai in February- March 2005. The progress of Phase I was independently evaluated by the HABITAT in February 2005.
As discussed earlier, broad strategy for Phase II was discussed with the Government of Maharashtra.

LESSONS OF PHASE I

EPM Process and Community Empowerment- The experience of the phase I of the SCP in Maharashtra shows that the EPM process is a scientific approach to conduct city consultative process in a flexible yet structured way. A wide based EP can provide the backdrop for this process. As already discussed, the SCP tools can be strengthened by similar other tools of, for example, PRA and EMS.

Stakeholders’ participation in the deliberation is highly empowering and enhances their capacities to appreciate the nuances of political process. The city consultation bridges the communication gap among the stakeholders and helps better understanding of each others’ position and viewpoint on the key issues. This also reduces political and bureaucratic delays of development projects. Both cities supported the process, and admitted gains in terms of better understanding of city issues and support from the citizens. However the ability of the anchor to network with the government agencies for problem solving was an important binding force to sustain the process.

While solid waste management was the main focus of SCP process in the beginning, other issues also emerged, as the consultative process unfolded. In both the cities issues ranging from Water supply and Sanitation, infrastructure and development planning process to gender specific and poverty issues were raised and discussed and probable strategies were suggested. Stakeholders’ participation in strategic and action planning being its main element, the EPM process is relevant to any civic issue,

State Support – State support both to the SCP process and the anchor institution is vital to the programme, could be seen in Chennai project and was strongly felt in Phase I of the SCP in Maharashtra. Dependence of the urban local bodies on the state government for planning, resources and implementation, makes such support imperative. On their part, the cities are likely to support process development programme like the SCP, as they view it as an opportunity to garner State level political and bureaucratic support for city development. In long term, however, the institutionalization of the EPM process may need legislative support of the state. The strategy to upscale the EPM process must therefore base itself on a committed government support. For this very reason, the sensitization, proactive involvement and monitoring at the state level has to be targeted and ensured by the anchor institution.

Entry Point- Urban local Bodies are constitutional entities with clearly defined political and administrative structure, functions and powers. Community participation in the planning and management is often very ‘alien’ to their functioning. After the constitution amendment in 1993, the system of ward committees in bigger cities introduced the element of NGOs participation in the planning process. It is however, limited to a few cities. Injecting a participatory process beyond the legal framework is fraught with the risk of resistance from within the municipal body. An entry point in the form of addressing their most felt need makes inroads into the formal and often rigid system. Backstopping this process by the state can consolidate the entry so made. This is the rationale of focusing the SCP on the SWM in Maharashtra.

Environment-Poverty linkage- Intersection of environment and poverty is sought to be forged in SCP project in Maharashtra by planning the waste management system more recycling oriented and providing employment to urban poor. Low cost environment services provided in the low income settlement can improve the living conditions of poor. Incidentally, there is not a significant slum population in either of the Phase I cities. Thus the poverty agenda was relegated to the backseat. But in phase II, city poverty profile will inescapably be the part of the EP. Considering the imperative of MDG, the format of EP need a review to address this issue squarely with environmental parameters.

Institutionalization - Mainstreaming the EPM process is both an element and an objective to be pursued. SCP in Maharashtra has a long way to go in this direction. It is planned in the following way-

The EPM process has become part of the training calendar of the AIILSG and two such programmes, supported by the government of India and the state government, will be held this year.
The AIILSG has entered a memorandum of understanding with both the cities to set up SCP Project Cells in their cities and support the same with budgetary support. The AIILSG is trying to identify local institutional partners in both the cities who could take the consultative process forward with the support of the AIILSG in the long run.
Such local partner institutions will be identified upfront in Phase II cities. Trainers of these institutions along with the municipal functionaries will be trained with the support of the State Training Institute (YASHDA). They in turn will pilot the EPM process in the cities in collaboration with community based organizations.
Setting up a state level committee and getting policy guidelines issued by the Government will provide the much needed administrative support to the process
Convergence of the SCP with the state level campaign on urban sanitation and national urban renewal mission.

APPROACH TO SCP PHASE II

Learning from the experience and building on the foundation of Phase I, approach to second phase of the SCP has been reviewed and revised. The evaluation of Phase I has also suggested areas of improvement. The change is in terms of greater and more direct engagement of the state government, widening the scope EPM process to address all critical urban issues ab initio, and net working with other capacity building institutions both at the state and local levels. While the entry point will remain the city solid waste management and implementation of the judicial mandate, its linkages with urban poverty alleviation will be focused upfront. There will be efforts to link anti poverty programme and urban cleanliness campaign with the city development strategy. Recycling of natural resources through waste recycling, water resource management will continue to be at the core of the SCP in phase II.

A consensus has emerged on the need to converge the SCP in the state with the Urban Cleanliness campaign under the banner of “Sant Gadge Baba Campaign”. The cities, having shown commitment and outstanding performance in that campaign would be given priority in selection in Phase II of the SCP in Maharashtra. A State Level Committee for selection of the cities and monitoring of the SCP and its institutionalization is proposed to be set up. The committee will be headed by the Principal Secretary, Urban Development Department, Government of Maharashtra; the Senior Advisor, SWM Cell, AIILSG will be the Member Secretary of this committee. Other members will be decided in consultation with the Principal Secretary.
Accordingly, State Level Committee under the Chairmanship of the Principal Secretary Urban Development, Government of Maharshtra has been set. The Committee , in its meeting on 16th June 2005 selected the following cities for PhaseII:-

Warora- District Chandrapur- Nagpur region.
Yavatmal- Amravati region.
Aurangabad, Latur and Jalna – Aurangabad region.
Rahuri- Nashik Region
Ashta- Pune region
Ratnagirir- Konkan region

Based on the experience of Phase I, the SCP toolkit will be adapted and more tools for an effective participatory planning will be tried out for application in Phase II. Institutionalization of the SCP/EPM in the AIILSG has already begun with the introduction of two training programmes organized in October and the other in November 2005. It is proposed to net- work with the State training institution to introduce similar training courses as part of their training calendar.

The AILSG will simultaneously complete the SCP process in the pilot cities of Panvel and Virar and will try to facilitate Demo projects in these cities in collaboration with the Basic Urban Services initiative of the UN-HABITAT. The city selected as the demonstration city will be requested to identify a key official to coordinate with concerned departments, agencies and stakeholders and provide continuity to the SCP process. He will be assisted by an appropriate secretarial support to follow up on a sustained basis. This may eventually evolve a team of experts at the city level, committed to the agenda and the process of the SCP and will help in the institutionalization of the process in local governance.

The AIILSG has signed into urban pacts with the second phase cities at the start of the SCP process and SCP project cell is established in the city in the beginning itself and local partners are being associated with that. The sensitization and motivation of the city representatives is no less important for the SCP process to succeed. With this object a study tour of the city representatives was organized in September 2005 for sharing experience of the SCP and other community based city development initiatives. This will set the tone of Phase II as well.

OBJECTIVES FOR SCP PHASE II

Based on the experience of Phase I and the approach mentioned above the phase II the objective for the SCP in Maharashtra are: –

To replicate the SCP/EPM process in eight more cities in the State to develop city development strategy and plans.
Consolidating the SCP process through the involvement and the support of the State Government.
To bring poor at the focal point of planning and governance through intersection of environment and poverty.
Institutionalization of EPM process through convergence with Policy and programme of both the state and the national governments.

CONVERGENCE WITH STATE AND NATIONAL PROGRAMMES

The main plank of strategy of the SCP in Phase II is to institutionalize the EPM process as a participatory decision making tool both at the city and the state level. Mainstreaming of the SCP with the National Urban Renewal Mission (NURM), and state policy and programme especially State Urban Sanitation Campaign is being emphasized to forge synergy and convergence of objectives of sustainable development of cities and towns.

The State of Maharashtra has launched, in 2002, a state level urban sanitation campaign under the banner of “Sant Gadge Baba Urban sanitation campaign” with focus not just on Sanitation but on improvement of basic urban services, city infrastructure and good governance. The components of this campaign are –

Water Supply Management.
Solid Waste Management.
Drainage.
Social amenities and Slum education.
Public Health and family planning education.
Civic planning, amenities and beautification.
Human resources and financial management.
Public participation

The performance of cities which participate in the campaign is evaluated by a state level committee on above parameters and cities that are ranked high in different regions and at the state level are given cash incentives in addition to felicitation by the Head of the State. This campaign, which has become a regular plan programme of the state government, has given great impetus to the urban reform agenda towards more sustainable city development.

The Government of India has embarked upon an ambitious urban reform campaign under the banner of “National Urban Renewal Mission” with seeks to link investment support to the cities and the state with a very wide menu of mandatory and optional reforms. The mission objective includes the “provision of basic services to urban poor including security of tenure at affordable prices, improved housing, water supply, sanitation and ensuring of other services such as for education, health and social security”. An important feature of the mission is that all the previously existing funding programmes have been merged with the NURM for any future funding support. The policy document of the Government of India mandates the cities bidding for any support under the mission to evolve a City Development Plan through the involvement of the stakeholders. The funding support also requires a tripartite agreement between the Government of India, Government of Maharashtra and the Urban Local Body. The NURM also includes Urban Infrastructure Development Scheme for Small and Medium Towns (UIDSSMT) which has a strong component of integrated housing and slum development for urban poor.

In The state level meeting of the SCP Committee on 6th September 2005, it was decided by the Government of the state to link State level sanitation campaign, NURM with the stakeholder participatory planning process of the SCP and evolve City Development Strategy based on the EPM process. This gives a great opportunity to the AIILSG to upscale the EPM process and also institutionalize the same at the state level policy level by demonstration of its capacity to provide a tool for city development planning.

CAPACITY BUILDING

Capacity building at both the government and local level is a key element of the phase II strategy. Compared to phase I, much greater stress is being laid on identifying local partner institutions in the identified cities and their capacity building up front to enable them to play a sheet anchor role right in the early stages of the consultative process. In order to seize the opportunity to forge convergence of the SCP with the priority programmes of the National and State governments, the AIILSG has been organizing a series of capacity building workshops at the state and city levels to sensitize the stakeholders on the environment, development and poverty alleviation and support them to evolve city development strategy, action plan and resource and investment plan. Experience sharing with other SCP cities is a part of the capacity building inputs. The AIILSG will hold a series of training and capacity workshops on both the EPM process of the SCP and City Development Strategy with a view to sensitize the city manager and enhance their skills to prepare sustainable City Development Plans. AIILSG would provide a toolkit for the planning process under the prestigious NURM programme of the Government of India. While doing this exercise the Town or land use plan will be the basic planning document; the consultation process may bring out areas of modification in that plan.

CORE GROUP ON DEVELOPMENT PLANNING

The Core Group has been constituted by the Urban Development Department GoM vide its GR No. TPBP-4304/2312/UD-11 dated 19th September 2005. The setting of the Core Group has its background in the City Consultation process held under the Phase – I of the Sustainable Cities Programme implemented in the Virar and Panvel.

A peculiar situation in Virar is that the development plan of Vasai- Virar region has not been finalized during last almost 15 years. The area did not have Development Control rules until February 2004. There have been unauthorized activities as result, in this area leading to haphazard development. Development in this region is also limited by the coastal zone regulations, which have come in the way of identifying a suitable land for the sanitary landfill.

In order to expedite the process of approving the Development Plan of Virar and also discuss the bottlenecks, in general, involved in the preparation and implementation of Development Plans a meeting of the stakeholders involved was convened under the chairmanship of the Principal Secretary (I) Urban Development Department on the 29th April 2004. The meeting was attended by experts from the field of urban planning such as Shri. Ramanath Jha, Shri. V.K. Phatak and Shri. A.K. Jain.

The Core Group is in the final stages of submitting its recommendation to the Government and among various other issues the Group has identified the need for manpower development and capacity building to create a strong pool of qualified urban planners well versed with the physical planning as well as policy issues related to Urban Development and Governance.

POVERTY FOCUS

The focus of the SCP Phase II will be to capture poverty profile in the cities concerned and underline the agenda of inclusive growth and provisioning of basic urban services for the urban poor. The consultative process will specially focus on extending sanitation infrastructure to the urban poor and evolving technology options that provide livelihoods also. The All India Institute of Local Self Government has been designated as the National Resource Centre of Poverty Alleviation by the Government of India. The SCP will be able to draw on the experience of the resource centre both in terms of poverty profiling and also in building strategies to inclusive planning and development.

BASIC URBAN SERVICES PROGRAMME

The SCP/EPM process will demonstrate integrated environmental planning in a low income cluster through mainstreaming of the BUS initiative of the UN HABITAT. The objective of setting up the demo facility will be to both demonstrate the technology of and approach to sustainable development. The selection of the city for the BUS will be done during the course of Phase II.

THE EPM PROCESS

In tune with the tool kit of the SCP, the EPM process will begin with environmental profiling of the cities, prepared in collaboration with the city stakeholders during the period between first training programme and the city Consultations in the cities. The AIILSG will hold preparatory meetings in the cities selected to identify the needs and critical issues in the cities and list the stakeholders and the local partner institutions having both stakes in the issues and also having capacity at the local level to take the EPM process forward and sustain it. The preparatory meetings will be in the nature of mini consultation to both refine the Environmental profile and broadly define the course of the city consultative process. This will be followed by city consultations which will lead to both prioritization of issues and the areas in the city which need city intervention in terms of investment planning. The Working Group exercise will be aimed at developing a vision of the city, development and growth strategy and development and investment plan.

CITY COMMITMENT TO THE PARTICIPATORY PROCESS

The AIILSG has been trying to get commitment of the cities in the early stage of the process in the form of a Memorandum of Understanding on the SCP process and setting up a SCP project Cell. Identification of a local partner institution is being done upfront. The State government has also been associated in the exercise, right from the stage of selection of the cities to ensure the policy and higher level support in working group exercise, cross sectoral coordination and city development planning.

The city consultation process is expected to raise a variety of issues now underlined in the National Urban Renewal Mission policy document. While Zero waste oriented solid waste management will continue to be the initial focus of SCP process, other issues, prioritized by the cities will be addressed by the inter-sectoral working groups for necessary administrative and policy intervention. Some of the issues raised during Phase I in Virar and Panvel, which are of general relevance will be taken to the state level for policy decisions, as these may provide cues to the issues raised during Phase II. The SCP process will focus on poverty as the cross cutting theme and will dovetail poverty alleviation programme under the NURM with SCP as a strategy.

The SCP process will be institutionalized in the training activities of the AIILSG. It is proposed to include the concept of the SCP/EPM in various training programme of the AIILSG and also conduct special training workshops through the Regional Centre of Urban & Environment Studies of the AIILSG.

The AIILSG is developing resource and reference material for capacity building interventions and advisory services. It will also document the discussions and the experiences of the city consultations. This will further help in standardizing the tools for upscaling and replicating the consultative process in other areas. The AIILSG is extending the support of its professionals to the cities and would support different targeted activities at the city level as the process advances.

It is proposed to build in some logistic support and incentive for the city level partners in the SCP process. It is proposed that the cities selected for Phase II will be given financial support for secretarial work and planning for steering the EPM process through all its phases. The city selected will be requested to identify a key official to coordinate with concerned departments, agencies and stakeholders and provide continuity to the SCP process. He will be assisted by an appropriate secretarial support to follow up on a regular basis.