Earth Summit 2002

A New Deal

Felix Dodds, Felix Dodds

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2014
• ISBN:
  9781134206735
• Edition: 2
• Topic: Economics
• Subtopic: Development Economics
• Index: Economics

'As we start the preparations for the Earth Summit in 2002, 10 years from Rio and 30 years from Stockholm, we need to set targets and dates that are realistic to deliver the change that is needed. There will also need to be a debate on the international machinery to achieve what we want, and 2002 will be significant in setting out the direction. This book has drawn in some of the key people who are working to make 2002 a significant event' FROM THE FOREWORD BY KLAUS TOPFER, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, UNITED NATIONS ENVIRONMENT PROGRAMME AND CENTRE FOR HUMAN SETTLEMENTSAt the Earth Summit in Rio in 1992, world leaders adopted a comprehensive programme of action for implementing sustainable development worldwide. As preparations for Earth Summit 2002 proceed, leading players from around the world present a frank assessment of progress to date. They set goals and describe mechanisms that will enable the international community to complete the tasks set in Rio and prepare for new challenges and opportunities. This book will be a catalyst for the public and political momentum required to push forward the global sustainable development agenda.

Part I

Roadblocks to Implementing Agenda 21 and How to Overcome Them

1

Roadblocks to Agenda 21: A Government Perspective

Simon Upton

Agenda 21 was motivated by perceptions of a deteriorating world environment and the need for humankind to clean up its act. However, like all compromises engineered by the UN system, and despite the best efforts of the able people involved, Agenda 21 is a version of everything. It means all things to all people and hides a maze of differing judgements and aspirations.

For the developing world, as the initial chapters of Agenda 21 make quite clear, the priority remains economic development and the alleviation of poverty and its worst manifestations – hunger, disease, illiteracy. For the developed world the priorities are rather different. There, poverty is not really much of an issue, except at the margins. The developed world has the time to look at what it is doing to its natural surroundings, its environment, and to feel an overriding sense of concern about it. Of course, these are crude generalizations. Many in the developing world feel very strongly indeed about their environment. Many in the developed world hardly give a toss.

However, the broad picture is, I think, valid. The approach of the developing world was: ‘You, developed countries, are worried about the state of the global environment. You want us to take action. However, our perception is that you have basically created this state of affairs through your own excesses. Furthermore, our priorities are limited to the basic needs of survival. So if you want us to take part in your global drive, you must give us the resources to do so, and you cannot expect us to do anything which interferes in any major way with our drive for economic development.’ Their interlocutors in the developed world argued along the following lines: ‘The indications are that the global environment is deteriorating, and deteriorating all the quicker because of runaway resource use and development in an increasing number of countries. There are growing global problems of climate change, loss of biodiversity, pressures on freshwater, marine pollution, hazardous waste accumulation and so on. These and other problems are reflected at the regional and local level. We must all play our part together in changing the way we do things, for our individual good, and for the good of the planet. Development that isn’t community based – wherever it takes place – is doomed and self-defeating.’

Again, this is a broad generalization. There are many in the developing world taking action on the environment without waiting for help from outside. There are many in the developed world prepared to take a lead on environmental action without any guarantees that others will follow suit.

But to my mind these are pretty much the fundamental differences of view that make Agenda 21 less a blueprint for action, with all that denotes in terms of acknowledged roles, planning and sequencing, and more a challenging proposition, one that still requires a modus operandi.

It is still needed. I am no expert on every facet of the state of the world environment. I have a particular concern about the atmosphere and the toxic by-products of modern industrial processes. If I follow indications given by science-based bodies like the IPCC, UN agencies like UNEP and the FAO and non-governmental think tanks like the World Resources Institute then we continue to face challenges in a number of other areas. Global population is increasing fairly rapidly, especially in developing countries and in urban environments, where problems of waste and pollution are intensifying. Food production may be able to keep pace, but distribution isn’t, to the same degree. There are increasing problems getting access to clean, safe freshwater. Energy use is rising, and with it the production of carbon dioxide, the major greenhouse gas contributing to global warming and climate change. We may be cutting down on the use of ozone-depleting substances but the ozone layer remains in a fragile state: continued vigilance is required. We are overloading the global nitrogen cycle, and this plus unsustainable agricultural practices is leading to soil degradation. Acid rain is a growing problem in Asia. On the biodiversity side, the global forests estate continues to shrink. Bioinvaders are a particular menace. The state of the world’s oceans is cause for real concern, with habitats, especially reefs, and fish stocks under extreme stress.

Broad conclusions that can be drawn from all this are as follows: changes in natural ecosystems are occurring on a larger scale than ever before. There are important changes occurring in the global systems and cycles that underpin ecosystem functioning. And the threats to biodiversity are severe, both in terms of extinction of species, and loss of habitats.

The fact is that we have been aware of these and other problems for some considerable time. And it is not as though we have done nothing about them. We have at least made an effort at the international level to organize ourselves, in fora and under legal conventions. The problem I think is that very often we get bogged down in process and the substance gets lost.

I was aware of this especially when I was facing, with some trepidation, the prospect of chairing the 7th Session of the United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD-7) in April 1999. The CSD had the reputation of being a turgid talk-shop, which resulted in nothing of substance and devoted its attentions to the painful wordsmithing of negotiated texts. I was gratified to find that many of my fellow ministers were quite of my mind, and like me wanted to see the CSD change its ways and become once again a body capable of providing real direction to the effort in favour of sustainable development.

One of the key subjects we had to deal with was Oceans and Seas. The complex tangle of bodies and instruments coming under the UNCLOS umbrella gives the impression of a minutely regulated resource. So it may be, but for all that we have not yet succeeded in managing it sustainably.

I am not sure that the New York environment is a good one for discussion and decision-making on sustainable development. In New York it must compete for attention with so many other issues better suited to that environment. It is hard to take climate change seriously if you have not experienced life on an island atoll 3 metres above sea-level where you are prey to any big wave. It is hard to get steamed up about the ozone layer unless you live, as I do, in a country where UVB exposure is a major cause of cancer. And poverty has no meaning if you have not made your home and livelihood, if you can call it that, on a rubbish heap without clean water to drink or wash and no hope of anything better. Though there may be no alternative to New York and its processes, we need to remind ourselves constantly of the reality about which we appear to talk so knowledgeably. We need to dig Agenda 21 out of the morass of bureaucractic process, diplomatic verbiage, and the mental trenches laid down on the battlefield of geopolitical debate.

We need to put Agenda 21 back on the road again. But we also need to get our bearings. One of the main problems we face in this regard is that we have no clear idea of exactly what we are aiming for. What is the paradigm of sustainable development? Does one exist, and is it useful to try to define it? Or should we instead agree to focus our efforts on four or five priority areas? The core of the problem is what and how people produce and consume. This is a very difficult issue, because it impinges on the fundamental tenets of economic development, of aspirations that everyone has for a better life through increased economic means, and of the freedom and flexibility to explore and try things out. The challenge for us, and it is increasingly one of life and death, is to find ways of exploiting our natural and physical environment in ways that conserve its capacity for exploitation in the future.

At the bottom, we’re involved in substituting natural capital with intellectual capital. We can no longer depend on seemingly inexhaustible supplies of virtually anything, and we are having to find ways of using resources more efficiently, both in terms of the benefits we draw from them and the degree to which we render them unfit for future use. What we don’t know enough about is the extent to which the intellectual capital can be substituted for the natural capital. So managing the risks inherent in that process of substitution becomes critical. Facing a major challenge such as climate change, for example, some claim that the future growth in intellectual capital – manifested, for example, in climate-friendly technologies – will take care of any risks. However, set against the magnitude of the risks involved and the long time frames required to reduce concentration levels of greenhouse gases, sole reliance on the white knight of intellectual capital is a deficient risk-management strategy. There is a need to take precautionary action.

The tools we have to meet this challenge globally are not all that well developed. International relations up to this century have evolved largely to meet the needs of individual states in terms of the acquisition – or the prevention of acquisition – of territory, hegemony, trade rights and so on. This reflects a basic grab for resources and power. The idea that there might be something for every country to gain from international exchange, and that there should be economic stability to allow them a chance to gain it, is relatively recent. It is reflected in the Bretton Woods instruments and later in the GATT. One prime motivation was the need to find ways of reducing the sort of tensions that led to World War II, of setting the whole world on a path to economic development and prosperity that, it was hoped, would minimize the chances of a nuclear Armageddon. The idea was to provide a global framework for economic development and, through the UN, for political security that would allow every country to pursue unmolested its sovereign interests in getting richer without impinging upon the freedom of others to do the same.

The idea that the rest of the world should be interested in what other countries do internally, except in terms of military build-ups and other possible threats to security, is also of recent origin. The interest in, and opposition to, ideological systems of government that favoured aggressive proselytism and acquisition of territory and power gradually extended to human rights abuses – one of the strongest generators, along with starvation and poverty, of political instability. The envelope of enlightened self-interest was being pushed further and further.

It is, however, quite a step from there to a willingness to recognize that the rest of the world might have a legitimate interest in the way individual countries pursue their sovereign interests in the economic activity that was the hope and focus of the post-war settlement. There are still many countries, and they include the world’s most powerful country as well as many developing countries, where there is an unwillingness to recognize that the rest of the world could have a legitimate interest in these ostensibly internal matters.

The sense of feeling one’s way into the future is reflected in the current state of action. It is in some ways counterintuitive to begin with action on ozone, because it represents one of the few likely success stories; but it stands in useful contrast. Since the entry into force of the 1987 Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer, there has been an estimated 70 per cent cut in consumption of ozone-depleting substances, and it is hoped that with the full implementation of the Protocol and its adjustments and amendments, the ozone layer will recover by 2050. It is predicted that in so doing, 20 million cases of skin cancer will have been avoided, along with other serious damage to human and animal health and terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems.

In climate change the picture is very different. The developed country parties in Annex 1 to the 1992 UN Framework Convention on Climate Change may well meet their non-binding commitment to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by the year 2000 – in aggregate, if not individually. But the first steps in effective binding action must await the entry into force of the 1997 Kyoto Protocol and the first commitment period of 2008–2012.

Parties to the UNFCCC have not yet worked out what long-term concentration level of gases is safe, and therefore what transition path they should follow towards a global envelope covering the needs of all. Many developing countries strongly resist the prospect of having to take action in future, but so do many in the developed world. There is a variety of reasons for this, as I have outlined earlier. Climate change is fraught with uncertainties. Greenhouse gas reduction involves no clear future benefit – the benefit would be damage avoided rather than any net increase in wealth or well-being; it involves actual and ongoing costs – except for those quick enough to position themselves to advantage. It will affect all important areas of economic activity.

In respect of biodiversity, we have rather a mixed bag. Prior to the 1992 Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) there was already a number of multilateral environment agreements (MEAs) which addressed problems of species loss and the need for conservation at both the regional and global levels. These instruments have had some success but at best can only be considered work in progress. The CBD involves an attempt to draw the various strands of species and habitats into a composite global whole. However, a problem of the CBD has been in defining what it should do that will make a difference, and then knuckling down to do it. The highest priority for a majority of parties to the CBD was the negotiation of a Protocol on Biosafety; this gradually turned into something of an inquisition against the products of biotechnology in general. Talks were initially stalled in February 1999 when agreement on the text of the Protocol was not forthcoming and the First Extraordinary Meeting of the Conference of the Parties of the CBD was suspended. The Protocol was finally adopted in January 2000.¹ Meanwhile, though the CBD has initiated work programmes in various areas, it has yet to make any real difference to the continued global loss of biodiversity.

The pressing need for remedial action in respect of the marine environment was one of the most important issues before CSD-7. The problem here is not that there is not a coherent legal framework – there is, provided by the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea – or a lack of attention to particular issues and risks. Rather, the problem is that there is no overall oversight of the management of the world’s oceans and the effects that it is having. The problem was illustrated graphically for a number of fellow CSD members during my visits to the major continents by the chart in Figure 1.1.

Note the complexity of the system that has been built up over the decades to provide an overall management framework to deal with the two key problems: pressure from the exploitation of living marine resources and marine pollution, including land-based sources. It is further illustrated by the fact that when it came time for the UN system to publish a report on the state of the world’s oceans and their management prior to CSD-7, the various agencies con...