PRESS CONFERENCE BY CHAIRMAN OF SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT COMMISSION
Press Briefing
PRESS CONFERENCE BY CHAIRMAN OF SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT COMMISSION
19990430
The biggest change in the Commission on Sustainable Development was to have Ministers engaging in an informal dialogue on some of the big issues of the day, Simon Upton (New Zealand), Chairman of the Commission's seventh session, said at a Headquarters press conference this afternoon. That dialogue had produced some very spirited and even outspoken debate on such issues as flags of convenience and fisheries.
Briefing correspondents on the outcome of the just-concluded session, Mr. Upton said that despite initial nervousness about the new approach, everybody had seemed to enjoy the experience. From that point of view, the meeting had been hugely successful and nobody had expressed a wish to return to the previous way of running the Commission. It was now possible for the next Chairman to use the present momentum to continue down a very different path.
Mr. Upton said his own view was that there should not be any statements by Ministers. They should engage in an entirely free flow debate. But it was up to the next bureau to decide whether they should continue down that path. During previous meetings he had picked up an increasing sense of disillusionment that the Commission as a forum was neither gaining much traction nor engaging the attention and interest of Ministers. His overriding aim as Chairman had been to breathe new life into the process.
Turning to substantive matters, the Chairman said the issue of oceans and seas was inevitably difficult because it was an enormous and ancient international agenda, involving layer upon layer of treaties, interventions, agreements and agencies. The archaeology of international maritime and marine negotiations was a specialist subject in itself. However, the Commission had done justice to the issue, including setting aside a whole day of the Ministerial segment to consider it.
He said that three of the issues on which the Commission had failed to reach agreement were the question of subsidies as they relate to fisheries, the provision of consumer information on fishing and the transport and transit of hazardous waste. However, the failure to reach agreement could be seen positively. It had resulted in a much more credible document because there had been no attempt to reach a "lowest common denominator" consensus.
The most important thing the Commission had done in terms of the "big picture" was to state right up front that the two most pressing decisions facing the oceans were overfishing and land-based sources of pollution, he said. Those were the unequivocal priorities. Anybody who wanted to do anything about oceans, whether on the national, regional or international level should not waste their time on other issues until they had fixed those ones. More than 60 per cent of the world's fish stocks were depleted and
Sustainable Development Press Conference - 2 - 30 April 1999
under stress. There was a gigantic international fishing effort that still managed to discard a quarter of all the fish that were taken. There was nothing sustainable about what was happening in the world's fisheries.
He said that in supporting the work of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the International Maritime Organization (IMO) on illegal, unregulated and unreported fishing, the Commission was urging that those agencies should consider the problem of States which did not fulfil their responsibilities under international law as flag States in respect of their fishing vessels, particularly concerning conservation measures.
On the issue of small island developing States, he said a lot of progress had been made, but the process had not reached finality. The Commission had not decided on a clear text available for adoption by next September's General Assembly special session on Small Island Developing States to review implementation of the 1994 Barbados Programme of Action. That issue required further attention and would re-emerge once more closer to the date of the special session.
Turning to an issue that had never been tackled before in the Commission, he said the discussion on tourism and sustainable development had not been bound by previous decisions and had produced some good recommendations. Many of those reflected the outcome of the multi-stakeholder dialogue held at the beginning of last week.
Responding to a question, Mr. Upton said the most important achievement of the just-concluded session was one that appeared to be procedural on the face of it. If the big priorities before the Commission could be carried through and debated as necessary by the General Assembly with proper preparation, that was a major step forward which would give a much higher profile to ocean issues. It was a very significant breakthrough.
In response to another question, he said the Commission had not discussed the question of environmental damage resulting from the conflict in the Balkans. The Commission had decided -- by a no-action motion carried by 33 votes in favour, 4 against with 8 abstentions -- that it was not the appropriate venue to discuss that matter. It was the first time the Commission had held a no-action motion.
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