On the 14th of March, 2018, Elena Rybak, Member of the Board of the European-Ukrainian Energy Agency (EUEA), managing director of iC consulenten Ukraine took part in the conference “The role of non-governmental organizations in forming the energy policy in South East Europe“. The conference took place in Sofia. The event was organized by the Energy Management Institute, Bulgaria.
Elena moderated the second panel of the conference, which focused on regional peculiarities of energy sector NGOs, experience exchange and joint debate regarding the way to increase the role of NGOs in the energy policy making. Speakers of the panel were represented by top-management and officials from Bulgaria, Romania, Moldova, Serbia, Greece, Turkey and other countries of Europe.
Elena specified that problems, which disturb the European energy NGOs, and are very similar and familiar to the Ukrainian colleagues. First of all this is mistrust from the side of the state authorities, unregulated law, accusations of protecting the interests of a narrow circle of companies.
The most efficient ways of solving these problems, according to speakers of the conference, are increase of expertise and analytical base of NGOs through narrowing specialization, attraction of financing from independent organizations (International donors) as well as improvement of legislation in the field of lobbying. Experts also have high expectations for the so-called Clean Energy Package, which focuses on the establishment of the Energy Union. The Clean Energy Package increases the role of public consultations and therefore brings the NGOs potentially on the next level of energy policy influence.
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