PRESS CONFERENCE BY NON-GOVERNMENTAL ORGANIZATIONS ON SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT

Civil society groups recognized that the primary responsibility for sustainable development rested with national governments, but the international community should deliver on its commitments to help put the world back on track, a representative of the non-governmental organization, SIDS/OASIS, told correspondents today at a Headquarters press conference sponsored by the Permanent Mission of Barbados. 

As the Commission on Sustainable Development, acting as the preparatory committee for the upcoming World Summit on Sustainable Development, concludes the third of four preparatory meetings today, representatives of six non-governmental organizations (NGOs) addressed correspondents:  Gordon Bispham, SIDS/OASIS Caucus; William Pace, Legal Instruments Caucus; Carlos Garcia-Robles, National Youth Environment Network of Mexico; Swati R. Raut, Science and Technology NGO Caucus; Ricio Valente, Indigenous Peoples' Caucus; and Stacie Oliver, World Federalist Association.

The World Summit on Sustainable Development will be held in Johannesburg, South Africa, from 26 August to 4 September.  It is a 10-year review of progress made in achieving the goals of sustainable development, as contained in "Agenda 21" -– a comprehensive plan for global action in all areas of sustainable development.

Mr. Bispham, who led the press conference, said it had been called because a collective group of NGOs from around the world were very concerned about the widespread lack of determination on the part of most governments to reach a substantive position, in terms of the outcome of the upcoming meeting in Johannesburg.  The NGOs were trying to create a better quality of life for all citizens and ensure that implementation of Agenda 21 was accelerated.

As negotiations continued, he urged governments and stakeholders to recognize the potential of the World Summit in terms of putting the world back on track and evolving some mandatory frameworks with respect to sustainable development.  Government initiatives could only go so far.  There must be certain core minimum standards with mandatory levels of corporate accountability, and greater coherence in terms of the economic, social and environmental considerations, in order to achieve that delicate balance called for by sustainable development. 

Mr. Bispham called on governments to recognize that there were a few major challenges that must be addressed, as identified in the Secretary-General's reports.  Among them was that the whole process of trying to integrate Agenda 21 into sustainable development had been fragmented at the national, regional and international levels.  Also, there had been a failure to change significantly the "unsustainable" partners of consumption and production, and the means of implementation had been very limited, especially with respect to finance.

Ms. Raut said there had been precious little progress in the current discussions on such issues as racism, environmental justice, the rights of indigenous peoples, women, human security, youth, militarism and corporate accountability.  Those issues were simply not mentioned or only minimally, despite NGO attempts to influence national delegates in that regard.

Mr. Garcia-Robles said that there were generally great expectations for Johannesburg and that governments that failed to live up to them risked their own

legitimacy.  There was a clamour of expectation and urgency from populations around the world.  Governments should not fail to meet those hopes.  The preparatory meetings, and the conference itself, were being led by countries in the North, while the countries of the South were basically being set aside.  That was particularly true with respect to youth, mainly of the South.  Yet, the decisions made by the North would be implemented by the South.

Ms. Oliver reminded governments that women made up half the world's population, yet their contributions had gone virtually unnoticed in the preparatory process.  The upcoming conference was a great opportunity to end the pervasive discrimination of women and their status as second-class citizens.  Would governments allow the legacy of the World Summit to be that it had neglected half the world?  The Summit offered a great opportunity to begin to right some of the wrongs, by allowing women access to land, clean water and education.  If governments were willing to step forward in that regard, then it would be possible to create a better world for the coming generations.

Ms. Valente said that indigenous participation had been specifically recognized and supported in Chapter 26 of Agenda 21.  The concept of sustainable development was fairly new on the international agenda, but for indigenous peoples it had always been a way of life -– and a matter of cultural integrity and survival.  Since the Earth Summit, the importance of including indigenous peoples in the effort towards achieving sustainable development had been stressed.  Indeed, the 300 million indigenous peoples inhabiting every region of the world were one of the poorest sectors of society, yet, because of their values, traditional knowledge and ancestral resource management practices, they would play a key role in reversing the current environmental crisis.

Their harmonious relationship with nature must be respected in the strategies for sustainable development, she added.  Indigenous people held a "distinct and vital" source of knowledge, which must be protected.  The ratification and application of existing international conventions relevant to indigenous peoples were critical to sustainable development.  She was greatly disappointed by the lack of inclusion and recognition of the role of indigenous peoples in both the third Preparatory Committee session and in the Chairman's report.

Mr. Pace said that, due to a failure of leadership, vision and political will, the preparatory process was failing dramatically, in a way that went beyond the situation in the second and third preparatory committee sessions leading to the Rio Summit.  Among the governments, the new JUS-CANZ government grouping (Japan, United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand) was undermining virtually every hope of progressive agreement in implementing Agenda 21 and having a moderately progressive document for Johannesburg. 

He added that many NGOs had indicated that the countries of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) had completely "hijacked" the “Group

of 77” countries and China, which had not been allowed to be effective.  Normally, a like-minded group of governments would come together, but that was not happening.  He hoped it would at the fourth preparatory committee in Indonesia.

On the legal issues, he said there had been a rejection of implementation of the Rio legal principles and a retreat on them.  The whole implementation process was being overtaken by so-called "type II" initiatives, which was a privatization of government responsibilities in implementation.  Also, individual private businesses were being accredited directly to the intergovernmental process.  That trend of accrediting non-NGO entities as NGOs to an international conference had some very

dangerous aspects, and would marginalize the ability of NGOs to do their work at the United Nations.

Asked to shed light on where the NGOs hoped to end up after Johannesburg, Mr. Bispham said he was not calling for a laundry list, but for concrete action, with means for implementation.  So far, certain critical issues had not been addressed in the draft outcome text.

Another correspondent commented that the real issues were poverty, food, water and energy, yet there was no talk during the preparatory process about concrete actions with clear time-bound commitments.  Why had the NGO community not raised the question of how those issues would be addressed?

Mr. Garcia-Robles said that most people had not understood that sustainable development was basically about how human beings interacted with their surroundings.  The sustainable development process must include every aspect of human life.  Youth was a very important aspect, as that segment represented 51 per cent of the world's population.  In developing countries, youth represented 70 per cent of the global population, yet that group had not been properly integrated.

Ms. Raut said that in her Asian region governments should be responsive to the environment, second only to the security of States. 

Ms. Valente said action plans must be implemented, and consumption and production patterns must be changed through public-awareness campaigns.  Indigenous peoples had already been recognized for their traditional knowledge about sustainable development, but now they were facing marginalization. 

Mr. Bispham added that developing an action plan for implementation required an accurate assessment of developments over the past decade, including an examination of any new factors that might affect sustainable development.

Responding to a series of questions about the third preparatory committee session, Mr. Pace reiterated that the vote to accredit private groups for the Johannesburg conference was setting a precedent for direct accreditation.  Some local authorities, which were mainly political parties, would like to be directly accredited, but that would open the door to many groups and individuals who would probably welcome the shift. That was a dangerous precedent and a further attempt to weaken the inputs of civil society and NGOs in United Nations/intergovernmental decision-making. 

The NGOs were not alone in thinking that the World Summit was at a crisis, he added.  It would be interesting for the press to find out how many heads of State were actually willing to go and endorse that "extremely weak vision" that was being advanced to the final preparatory session in Indonesia.  The NGOs had enormously specific issues about what should be included in the implementation goals, including the key aspect of monitoring implementation of the trade and financial institutions.

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