The Arab Civil Aviation Organization was established on 7 February 1996. It is a specialized organization of the Arab League aiming at promoting closer cooperation, coordination and modernization among Arab countries in the field of civil aviation, and its actual headquarter is in Rabat, kingdom of Morocco. The Arab Civil Aviation Organization (ACAO) has been working in the past few years to activate its role as an observer in ICAO´s Committee on Aviation Environmental Protection (CAEP), which was established in 1983 to replace the Noise Committee and the Air Pollution Committee for Aircraft Engines. In view of the challenges and rapid growth of flights in recent years to and from our Arab homeland, which led to an increase in the rates of pollution resulting from the various activities of civil aviation, affecting thus negatively the environment, the Arab Civil Aviation Organization decided to establish the Environment Committee after the Doha declaration of 2009 on Arab Civil Aviation Environment Protection. The committee is in charge of all environmental affairs in the civil aviation sector in the Arab countries. Its first meeting was held in Dubai on July 17, 2010.

The vision of the Environment Committee is to maintain a balanced and sustainable environment for the Arab region by contributing to the development laws, regulations, policies and procedures in the Arab civil aviation sector, in accordance with international and local requirements to reduce the environmental risks of the civil aviation industry and achieve sustainable growth. The Environment Committee has also five strategic objectives. First, conservation of natural resources while optimizing the utilization of new and renewable energies; reducing emissions and noise levels; focusing on capacity-building and human resources development to enable them to implement environmental policies; working on environmental policy and legislation to meet international requirements; The fifth strategic objective is to assess the environmental risks resulting from civil aviation activities to avoid their negative impacts.

Here we highlight the most important achievements of the Environment Committee, which contributed to the development of the aviation industry in the Arab world from the environmental perspective, most notably:

• Issuing a declaration that includes Arab countries´ opposition to the EU´s program on emissions trading in the field of civil aviation, which was circulated in Arabic and English through all audiovisual media (2012)


• The development of an environmental strategy for the Arab States (2013)


• Establishment of a working group on studies on the potential for biofuel production, including economic feasibility and short- and long-term impacts (2014)


• Work on a draft common framework for market based measures proposed by ICAO (2014)


• Modernization of the Arab Civil Aviation Organization strategy related to Environment (2016)


• Development of Standards on the establishment of a directory of Arab Aviation Environment experts at the regional and international levels (2017)


• A training course with ICAO on the ACT CORSIA (2018)


• Training course on Aviation and Environment - Green Airports (2018)


• Dissemination of a directory of entities responsible for the environment for guidance purposes (2019)


• Training course on environment and gas emissions standards ISO 14001/14069 (2019)

Mohammed Ibrahim Marzouki

Vice Chairman of the Environmental Committee of the Arab Civil Aviation Organization