D Looking further out – possibly beyond – a project, there is a need for a data
set which ensures that development agencies have information about likely
adverse longer-term, intra-regional and national, and economic social politi-
cal environmental outcomes.
A number of parallel formats can be identified in alignment to Strategic
Risk Assessment core procedures – including Environmental Impact Assessment
(EIA), Social Impact Appraisal (SIA), Technical Impact Assessment (TIA), and
Impact Abatement Assessment (IAA). Aggregated, these combine as Total
Economic Valuation (TEV). Some key questions for all manner of project propos-
als are:
- How are the risks apportioned?
- Are the risks at an acceptable scale?
- What are the objectors really saying?
- What are the longer-term ‘legacy’ effects?
- What are the project alternatives?
- Should a project be undertaken ‘now’, ‘later’ or ‘not at all’?
The construction given as box 4.5 sets out a skeletal format for the above, pre-
sented in the style of a Risk Impact Assessment(RIA) procedure. This includes
notes relating to the ‘Decision nodes’ (in plain text) and the ‘Processes’ which take
place between nodes (noted in italics). RIA sets out to facilitate, manage, and
secure development, to serve conservation, and to support growthwithin a balanced
combination of economic-social-environmental parameters and controls. An
important accessory feature about the box 4.5 construct for an RIA is that it
empowers both a ‘call-in’ of projects and a ‘call-up’ of input from local govern-
ment, central government agencies, statutory undertakers (such as state-owned
enterprises and research institutes) and other groups and individuals.
From this it is clear that additional to being ‘environmental’, risk assessment is
concerned for social impact, which also implicates the economic gain-and-cost
pattern. Keeping in mind a simple truism – that commercial development proj-
ects are beholden to shareholder profits – risk management practioners and adju-
dicators need to be diligent about adverse social injustice effects. The wrongdoer
must clean up or pay – the ‘polluter pays principle’ – which may place some or
all of the cost of environmental clean-up onto the consumer – doing so in accor-
dance with the rationale that every citizen warrants equal protection from waste
discard and environmental pollution.
In most instances the perspective of project generators should be counter-
reflected by a mirror appraisal which reflects from and represents those being
impacted upon. In essence, all parties to a project need, separately, to be aware of
the risks and uncertainties and be equipped to respond to them in systematic,
explicit, consistent and trustworthy ways which are co-reliant upon accurate data.
This attendance upon an all-parties level of awareness about risks and uncertain-
ties establishes, on the one hand, better-informed donors and recipients, while
also imposing, on the other hand, compliance requirements. To the clearly up-front
costs associated with the delivery of Risk Impact Assessment compliance, must
Growth Pattern Management 143From Otway and
Fishbean, 1976.
‘Risk research(s)...
hidden agenda is the
legitimacy of decision-
making institutions and
the equitable
distribution of hazards
and benefits.’