1.07 Country and regional programmes: independent advice Our advisory trajectory starts with a request for an advice by an eligible authority. This will usually be the local authority responsible for EA approval, but the request can also come from Dutch organisations such as DGIS, embassies, or the RVO. The advice is intended to contribute to the following objectives: • Increase the influence of the requesting authority in the decision-making arena. As a result, they can demand higher performance in EA, which means that the quality of the environmental assessment process and the final ESIA report are improved, resulting in a better quality of the project or plan that is based on the assessment. • Capacity development of one or more organisations involved in environmental assessment. This results in better EA reports, better informed decision-making, better decisions and better projects or plans, as well as implementation that is in compliance with the environmental license conditions or the adopted plan. • Help ensure that project and plans meet national or international quality standards, because they are based on good quality environmental assessment.