The Kyoto Protocol provides countries of Eastern European and the Commonwealth of Independent States (EE & CIS) with new opportunities for reducing their greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, moving their development towards a low?carbon path, mobilizing resources for environmentally friendly technologies and achieving other sustainable development objectives. However, in order to realize the opportunities provided by the innovative mechanisms under the Kyoto Protocol, the countries need to develop strong national institutional, technical and human capacities to being able to effectively identify, develop, evaluate, approve and implement projects under JI/CDM and other carbon market schemes, such as under the voluntary carbon market.