The Global Environmental Facility (GEF), for which UNEP, UNDP and the World Bank are the implementing agencies, was established as a mechanism to promote international co-operation and foster actions in providing new and additional grant and concessional funding to eligible countries to meet the agreed incremental costs of measures designed to achieve global environmental benefits.

The GEF Operational Programme #10 states that "the long term objective of the Contamination-based Operational Programme is to develop and implement International Waters projects that demonstrate ways of overcoming barriers to the use of best practices for limiting releases of contaminants causing priority concerns in the International Waters focal area.

Interventions under this operational programme focus on four main components. "One includes a set of limited demonstration projects for addressing land-based activities while others include projects related to contaminants released from ships, persistent toxic substances such as POPs, and targeted regional or global projects useful in setting priorities for possible GEF interventions, meeting the technical needs of projects in this focal area, or distilling lessons learned from experience."

Subsequent to the finalization of the UNEP strategy in March 1998, a concerted effort was made by the Implementing Agencies to address the recommendations of the Overall Performance Study. Project Preparation and Development (PDF-B) grants have been awarded to develop projects in the areas listed below. The GEF Council in December 1999 decided to include a full project on Regionally Based Assessment of Persistent Toxic Substances in its work plan for 2000-2001. A separate Homepage will be developed for this project when it starts.