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Editorial

Setting the sustainability agenda for the New Millennium
Luis Gómez Echeverri

Johannesburg: and what nou?
Domingo Jiménez Beltrán

Johannesburg. One setp forwards, two steps back?
Josep Xercavins

Different wiews of the Summit on Sustainable Development
Achim Steiner and other authors

Global disorder
Lluís Reales

Interview with Victor Viñuales, Director of the Ecology and Development Foundation
Lluís Reales

Editorial
From Rio to Johannesburg

The Earth Summit of Rio de Janeiro, held over a decade ago, opened the eyes of the people and governments of the world to the importance of the environmental problems affecting the earth. It was the international coming of age of environmental awareness.

The World Summit on Sustainable Development, which took place from 26th August to 4th September this year in the South African city of Johannesburg, was more than just an environmental summit. It became a meeting on development and an intense debate on the type of development we want and whether the current dynamic of economic globalisation works, given that it does not benefit all human beings but only a privileged minority.
The Johannesburg Summit opened everyone's eyes to o

ne fact that some experts and social activists had been arguing for some time: environmental protection and eradication of poverty are two sides of the same coin. One cannot be achieved without the other.

There is a great paradox in the process since the Rio Summit: in the last decade different successful institutional processes have been initiated but they have not given rise to any tangible global results. In fact, what has happened is that economic globalisation has undermined the progress made by the Rio agenda, has established a world-wide exploitative economy and has left natural resources to the mercy of the market.

In December 1992, this publication entitled an issue of the magazine "After the Earth Summit. What now?" Authors as distinguished as José Lutzenberger, Ramon Tamames, Henk Hobbelink and Ignasi de Senillosa, among others, reflected on the challenges after Rio. The anticipatory nature and relevance of most of those reflections were remarkable. One decade later, we have decided to repeat the experiment because of the Johannesburg Summit. Medi Ambient. Tecnologia i Cultura has asked several people to reflect on the legacy of Johannesburg. It is clearly very early to evaluate the impact of the World Summit on Sustainable Development. However, now a few months have gone by, the first impression is important.

Luís Gómez-Echeverri is a high-ranking official on the United Nations Development Programme and has been a key person throughout the Johannesburg process. From the perspective of the United Nations, his text considers the great challenges involved in sustainable development. Domingo Jiménez Beltrán, ex-Director of the European Environment Agency, assesses the political declaration and the plan of action that emerged from the Summit and analyses the European Union's role in the process. For his part, Josep Xercavins, co-ordinator of the World Forum of Civil Society Networks-Ubuntu, argues that the decisions that states have taken are not the ones the world needs. The article by Achim Steiner, Director-General of the World Conservation Union (WCU) is a heartfelt contribution. The WCU has chosen a series of articles that present the summit from different cultural perspectives. The issue is completed with an interview with Víctor Viñuales, Director of the Ecology and Development Foundation and expert in business and sustainability matters.

Lluís Reales
Editor of Medi Ambient. Tecnologia i Cultura

Setting the Sustainable Agenda for the New Millennium

Luís Gómez Echeverri
Senior Official United Nations Development Programme

(These are the views of the author, which do not necessarily reflect the views of the UNDP, where Luís Gómez-Echeverri is a Senior Official)

The World Summit on Sustainable Development, WSSD, marked the end of a decade of important United Nations Summits and Conferences. It also marked the end of one of the most spectacular decades of change in the international system. The end of the Cold War and the liberalization of markets and finance led to one of the largest transformations in governance at all levels: global, national and local. In a relatively short period of time, new actors and new ways of doing business took on an importance that was either not fully recognized or simply not present during the Rio Summit. The changes and the globalisation that ensued, led to major changes of roles of the various actors: international organizations, national and local governments, the private sector and civil society.

Whether globalisation and the changes of the last decade have been good or bad for the environment and/or for development is still not clear. It is either too early to tell or the dynamics of the new system are not yet fully understood and consequently not conscientiously managed so that these forces can act for the benefit of mankind. In any case, there is not only a lack of consensus on these issues but rather a heated, and in some cases a violent debate on the alleged damage and/or benefits of globalisation. Nor is this debate helped by the fact that although one fifth of humanity has achieved prosperity undreamt of by former generations, the great majority of the rest live lives of unbearable deprivation and precariousness. The changes of the last decade have not improved but worsened the gulf in wealth between the richest ten percent and the poorest ten percent. This gulf has grown from a ratio of 30:1 in the early 1970s to 74:1 today, and is widening more rapidly now than ever. In the last decade, an extra 10 million people a year joined the ranks of the very poor. In 1993, around 25% of the world's population received 75% of the world's income. In that same year, the United States population of some 250 million had a combined income greater that that of the poorest 43% of the world's population or approximately 2 billion.

It is against this background that, according to General Assembly Resolution 55/199, the WSSD was to carry out a ten-year review of the achievements of the 1992 UN Conference on Environment and Development, also referred to as the Earth or Rio Summit. This review was to be carried out at a new Summit, the WSSD, in order to get world leaders to reaffirm their Rio commitments to sustainable development. It is difficult to imagine against what yardstick this review and assessment could have been undertaken considering the significant transformations of the international system since Rio and the fact that they are not yet well understood. It was fortunate, therefore, that as the date approached for the Summit, there was a concerted effort by everyone to lower expectations and to state the goals and objectives of the WSSD at a more realistic level. To put it simply, the WSSD was to build on the achievements made at Rio and other Summits and global conferences since Rio, including Doha (the World Trade Organization latest round of negotiations), Monterrey (the Finance for Development Summit), and the Millennium Assembly (where over 100 world leaders committed to the Millennium Development Goals), and to focus on implementation of these achievements. Given the focus on implementation, it was also an opportunity to promote instruments and forms that could facilitate action and significant achievements. A new emphasis on partnerships and mechanisms that promoted inclusiveness and participation by all sectors of society was to be explored and promoted.

The Environment and Development Nexus

The decade between Rio and Johannesburg was a continuation of a 30-year old to bring environmental concerns into the international development agenda. It is difficult to review the decade between Rio and Johannesburg without some mention of the progress and achievements of this 30-year period, which started with the Stockholm Conference on the Human Environment in 1972. Unlike Rio and Johannesburg, the Stockholm Conference was attended by very few heads of state. From the developing countries, only Indira Ghandi, the Prime Minister of India, stood out. Unlike Rio and Johannesburg where the environment and development link was central, Stockholm advanced the links between "human" and "the environment". The focus on the human effects of the environment served as a good entry point and brought to the attention of the world at large the fact that there was one set of global problems that needed the attention of the world community and that the institutions to deal with these problems did not exist. UNEP and a number of other institutions and conventions began to be created and negotiated. The seeds for the concept of sustainable development and the change of paradigm that this concept would bring were planted at this conference.

It was not until a few years later, however, that the Brundtland Commission proposed a more sophisticated, integrated response to the global challenges of the times with the concept of sustainable development. A concept still badly understood by the majority of people around the world, it has nevertheless become a useful code word in this campaign to bring together environment and development and the term used to refer to the paradigm change that the world would experience in the decade after Rio. The introduction of the concept of sustainable development created a brand new and much more ambitious agenda. It is difficult to assess the WSSD without mentioning that this ambitious agenda and concept of sustainable development was introduced merely a decade ago.

How successful has the international community been in bringing environment and development together? There are many partial successes, as presented below, but it has not been easy and there is still much to be done. Hopefully the WSSD follow-up will help in this regard. The more specific approach to human needs through a better management of key resources of the WSSD was better understood and welcomed by most delegates. Despite some of the progress in bringing environment and development together, a significant gulf still exists however between development and environment practitioners. For many environment practitioners, those working in development are either unaware of or simply uninterested in environmental issues. For this community of practitioners, Rio and the WSSD were mainly environmental conferences. For those working in development, they were development conferences. Those working in development argue that it is difficult to talk about improving the quality of life when the priority for a very large portion of the world's population is primarily to preserve life itself. The dismal condition of poverty and deprivation in which a large proportion of the world's population lives provides a very poor platform on which to talk about the environment, they argue. The only way to succeed with this group is to advance environmental approaches that address the problems of poverty and vulnerability. The WSSD, more than Rio, succeeded in doing this through the promotion of the focal areas of Water, Energy, Health, Agriculture, and Biodiversity or so-called WEHAB.

The Road from Rio to Johannesburg

As mentioned before, the main purpose of the WSSD was to make a review of the decade since the Earth Summit at Rio in 1992. Unfortunately, and for reasons already mentioned and mostly due to the negotiation format of these summits, a proper review was not really undertaken. As a result, the many positive effects of Rio were not really given the proper credit or full justice. Preoccupied with ensuring that world leaders reaffirmed their commitments to sustainable development and given the grave deterioration of the situation of the poor and to the environment around the world, delegates found it more important to concentrate, rightly so, on the immense task still to be tackled rather than on the great things which have already been achieved. This, many felt, could lead to complacency. Unfortunately, this attitude did not allow for a just review of the decade and the Rio accomplishments. A more sober look of the accomplishments would have probably concluded with a more optimistic view of what can be done and what can be accomplished. Instead, the mood around the Summit was at times pessimistic and doom-laden.

A more sober look at the decade between Rio and Johannesburg would also have revealed and documented the great progress achieved on many fronts. It would also have reminded many development and environment practitioners and particularly those that worked in the interface between environment and development, that their world after 1992 was transformed. Some of the changes of the decade are described immediately below.

New philosophies began to filter into sectoral ministries across the developing world. Some examples include: (a) agricultural production was no longer one of producing at any cost in order to increase the levels of output so as to feed an ever growing population. Instead, agricultural productivity was to be increased but sustainably in order to preserve the natural resources on which this productivity depended. As simple as the concept may appear, making agricultural production sustainable is not so easy. It requires a new culture, new technologies, new knowledge, and in some cases totally new products and inputs. It also requires additional resources for the transition. Similar processes began to be introduced in other sectors of the economy; (b) industry started to introduce the concepts of eco-efficiency in industrial production. Through this concept, industry was to produce more output with fewer inputs, many of which could be recycled resulting in cleaner technologies. Industry from across the globe began to realize that this was not only good for the image of the companies, and thus good marketing, but also good business since producing more with less is actually very good business; (c) waste began to be seen as a possible resource and not just trash or a problem. If managed properly, this problem could be turned into a resource - for energy and occasionally for food. In many other sectors, similar changes took place. The drivers of change in each of these sectors varied. In some cases the drivers were economic and commercial, in others image building-related, while in others it was simply due to the pressures of a well-organized civil society. The origin of the change did not matter really. The fact was that it was happening and continues to happen throughout the developing world and it continues to contribute to sustainable development.

A new institutional infrastructure began to emerge both internationally and nationally, particularly in developing countries. Environmental ministries and in some cases, sustainable development ministries as in the case of Bolivia, began to make their voices felt. Although these ministries are in most cases not the most powerful, their influence is starting to filter into other sectors and other ministries gradually. The weakness of these ministries is also related to the gulf that exists between the development, economics, and finance ministries and those that deal with the environment. Hopefully, as this divide or gulf disappears or is narrowed, the normative role of these ministries will become more relevant and their authority will help to increasingly bring in environmental considerations properly in economic and social decision-making in countries.

Global negotiations became much more inclusive, a prerequisite for advancing sustainable development, which required more cross-sectoral approaches and greater participation by all sectors of society. Issues that affected the lives of large groups of populations were no longer considered just a problem for governments but a matter of joint concern and joint action by all. The style and the format of UNCED at Rio also revolutionized in many respects the way that the UN did business. The active presence of NGOs, civil society, indigenous and religious groups, became a common sight in the corridors of the United Nations during important negotiations. In most cases, these groups did not have a vote in the negotiations. Many of them, however, often formed part of country delegations and/or had strong influence in the decisions taken by these delegations.

The private sector, which up to now had been distant or rather absent from UN proceedings, began to be actively involved. For better of for worse, it is the private sector, which, after all, drives much of the investment and resource use in today's global economy. Their decisions affect not only the sectors and businesses that they run but also the technology choices that they make and with which the world has to live until these are properly amortized over decades. Not having these important decision-makers in global negotiations and particularly those related to the environment would be foolish and short-sighted. But their participation is still regarded with some suspicion. This suspicion will remain as long as the debate on globalisation persists and as long as there is not a better understanding of the forces that run the world today and better mechanisms developed to ensure that these forces act for the benefit of the majority and not the other way around. The greater involvement of the private sector in UN business and in global negotiations has created healthy tensions within the United Nations itself and this in turn, is helping to fine-tune the role of the United Nations in this new era of globalisation.

One of the best examples of the importance of private sector involvement in the environment is that which has been building up around the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. Their involvement is not just helpful. The future of the Framework Convention depends to a great extent, on their active involvement.

For the first time, issues of the environment began to filter into other global negotiations. Environmental considerations were taken into consideration in most of the other global conferences and Summits of the decade. The concept of sustainable development began to make its way into the language of most policy makers around the world. For the first time, global environmental conventions began to act as catalysts for action in many sectors and in finance. Many new financial mechanisms, such as the Global Environment Facility, began to lever other important resources in support of sustainable development.

But most importantly, the Earth Summit at Rio created a new system of negotiations for the environment. And it is here perhaps where the greatest, the least recognized and least understood contribution of Rio lies. This was certainly not recognized explicitly or visibly at Johannesburg.

A New Negotiating System on the Environment and Development

According to some analysts of the international system, UNCED unleashed a new negotiating system on environment and development. Being only ten years old and with a high degree of complexity, it is too early to assess the effectiveness and value of this system. Again, nothing of this was ever discussed, much less recognized at the WSSD. The WSSD did not even come close to assessing the UNCED decade from this broader perspective. The GA resolution was not realistic in asking the WSSD to assess the achievements of the decade given the format of debate and negotiation provided by these Summits. Had governments taken a look at the decade from this perspective, some pleasant surprises would have led to greater optimism.

The complex set of negotiations that have emerged in a relatively short period of time as a direct result of the Rio outcomes, namely, Agenda 21 which has led to global plans of action on several sectors such as water, forests, fisheries and oceans, the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, the Biodiversity Convention, and the Forest Principles, has had more influence on the international system than most other thematic negotiations in recent times. The fact that Rio was taking place in 1992 gave impetus to action prior to and after Rio in a number of areas. Some of the individual pieces of this system, such as the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, would have never succeeded in getting to where it did (despite its present difficulties) had there not been a broader negotiating system supporting it. Its brief history is worth remembering as evidence of the influence of this broader system and as a good example of an unusual global negotiation success achieved in record time.

Despite the complexity of the issues addressed by the Framework Convention, its negotiation was quick and effective. The history of the negotiations on climate change dates back only a few years prior to Rio. It really dates back only to the Toronto Conference on the "Changing Atmosphere: Implications for Global Security" and which was held in June of 1988. It was at this conference that the suggestion was made that the Rio Summit would be a good opportunity to adopt a convention on this subject. When the suggestion was made, many considered the 1992 target impossible to reach. As is well known, the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change went on to be adopted (with the United States as one of its first signatories) and ratified by more than 190 member states. It is doubtful that such a success would have been achieved so quickly without the Rio Summit. Given the complexity and difficulties in linking science with policy, particularly on issues as uncertain as climate change and one that addresses problems that will, for the most part occur on future generations, it is difficult to believe that such success in negotiations was achieved. In most assessment of Rio and Johannesburg, this point never came up and it should have.
Was this new negotiating system successful in bringing environment and development closer together? It is perhaps too early to tell. However, this should be the yardstick against which the decade between Rio and Johannesburg and beyond should have been assessed. Did Johannesburg do anything to make this negotiating system more effective by bringing environment and development together or did the divide between the practitioners of each field remain as great as ever? Consciously or not, the WSSD made great strides in bringing environment and development closer together and it is for this that the WSSD should be remembered most. By making the MDGs (the Millennium Development Goals) one of the centre pieces, the WSSD was really the first major conference to look effectively at both environment and development in an integrated way - while setting the scene for establishing better links and interdependence. The WSSD led to the establishment of institutional mechanisms to promote these links. The WSSD went on to strengthen and to gain a greater constituency for the nexus on environment and development through the promotion of the WEHAB thematic areas - Water, Energy, Health, Agriculture, and Biodiversity. For each of these, frameworks for action were recommended as instruments to advance on the MDGs - the Millennium Development Goals of the Millennium Assembly reached recently at the UN. The virtue of the MDGs is that they are goal- and target-oriented rather than sector-oriented forcing greater integration and cross-sectoral approaches that are supportive of sustainable development.

The simple wording of the MDGs, as presented below, their powerful relevance to today's challenges, their time-bound goals and targets, reinforced at Johannesburg, is what makes them the most important pieces in the WSSD follow-up:
1. Eradicate extreme poverty
- Halve the proportion of people living onless than one dollar a day
- Halve the proportion of people who suffer hunger
2. Achieve universal primary education
- Ensure that boys and girls alike complete primary education
3. Promote gender equality and empower women
- Eliminate gender disparity at all levels of education
- Reduce child mortality
- Reduce by two thirds the under-five mortality rate
5. Improve maternal health
- Reduce by three quarters the maternal mortality rate
6. Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases
- Reverse the spread of HIV/AIDS
7. Ensure environmental sustainability
- Integrate sustainable development into country policies and reverse loss of environmental resources
- Halve the proportion of people with no access to water
- Significantly improve the lives of at least 100 million slum dwellers
8. Develop a global partnership for development
- Raise official development assistance
- Expand market access
-Encourage debt sustainability

At the WSSD, these MDGs were not only reaffirmed but also reinforced through specific plans of action, particularly in the WEHAB thematic area proposals. In addition, other important goals and targets were added. One goal and target on sanitation called for halving the number of people that today do not have access to proper sanitation - some 2 billion. In the area of fisheries, the WSSD called for an end to destructive fishing practices and establishing marine protected areas and networks by 2012.

The Road from Bali to Johannesburg

The WSSD held four Preparatory Committee meetings. The first was held in New York from 30 April to 2 May 2001, and the fourth in Bali from 25 March to 7 June 2002, less than three months prior to the Summit. During this last so-called PRECOM IV, delegates produced the draft Plan of Implementation for the WSSD and transmitted it to Johannesburg for further negotiation. The draft Plan contained much of its text in brackets as the session had failed to reach consensus on key aspects such as energy, trade, finance and globalisation. The lack of consensus and the absence of a more refined document less than three months before Johannesburg obviously produced nervousness among many. The apparent lack of success at Bali and the general concern that it created had the positive effect of mobilizing several actors in support of the WSSD. The investments made up to the date of Bali and what was at stake were too great to let this major conference fail. Had the WSSD had the same intensive level of involvement, engagement and interest for the whole period of the PREPCOMs as in these last three months, the results of the Summit would probably have been dramatically different.

Several partnerships were negotiated and announced during these three months. The important preliminary work and Frameworks for Action on WEHAB were formulated by the United Nations with much support from the whole UN system including the World Bank and others outside the UN system. More heads of State announced their participation. Commitments on regional initiatives took better shape as countries sought to ensure that their regional interests were presented and promoted during the WSSD. The private sector organized itself to participate in a manner that had never been seen before in any other Summit. The NGO and the civil society increased their advocacy and voiced their concern regarding the lack of progress. The previous concern of some delegates over the innovation of the WSSD of introducing a "two track" approach: on the one hand, the politically negotiated document that specified the government commitments and the partnership concept that called on all sectors of the society to participate in the action was made less contentious. Fears that the partnerships could undermine and erode multilateralism were reduced when assurances were made that the primary political document and output of the WSSD was the Plan of Implementation where governments made their commitments and that the partnerships were simply complementary tools to ensure that action took place with the participation of all. Hopefully, these would facilitate implementation of the agreements and also bring additional resources.

What made the WSSD different

For many, the WSSD was the opportunity to "bring together" the achievements of the Summits and Conferences of the decade since Rio and to "finalize negotiations not completed in the past". Consequently, many saw an excellent opportunity to create links between the outcomes of the WSSD and the MDG, the Millennium Development Goals, Doha, the WTO latest round, and Monterrey, the Finance for Development Summit. This made the WSSD agenda more comprehensive and challenging than most other summits of the decade.

For the first time, a world summit sought to address social, economic, financial, trade, and environmental issues with specific targets and commitments. All were meant to converge around the ultimate goal of sustainable development with a focus on action and implementation. This ambitious agenda of the WSSD made the negotiations difficult and complex. It also made the criteria for success of the WSSD much more difficult to define.

Given the focus on action and implementation, the success of the WSSD should be measured in terms of the success of the implementation of the various commitments and targets in the next few months and years. And the key to success will depend on the effectiveness of the instruments provided by the WSSD for this purpose. Some of these instruments include the WEHAB Frameworks of Action which are meant to provide impetus to action in five key thematic areas for developing countries: water and sanitation, energy, health, agriculture, and biodiversity. The other was the partnership framework designed to facilitate action and involvement by all sectors including NGOs and the private sector, to simplify the translation of the political commitments (the Plan of Implementation) into action at the level of developing countries. One other important instrument was the set of time-bound targets, most of which were designed to strengthen and reaffirm that commitment on the MDGs, the Millennium Development Goals. These goals and targets provide a vision and a priority of action for the next few years up to 2015.

The Challenges of the WSSD Follow-up

Given the broad agenda of the WSSD, it is difficult to envisage one simple framework for the follow-up that can respond to all of the concerns of the Johannesburg Plan of Implementation and Declaration. One alternative could be to identify a few minimum elements that respond to the interests and concerns of the majority of countries and particularly the needs of the majority of the population of developing countries and to give these greater priority. Whatever framework is used, what is clear is that it should include, at least, the following elements:

- A focus on poverty eradication or at the very least to give priority to the vulnerable in developing countries for which reaching the MDGs is so important
- Greater attention paid to environmental issues BUT from the perspective of the needs of the poor and vulnerable
- An integration of these into sustainable development strategies with finance, trade and social services as pillars of support

The Millennium Declaration and the WSSD Follow-up

The Millennium Declaration sets out within a single framework the key challenges facing humanity, outlines a response to these challenges, and establishes specific measures for judging performance through a set of inter-related commitments, goals, and targets. The Johannesburg Plan of Implementation confirms them, reinforces those in need of reinforcement and adds others; particularly those related to MDG 7, ensuring environmental sustainability and also adds one important target on sanitation. Together, they represent the best global cooperation platform ever achieved in the United Nations and a powerful platform for the response of the international system.
Added to this is also the WEHAB initiative of the Secretary General and its Frameworks for Action which could provide the simplest and most comprehensive means by which the international community could support country-level activity related to the goals and targets of the WSSD and MDGs. In proposing the WEHAB initiative, the Secretary General sought to provide focus to action on what were among the most important concerns of developing countries: water and sanitation, energy, health, agriculture, and biodiversity, all considered integral to a coherent international approach to the implementation of sustainable development. The initiative of the Secretary General to suggest these thematic areas as focus was not challenged at Johannesburg.

The WEHAB initiative helped to emphasize environmental problems BUT from the perspective of the needs of the poor and the vulnerable. Issues such as water, energy and soil erosion were presented, not simply as environmental problems per se but rather as issues in urgent need of being addressed in order to prevent disease and malnutrition or to ensure a certain minimum standard of life, particularly for the underprivileged.

The WEHAB initiative emphasised on the need to provide access to affordable sanitation and energy for those that did not have either the quantity or the quality required for their livelihood. Similarly, the issue of biodiversity was presented from the perspective of the needs of human health and nutrition as well as ecosystem health. Reinforcing these perspectives was the constant call for "integration" of the various WEHAB themes amongst themselves and for their integration to the sustainable development strategies at the country level. The biodiversity framework for action was presented as being related not simply to conservation issues, but rather as an urgent call to integrate national biodiversity strategies into national development strategies in order to address problems of water, medicines, food, and ecosystem health. These perspectives called on local solutions by local people rather than standard solutions brought in from outside.

The Role of the WSSD follow-up in the MDG Core Strategy

Since the Millennium Declaration in 2000, the United Nations and the Secretary General have invested a great deal of time and resources in setting up a campaign and a road map to ensure that the MDGs are achieved by the target year of 2015.

The four elements of the MDG strategy provide an excellent framework for the WSSD follow-up:
(a) monitoring, tracking and review of progress toward the targets and goals;
(b) analysis, definition and assessment of the policy dimensions of achieving the targets;
(c) campaigns and resource mobilization; and
(d) operational activities at the country level.

The outcome of the WSSD and the WEHAB initiative reinforce the MDGs and improve the developing countries' chances of reaching them by proposing concrete programmes of action. The WSSD and WEHAB provide the basis on which to formulate strategies and plans of action for reaching the MDGs before 2015. They are not a substitute for the MDGs but rather complementary and supportive instruments for the MDGs. After the Millennium Assembly at which the MDGs were agreed, many countries started up special campaigns and programmes of action. These initiatives could provide excellent platforms for the WSSD follow-up. And vice-versa, the WSSD follow-up could provide greater focus and impetus to action.

Having one single campaign at the country level would offer the following advantages:
- It would bring coherence and consistency to the follow-up of the UN Conferences, particularly those mentioned above: WSSD, DOHA and Monterrey.
- It would bring an integrated approach and avoid duplication
- It would set the framework for tracking performance
- It would provide a framework for policy dialogue
- It would enhance information exchange among countries

The challenge is to be able to incorporate the WSSD input to the MDG campaigns and other national initiatives throughout the developing world. But without additional resources, there is little that developing countries can do. Additional resources and much support are needed from the international community. According to the World Bank, the additional foreign aid required to reach the Millennium Development Goals by 2015 is between $40-$60 billion a year of financial support for investments in various sectors. This represents an approximate doubling of current levels of ODA (which in 1997 was $57 billion). In addition, countries would need to undertake measures to build their capacities at the national level. Some of these efforts will need to be taken by the countries themselves, particularly when it comes to policy and institutional reforms, but additional resources for capacity building will also be needed. One of the main objectives of the WSSD was to encourage rich countries to make larger commitments of ODA, Official Development Assistance portfolios. The commitments at Rio, to try to reach the 0.7% of GDP target for ODA is far from being reached and it is doubtful that it will be anytime soon. It would help if the bulk of private capital flows, which are now concentrated in a small group of countries and sectors, could start flowing to a larger group of countries and trade became more open to a larger number of countries. If both of these things happened, then the level of resources for MDG campaigns would increase significantly.

Despite the negative trends in ODA, having one single campaign for the MDGs and the WSSD would be attractive for those wanting to finance such campaigns. From the point of view of donors, the possibility of countries having one coherent framework in which several sectors of the economy and society and several agencies - both multilateral as well as bilateral - can participate in a country-led exercise with goals, targets and time frames should seem ideal. If at the same time these could be integrated into on-going poverty eradication and other strategies could be quite attractive and possibly help to change some of the trends in ODA.

The possibility of additional funding for environment and development is not an impossibility. Starting with the Monterrey Commitments, and continuing with the recent announcement of the new replenishment for the Global Environmental Facility (one of the largest funding mechanisms for the environment today), the "grantization" of IDA (the suggestion of rich countries that a large portion of the World Bank funds available to poorer countries be given as grants rather than loans), and several WSSD financial commitments announced in Johannesburg such as those of the US, the EU, and Germany on water and energy present developing countries with a potential opportunity to gain additional resources for the MDGs and the WSSD follow-up. At Johannesburg the following important commitments were made among others: Italy announced that it was prepared to cancel up to Euro $4 billion in debt to poor countries. Germany offered Euro $500 million over five years for renewable energy projects. The United States announced $970 million in investments over the next few years in water and sanitation projects. The European Union announced the "Water for Life" initiative. And there were many other pledges and contributions tied to a variety of partnerships designed to advance and to contribute to the WSSD follow-up.

But these are only potential opportunities. They will become realities only after countries begin to formulate coherent plans of action and strategies to reach their targets. These strategies and plans of action will turn into fundable programs at the country level. And it is here, where the WEHAB frameworks provide some of the best instruments for specific action at the country level.

The WEHAB Frameworks

Water, energy, health, agriculture and biodiversity are important pillars of sustainable development. If countries around the world took action on all of these thematic areas in an integrated and inter-connected manner, the goals of sustainable development would not only be advanced dramatically but also those of poverty eradication and quality of life for all. All are included in the WSSD Plan of Implementation and all require integrated and cross-sectoral approaches that need the support of important cross-sectoral issues such as trade, finance, and macro-economic policies that address issues related to the consumption and production patterns that affect these thematic areas.

The WEHAB frameworks for each of the thematic areas were presented at Johannesburg and used as a basis for the debate in the plenary sessions of the first four days of the WSSD. Adopting a novel format never before used in formal United Nations plenary sessions, the WEHAB discussions included participants from major groups that included among others, indigenous groups, scientific groups, NGOs, women's groups, and the private sector.

All used the WEHAB frameworks presented by the United Nations as the basis for the debate. All supported the proposals there and either emphasized certain aspects of these frameworks (such as the need to reduce or eliminate agricultural subsidies as a pre-requisite for advancing on the food security front) or added features to the Frameworks that have now been incorporated in the Chairman's report to the WSSD. The Framework documents synthesize the key issues and challenges for each of the thematic areas of WEHAB, list the major agreements reached for each of these areas in the last decade, and present frameworks for action for each one in an integrated fashion for sustainable development and poverty eradication.

Conclusion

The WSSD had to compete with other major international events for press and public attention. The follow-up will be equally challenging given the fast pace of events in the international arena. The Iraq situation and other pressing problems in various parts of the world, whether in Latin America, Africa or Asia, should not be a pretext or distraction for not following up on the excellent goals and aspirations of the WSSD and the conferences and summits of the decade of the 90s.

Johannesburg: and what now?
Domingo Jiménez Beltrán.
Ex-Director of the European Environmental Agency, currently Advisor in the European Commission Services "Premio Doce Estrellas para el Medio Ambiente 2002" [2002 Twelve Star Award for the Environment].

The third United Nations summit dedicated to the environment should be analysed within the international context of the past thirty years, as well as within the framework of Community environmental policy and the evolution of the concept of sustainable development. Over these decades, the environment has gone from being on the fringe -something with longed-for romantic overtones following the accelerated industrialization that occurred after World War II, especially in Europe- to becoming an important factor on international policy agendas. Johannesburg has become another step forward in this process.

The first summit on the environment organized by the United Nations, the Stockholm summit of 1972, was coined as that of "human development". The objective was to overcome the then-prevailing idea that the environment was a burden or limitation to development. It was a determining factor in bringing forth the Community Environmental policy that began with the European Summit in Paris that same year, without which construction of the European Community could not have been imagined. Since that date in 1972, the two processes -the Global or United Nations Summit process, and that of the Community or advances in environmental and Sustainable Development policies- cannot be understood separately.

The Rio Summit in 1992 hosted the greatest concentration ever seen of Heads of State and of Government (more than 140). No one wanted to miss it, from President Bush, Sr. to Fidel Castro, who gave a passionate, highly applauded anthropocentric speech lasting less than two minutes, without forgetting President González, who promised that Spain, over the following decade (now ended), would triple the volume of its help for development (live and learn!). Just in case, they were all there to talk about development and the environment.

The Rio Summit -held five years after the publication of the so-called Brundtland Commission report (named for the woman who headed it, the ex-Prime Minister of Norway) of the United Nations The Future in Our Hands, that presented the idea of sustainable development ("ensuring that the needs of present generations are met without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own")- was presented as the Summit on Development and the Environment in the hopes of integrating them. Now the Johannesburg Summit has been shamelessly qualified as that of Sustainable Development.

Without yet entering into the specific results of the Summit held in Johannesburg between August 24th and September 4th, and if we weren't immersed in the so-called information society -that of technological change and accelerated consumption, which is not given to putting progress in perspective- we could conclude that the situation prior to the Summit wasn't bad, considering -at least in conceptual terms- that in just 30 years and in environmental matters, it went from being a limitation to development to being something to integrate into development and, finally, to being able to become the system or development itself. This was achieved by introducing the concept of sustainable development, which has also provided a future context for environmental policy by embedding it, without detracting from it, in the centre of this model of development.

As a qualitative leap, this wouldn't be too bad, if only from the perspective of intent, and even if the final aspiration were a real step forward in the process toward more sustainable development.
What is sustainable development all about in practical terms? How is it being applied in the EU? What does it have to do with me as a citizen and consumer? Above all, what has the Johannesburg Summit contributed to progress toward development for the future, one that is more sustainable than the current one? And, finally, what are the major challenges pending in the consolidation of this conceptual and instrumental framework, at EU level, that allows for the creation of the conditions making change towards a more Sustainable Development possible?

The concept and its practical interpretation

Varied interpretations from the original have been given and continue to be given for the concept of sustainable development, and very few of them improve it, although most adapt their nuances to the interests of the groups orchestrating them.

For the most economics-minded, this would consist in "living off interests and not capital" or rather, using resources without depleting them. For the business-minded, this would be "the economy of permanence", or how to adapt business to the conditions of the environment in order to continue doing more, although different, business.

For most mortals, even if it were a dream, it could be "how to improve the quality of life for all of us now and in the future", and in doing so use effectively and efficiently all types of available resources. This has been translated into the impressive paradigm of what was originally "factor 4", or how to double development with half the resources, becoming "factor 10", which would attempt to solve the North-South disparity by allowing the former to continue developing at double the rate, but with one fifth of the resources, and the South to multiply by ten, or up to twenty, its development in the same period, but with just half its current resources. This would reduce the current unequal distribution, with less than 20% of the population using over 80% of total resources.

It's funny that these paradigms that sounded so utopic outside ecologist or environmentalist coteries only five or six years ago have entered not only into Public Administrations, but also and especially into non-speculative business circles. It has gathered force in the latter, following the recent financial and management scandals that are behind the famous "triple bottom line" that attends to and understands the economic, social and environmental dimensions of sustainable or lasting business, and which would make unthinkable what Greenpeace calls the "corporate crimes" that destroy the third world.

In practical terms, sustainable development consists in using available resources more effectively and equitably, or in separate socio-economic development from the use and degradation of resources and from the loss of environmental quality.

It is no more than living better in a true sense, in terms of improving quality of life and satisfying our real needs, not those that are imposed or created, which is what leads to growing alienation and frustration. This must be done by producing less waste, releasing fewer pollutants into the atmosphere, water and our food chain (so that the air we breathe, the water we drink and the food we eat are more healthy and not just less contaminated), consuming fewer non-renewable or limited resources (such as fossil fuels formed over millions of years, as well as the soil, coasts, etc.) and fewer resources that are renewable but have limited use in order to permit their renewal (such as water, forests, etc.), and not affecting the basic operational processes of the planet (such as climate, ozone layer or nutrient cycles).

Okay, so who doesn't want that? It seems we all want that, but not necessarily now and not exactly me; rather, let someone else start and then pass the buck down the line because, as Groucho Marx said in one of his movies: "The future? What has the future ever done for me?" Perhaps it is in this perception of the concept as mere solidarity with the future where the barrier may lie in putting this paradigm into practice which, in any case, seems unavoidable. As a well-known progressive Spanish politician recently pointed out to me "all this sustainable development doesn't sell, especially the part about solidarity with the future, it doesn't get people excited" especially when they are the end doers, the consumers and local corporations and business people who are responsible for the changes in the models of consumption and production.

It is here, in this diatribe, in how to translate the concept of sustainable development into something specific and immediate as well, where recent Community experiences become interesting because of the actions initiated as well as the obvious deficiencies. They can be carried over to a global level when we try to analyse the perspectives at this time, with the Johannesburg Summit still recent, and while waiting to put it into practice, especially at Community level, so that what happened with Rio is not repeated.

If we make abstract what has happened since September 11, there is no doubt that on both a global level and in particular within the EU, important conceptual and perceptive changes have come about in regard to the environment, particularly in its integration in development as part of the term sustainable development. Where we fail is in putting this process into practice. We did not rise to the occasion of the agreements of Rio, and the question now is still not just the analysis of the Johannesburg agreements, but if in any case we will make good on them, and even if we willimprove them in practice, particularly in the EU.

Construction of a strategy in the EU

At a Community level, over the last few years -obviating the parenthesis of the Spanish presidency (also affected by the proximity of September 11th), there has been a series of developments that I would call converging, and which arrived at the launching in June 2001, at the European Summit of Gothenburg, of a Community Strategy for Sustainable Development, with its specific principles and objectives, some of which were ambitious and some surpassed by Johannesburg, as we will see. This strategy, together with the so-called Socio-Economic Agenda of Lisbon, was a serious political commitment at the highest level (Heads of State and Government) to together and indissolubly take on the three dimensions of true development -social, economic and environmental- in other words, sustainable development.

More importantly, heads of state and government have forced a revision of progress in general and of pertinent policies in particular (in Agriculture, Energy, Transport... within the integrating process called Cardiff, due to the summit that was approved in 1998) based on a broad package of "structural" indicators that would make up the so-called yearly "Synthesis Report" to be discussed at each spring summit. The first of these, in Barcelona, may have failed because it was the first one, but it also may have been due to the low priority given the subject by the presidency.
The general references generated in Rio, specifically Agenda 21 and the Declaration, became the pretext permitting progression of the concept of "sustainable development". As a concept, it was at first taunted and ridiculed as a theorizing extraction from ecologists; however, we have finally seen it imposed on the EU.

First, formally, by establishing it as a goal of the EU in the Treaty of Amsterdam, before which the policies of the Single Market, as well as economic policies and those of the Monetary Union itself would be instrumental.

Second, politically, by starting up, at the Gothenburg Summit in June 2001, a true Community

Strategy for sustainable development, or rather, for a more sustainable development.
Third, practically, by the European Council itself -the highest Community authority- taking on execution of the strategy. This includes annual reviews, at each spring summit, based on the so-called Synthesis Reports which, using about 40 indicators covering the social, economic and environmental dimensions of sustainable development, or simply desirable developmental, are intended to be a scale for measuring the true progress in achieving greater quality of life for everyone (principle of fairness) with less use and degradation of natural resources (principles of effectiveness and efficiency).

To this practical introduction of the concept, a decisive contribution was made by the fact that many active civic groups, such as local groups and more advanced business associations -who can identify themselves as doers, because they are the ones who end up executing the policies- have taken "sustainable development" as a mid-term programming and management tool. Municipalities, through Local Agenda 21, have even encouraged competition among cities. Businesses -with reference to the "triple bottom line", or the triple social, economic and environmental dimension that businesses aspiring to being long-lasting and sustainable have- have already achieved the goal of having those that enter the Dow Jones Index of Sustainability provide more profits in the market than the rest.

The EU in an advantageous position

And just what are these converging circumstances that create the line of argument or the logic of Community intervention in this matter? This holds interest in the area of the Member States as well as the Community and possibly globally. Although it served to support a certain leadership of the EU in Johannesburg, even though it was only in this case to save what little it could, it could still become the basis for the EU to "show the way" towards more sustainable development, thereby legitimising its future proposals and creating a Global drag effect that may even reach the USA. These circumstances are as follows.

1-The European Environmental Agency has continuously shown, from its first report in 1995, that despite the unquestionable success of the Community Environmental Policy (no country, not even Denmark, would have done it better outside the EU) there was not sufficient general improvement in environmental quality, and this could only be attained by means of changes in economic and sector policies. These should be reviewed in any case, since their evolution is not just inadmissible, or unsustainable, and not just in environmental terms, but even in socio-economic terms, because their uncontrolled expansion -not integrated in the rest of the socio-economic context, puts its own objectives at risk (too much traffic creates traffic jams, reducing accessibility and mobility; too much tourism destroys tourism and its quality; abusive growth in energy requirements generates blackouts and critical restrictions...) by eroding the bases sustaining them, as well as violating other similar policies. The reference to sustainability strengthens the selfsame socio-economic ends of economic and sector policies.

2-The exercise of analysing and reviewing economic and sector policies -as was carried out within the process of integration or of the Cardiff Process, in order to analyse how these policies responded to or were consistent with environmental policy, and now more recently with the goal of sustainable development (Art. 2 and 6 of the Treaty)- showed something very interesting. These policies were, furthermore, incoherent among themselves, or in other words, the policy of transportation violated that of energy (the increase in energy dependence and insecurity in supply is basically due to the unsustainable increase in traffic and road transportation, which is much higher than that of the economy). The same was done by many intense agricultural practices. The reference to sustainability permits synergies to be strengthened among different policies by creating common, shared or in any case convergent objectives.

3-The basic idea, at a Community level, would be not just to make more policy (and not just more market as the US proclaimed) but especially to establish new ways of making policy by following the principles of so-called Governability. This includes, together with the instrumental ones of transparency, control and public participation, those of effectiveness and coherence. It also translates into strengthening the indicated mechanisms of annual open review of the progress made in all economic and sector policies, including redirection of them in order to get closer to the medium- and long-term objectives agreed upon in the Strategy for Sustainable Development (and its external dimension or dimension of participation in global sustainability) and in the socio-economic Agenda.

Consequently, the paradigm of sustainable development at a Community level is identified as an operative concept of immediate application in order to improve the situation right now in the short and medium term, and not just in the future. In other words, we could call it solidarity with the present and with ourselves, or even pure self-centeredness in the good sense. This would respond to the challenge set by President Prodi of making the EU's economy the most competitive, based on knowledge, because this and just this is what sustainable development is: development based on knowledge and not on ignorance as to its consequences, even when they are immediate and of a socio-economic nature, and not just environmental.

Along these lines of argument, the EU has progressed since December 1997, when the Swedish Prime Minister Goran Persson proposed establishing mechanisms to review all Community policies with an eye to integration and/or sustainability. Progress has been made, slowly but surely, in the various European Summits, especially in creating expectation in civic society, including the most active NGOs in the Community. They were a little frustrated, however, precisely during the key period of preparing for Johannesburg, in the first semester of this year during the Spanish presidency, in that it was not present in the priorities which were also possibly influenced by the effects of September 11, which affected the political Agenda.

What follows below is an analysis with a perspective on the future that takes advantage and tries to make good of the perhaps abundant results of Johannesburg. It is set out using the basic idea of having the EU lead the way for developed countries, in an opportunistic sense as well, or one of harnessing. To do so necessarily means making use of innovation and, specifically, legitimising it globally in order to lead a more Sustainable Globalisation.

The different context of Johannesburg

In sizing up Johannesburg, it must not be forgotten that the model is different from that of Rio, due as much to the different geopolitical situation as to the context or the multilateral environmental framework. Rio was reached in the midst of economic and political euphoria, of "PROMISING CHANGES", with economic progress, the fall of the Berlin wall and the East opening up, with a hopeful sense of globalisation being beneficial to everyone. Johannesburg, however, and in part as a result of September 11th, was reached in the midst of "HARSH REALITIES", with continued acknowledgement of the differences between North and South, unstoppable growth of forced immigration and discouragement in eradicating poverty, terrorism on the rise and globalisation benefiting those it always does…

Furthermore, in Rio it was all yet to be done in terms of multilateralism in the environment. There were three large Agreements on the table and juicy proposals in conceptual terms and terms of principles contained in the Declaration and Agenda 21. In Johannesburg, they all seemed old hat, when in fact they had yet to be put into practice.

Nor should we forget the situation immediately prior to the Summit in the EU as well as globally, which was made clear in the last preparatory meeting of the Summit in Bali, where the anticipated miracle did not take place. Apart from confirming that the matters that the developing countries, or G77, were concerned about were considered already closed, what was done was to confirm some specific objectives regarding the priority given to matters of drinking water supply, urban sanitation, access to energy and reinforcing the need to make progress toward new models of production and consumption, leaving the Agenda wide open in the remaining topics.

At a Community level, no miracle occurred at the European Summit of Seville either, which was the last opportunity following the dead stop produced at the Summit of Barcelona. Four years of progress in developing a Community Strategy were supposed to have their climax in Barcelona, as a result of the final push given it in Gothenburg (which ended up naming the strategy). Yet in Seville, the ambitions of the EU were confirmed, as was the fact that the agreements of Doha as well as Monterrey would not be reopened, although their fulfilment would be required, and they were even quoted as the basis for the famous Global Deal that had created such expectations prior to 11 September. The need for a positive Agenda for Globalisation was also emphasised, along with strengthening the Governability at a national level and on the specific priorities agreed upon in Bali (water, sanitation, energy). Added to these were Health and the Initiative for Africa, and insisting on the need to translate priorities into goals and specific schedules.

In short, we arrived at Johannesburg with greater challenges, while at the same time with less expectation, abilities and preparation, as well as the burden of 11 September. As if that weren't enough, the main topics for developed countries, or for the G77, including access to the Market and financing development, were considered closed, for many of the G77 falsely, in the previous conferences of Doha and Monterrey respectively. Finally, given the push towards multilateralism or global environmental cooperation in Rio, Johannesburg was reached with practically only the European Union strongly backing it in this sense, with all the baggage from KYOTO, backing agreements and commitments that had specific timeframes, and even in areas, such as energy, in which the EU was not legitimised by practical progress.

So in opposition to what has been said, that the expectations in Johannesburg were perhaps somewhat high, the truth is that they were too low. That is why the results should be taken, in any case, as minimum results that require strict compliance. Then they should be used, as far as possible, to build upon them or make advances from them.
Consequently, expectations for Johannesburg included having a large presence of heads of state, approval of an Action Plan, with specific actions being the responsibility of the Governments (type I) and having deadlines for fulfilment in order to go a little beyond Rio. This finally included what were called the five priorities of Kofi Annan.

What has Johannesburg achieved in practical tems?

As occurred with the Rio Summit -which was a success in itself in regard to the qualitative leap it gave the Policy Agenda, but which we did not follow through on in regard to fulfilment- the value of Johannesburg will be demonstrated in our ability or inability to make good on what was achieved there, be it great or small. That is why the following analysis is offered from two points of view, the first being the results achieved in regard to how it has affected or not affected the EU's specific policy Agenda. The second perspective is whether or not this time we act accordingly and, instead of taking the results of the Summit as a ceiling or maximum aspiration, which is what happened with Rio, we take them as a basis upon which to build or as the lowest common denominator for our aspirations.

Johannesburg achieved the following:

A Declaration which confirms the Principles of Rio, some of which beg being repeated because of their importance and their difficulty in being respected. These include shared but differentiated global responsibility (basis for the different obligations of countries in the Kyoto Protocol), for prevention and precaution and caution (basis for differentiated intervention in the Market of the EU and US, because the EU applies the principle of taking measures without full evidence when risks are serious), and for internalising costs (basis for so-called fair pricing). Furthermore, it consolidated as an essential requirement changes in the models of production and consumption, as well as fighting for reconstruction of human solidarity, eradication of the most unsustainable conditions, like famine, and for establishing mid-term policies that permit participation in forming and executing policies and in decision-making in general, as long as they are accompanied by monitoring and evaluation mechanisms to ensure public control and political accounting for actions. And a novelty following the recent corporate scandals is the fight to reinforce corporate responsibility.

An Action Plan that includes some obligatory results, in regard to specific goals to be attained by certain deadlines, although some are just trends or earmarked for improvement. It also includes obligatory means that are considered essential or elements that condition progress.

Highlighted among specific objectives are the following: Before 2015, reduce by half the population that has no access to drinking water and basic sanitation, which means an ambitious task of giving this service to about 1.5 billion more human beings with enormous, almost impossible tasks in huge conurbations. Return fishing grounds or fishing stocks to a sustainable level before 2015. The scope of this can be imagined just by learning that in areas near the EU, the percentages that have surpassed the so-called "safe biological limit" are greater than 70% in all our seas. Minimize risks due to chemical substances before 2020. This is also a huge task, given the general situation of the control of chemical substances produced and used, with just a part of them being evaluated and few being really controlled in end conditions. Finally, halt the loss of biodiversity, or rather, stop the degradation of our ecosystems, before 2010, with all that means. It would require the fishing and agriculture industries, forest and mining operations, coastal and urban developments, hydrological plans and infrastructures and, in general, all our territorial actions to stop spoiling our plant and animal life and the functionality of our ecosystems. It would mean discovering how to build our infrastructures without destroying our highly valuable -in a socio-economic sense as well- natural infrastructures.

Qualitative or trend goals include the following. An urgent, substantial increase (the specific goal of 15% advocated by the EU was not accepted) in the contribution of energies from renewable sources and the promotion of markets for ecological products or those coming from ecological agriculture, which is of great interest to developing countries.

Some of the obligatory means are recovered from the Millennium Declaration of the year 2000, such as having National Working Strategies for Sustainable Development available before 2005. In the case of the EU, it exists, more or less, but in the case of half the Member States -among them Spain- that should have finalized it before Johannesburg, it is missing. Special mention is made, because it is a key part of the strategy, and the most difficult, of the obligatory development of a 10-year framework outline of Sustainable Production and Consumption Programmes. This obligation had been self-imposed in the EU before going to Johannesburg.

There were also other non-objectifiable achievements, such as promoting and coming close to ratifying the Kyoto Protocol by having Russia and Japan not go back the way they came, establishing a coalition led by the EU for progress in renewable energy and establishing a total of 200 development co-operations, or voluntary collaborations. These include the one related to water and that of the EU with the NIS, which joins voluntary forces (Type II actions) among governments, businesses, NGOs and other agents of Civic Society.

Despite the fact that Johannesburg was not as ambitious as Rio 1992 and that there were absences by many of the leaders present at Rio, such as the US President and the President of Spain, we must not forget that almost 65,000 people were there. It was a great event that only the Environment seems able to attract, and at least a Political Declaration was achieved, thereby recovering the spirit of Rio. More importantly, a Plan was set up with certain objectives and deadlines, in an attempt to redirect globalisation, which for now is merely mercantile, by making it somewhat more sustainable and contributing to a greater or sufficient quality of life for everyone now and in the future. At least an attempt was made to respond to the five priorities of Kofi Annan that were given by the EU: water, health, energy, agriculture and biodiversity. A suitable balance was sought between the so-called Type 1 actions that involve commitments from States and which were advocated by the EU, and Type 2 actions that involve participation by the private sector, civic society and volunteers, which seem to be the ones desired by the US.

Assessment for all tastes

It is clear that the specific results were not much less than what was expected, given that the expectations were low, although it must be admitted that the Summit, given the assessments made, may well have been at the low level of the circumstances. At any rate, it did not rise to the occasion of the great challenges mentioned.

There are varying interpretations for all tastes. They are not all equidistant, and their analysis, as always, allows us to make a beneficial interpretation in order to project the results toward the future, and to make good use of what was achieved by strengthening it and, especially, by building upon it.
For President Prodi, Johannesburg did not repudiate the need to hold these summits, even though at the same time, the WWF qualified it, in a free interpretation of WSSD, as the "World Summit of Shameful Deals ".

For the Director General of the Environment of the European Committee, it was proof that multilateralism works, while for the WWF, it was proof that Intergovernmental processes do not work.

For President Prodi, Johannesburg bore witness to the further deterioration of the image of the developed world (including the EU, and not just the US). Furthermore, President Prodi firmly pointed out that the market as an instrument to help development (or help as a result of the market) does not work, rather, they should go together (help for development as a goal in itself!) « from trade to help to trade and help » in Prodi's own words. He even stated that the reason for the failure of the EU proposal to reach a goal of 15% for renewable energy contribution was the obvious fact that the EU (with its timid 6% quota) was not authorized to force this agreement. Nor was it authorized, according to Prodi, in the matter of farming subsidies, which so badly penalized agriculture in the Third World.

For a large part of the political stratum, Sustainable Development has been consolidated in the political Agenda, in the words of P Cox, President of the European Parliament, who meanwhile broached the growing gap between political agenda aspirations and political ability to act, especially in taking the results from the summit as a base from which to start, and not as a ceiling for our aspirations. These assertions were confirmed with very strong words by the President of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development, Bjorn Stigson, who repeated several times that the challenge is not a technical one, but a political one due to Institutional lack of ability, which is quite a blow!

There is also quite a coincidence in the reinforced focus on Sustainable Production and Consumption in the political process. This involves the unavoidable condition of having the market start working for (sustainable) development and not vice-versa, according to the appraisal shared by the Danish Minister of the Environment, C. Schmidt, and by the European Bureau of the Environment (J Hontelez).

According to Commissioner Margot Wallstrom, the Johannesburg instruments -the Declaration and the Action Plan, together with the Doha and Monterrey conferences- form a basis from which to set off toward global development co-operation (or for the unachieved Global Deal) for sustainable development. However, for the NGOs, in general in Johannesburg, the chance was lost to give sustainable development a significant boost, what with the US still responding to the results from Rio (!) and the EU willing but not able to tackle the subjects of globalisation (positive), improved access to markets, support for development and demands for business responsibility.
My personal perception would be:

That the summit almost rose to the occasion of the low expectations generated.
That there is still a huge difference between what is said -or agreements- and what is done -or achievements. As the children in Johannesburg said « talk, talk, talk...ACT, ACT, ACT», or as WBCSD said" «walking the talking».

Let's hope this will finally, FINALLY be the time at least the agreements will be met, and that this is continually monitored and demanded.

That we will at least create the conditions and institutional capabilities to enable the emerging civic society to exercise all its potential, beyond the limitations of their own governments.

-And finally, that although the exercise of realism has left us with a few minimal agreements, we have not lost the future promise, at some better time, of surpassing the Doha and Monterrey agreements and attaining positive globalisation as the EU intended and, I assume, intends. This would mean open markets full of possibilities for developing countries, and support for development to indissolubly and proportionately accompany the market (and repair its limitations or defects). It wouldn't seem possible unless some global taxation is nurtured, as demanded by President Chirac himself in Johannesburg, for the Global Fund for the eradication of poverty and for sustainable development. It is the time not only for harsh realities, but also for promises of a necessarily and mandatorily better future that does not give up on sustainability.

And let the EU show the way! And now what?
Pespectives for the EU to show te way towards sutainability. And benefit from it?

Without the need for abstracting evident short- and medium-term priorities, such as those referring to the Economic Stability Pact as a key part of the Monetary Union and Common Currency, and especially expansion and convection for the EU's political and institutional development or adaptation -which will occupy the political Agenda, along with Foreign Policy- there is no doubt that the EU's objective is still to achieve sustainable development in accordance with Art. 2 of the Treaty, for which most of these priorities are instrumental.

These other urgent matters should not hinder construction of the process towards greater sustainability guaranteeing progressive improvement in the quality of life now and in the future for everyone, as far as possible, as well as contributing to global sustainability or positive globalisation. This was one of the starting points from which the EU made contributions to Johannesburg, and it is part of the so-called external dimension of the Community Strategy for Sustainable Development.
What follows is an attempt to analyse the starting conditions and future determining factors for EU leadership of this change at a global level, beginning with changes in the EU's own area.

A favourable perspective for the EU

There are enough converging elements to favourably position the EU in this process:

-The multilateral Agenda broadens progressively to include the three dimensions of SD.
-Community Sustainable Development Strategy (SDS) is without doubt the most advanced (although insufficient as such) at a regional level. It can also be qualified as mature, since it survived and even grew under the unfavourable conditions of the last Presidencies (post Sept. 11) and the process of Johannesburg itself.

-The SDS has strong ties now to putting into practice the so-called Governability that is considered to be a key part of development. A determining element in this, as was recently acknowledged by an economic weekly that is above suspicion in this subject, would be institutional capability, well beyond the economic programs in themselves, and which will be hard put to progress without a framework for cohesion and efficiency such as that offered by the SDS.

-In this sense, the SDS has already demonstrated its usefulness as a reference point in current reviews of agricultural and fishing policies in order to make them more governable and sustainable.

-Finally, it all seems to rest now on attaining sustainable production and consumption and, to that effect, market orientation or organization, since its being to the service of development and not the opposite would be the key element, as well as being a significant incentive for innovation and competitiveness.

-The Council on General Matters of the EU, of Sept. 30, as well as the Environment Council of 0ct. 17, reflected this favourable situation and the challenge for the EU to open up the way. In its conclusions, it made the SDS connection with the multilateral Agenda and the WTO Conferences in Doha in Nov. 2001, with the United Nations conference in Monterrey in March, 2002, with the FAO Food Summit in Rome and, of course, with the package of the United Nations Johannesburg Summit, including the UN Millennium Declaration in 2000 and all the agreements reached in Rio in June 1992 and which are still in effect and pertinent!

-In these recent meetings, the Council has confirmed the need to review the SDS in 2003, given recent developments, and in order to support, in its own words, the results of Johannesburg as well as respond to other multilateral objectives. This involves recognizing that many of them could go beyond those agreed upon at a Community level.

Requirements and opportunities for the EU

In this sense, it should not be forgotten that in Johannesburg the EU obtained not just responsibility to lead change (for which it should feel proud, but not necessarily satisfied) but also specific commitments surpassing those agreed upon in the still-valid SDS. These include the 10-Year Plan for Sustainable Production and Consumption, the need to show the way to reach the advocated goal of a 15% quota by 2015 (it is now 6%, with a goal of 12% for 2010), true advances in Farming and Fishing Policies (with 100% of stocks recovered by 2015!) that are sustainable and not subsidized and, of course, going beyond the Doha commitments in accessing markets and at least complying with those of Monterrey in supporting development (reaching the average of 0.39% GNP in ODA and a minimum of 0.33% for each Member State). Anyone who believes that this is not ambitious, if minimums are achieved, should look at the current situation in the recent reports from the European Environment Agency!

So we start off from a situation in which we have a multilateral agenda, which, while not being ambitious, could still bring about significant changes and create conditions for more radical changes if the agreements are taken as basic ones. This would enable it to go even further, once the proposals have been proved possible and even healthy in socio-economic terms and there is at least initial policy instrumentation enabling the EU to show the way and even reap benefits through this pioneering, and therefore innovative, attitude. It should be added that this approach reinforces the thesis of making the expansion an opportunity as well for matters of sustainable development and seriously approaching sustainability as a basic goal of expansion, making community wealth an instrument of respect and not an objective in itself.

As was recently said in the heat of debate on SDS by the WWF Director Tony Long, opportunities for EU leadership are increasing, to which Danish Minister Schmidt added that it is an occasion for action and our success depends above all on our own ability.

Thoughts on the future

What follows is a personal interpretation of the situation and the perspectives opening up before the EU if, as the Danish Minister said, we act with a certain amount of skill in handling a consolidated political agenda. However, it should be orchestrated on the basis of existing abilities, or abilities to be strengthened, making sure institutional capabilities respond at least to the expectations of civil society.

The basic idea consists in translating the Political Agenda into a clear socio-economic purpose, within a clarifying vision that offers cohesiveness and is accompanied by a sense of direction. Purpose, vision and sense of direction.

Purpose

The objective of the EU is sustainable development (Art. 2 and 6 of the Treaty), with the economy and market as instruments.

Sharing in the intention of President Prodi "to make the EU's economy the most competitive based on knowledge" and in the business interpretation of the WBCSD that SD is not doing less business but different business, the purpose must be objectified as well in terms of solidarity with the present, and not just with the future.

This would mean trying to obtain better (or sufficient) real quality of life for a growing majority through cohesion and efficiency of action. This would permit the paradigm of SD by fusing the present and the future in a cognitive action that introduces an atemporal dimension into rational management based on the knowledge of our only natural capital and building on it ("building without destroying"). The aim would be an attempt to overcome "short termness" in the market economy that is not subject to its instrumental nature, the symptomatic treatment of which, in addition to not permitting, foreseeing or even managing the crisis, imposes itself on the rationality of an approach that integrates it in time and space. It is very likely that "pacification of the economy" and its being subjected to the rationality of SD could be the most important achievement of positive globalisation.
It is also very possible that this intention of techno-political extraction needs to be completed with an in-depth study of its ethical, cultural and even aesthetic dimensions in order to turn this process into what the Club of Rome called the Third Industrial Revolution. If the first two were based on accessing new raw materials and energy sources (first coal and later petroleum), this is based on progressively abandoning them and rationally using -and not abusing- resources. This could make it the first worldwide revolution, but that lies outside the scope of this dissertation.

Vision

Essentially, sustainable development would be nothing more than development based on knowledge in addition to acting on the five principles backed by Governability (transparency, coherence, effectiveness, control and public participation). It can be translated into the simple vision of progressive separation or disconnection, until absolute disconnection is achieved between improved (or sufficient) quality of life (development until now) and use of resources and environmental degradation.

It is important to look for progressive exploitation of this final vision within the process of building existing and developing community policies, and its reflection even in the institutional process of reviewing and executing community policies. In order to do so, there are some simple theses that are beginning to emerge from within this simplifying vision:

-The SDS should be considered (conveniently reinforced) as the framework concept or, in the words of John Hontelez (EBE) "as the cornerstone and not the stone in the corner".

- Sustainable production and consumption are at the centre of the process.

-The (domestic) market should work for these processes and, in general, for (sustainable) development and not vice-versa (Min. Schmidt). We need to direct the market and not have the market direct us (JH) because it attends more to the offer or interests of the producers/business people than to the demands or interests of consumers, as recently indicated by Commissioner Byrne.

-Necessary market orientation or organization (in order to respond to the objectives of general interest) promotes innovation (Commissioner Fischler) and, as we see, it is the essential condition to having sector policies (farming, fishing...) join the path of sustainability, or sometimes to continued functioning.

-The question continues to be how to evolve from an economy directed by offer to one attending more to demand, and this means becoming free of the syndrome of infrastructures that facilitate offer.

-Key points of action in this process of progressive evolution include fair prices (internalising costs and signals adapted to the market) proper taxation (there can be no sustainability without good accounting that shows tax burdens or benefits on concepts of SD effectiveness and contribution to SD), improving the productivity of resources (competitive advantage of the EU over the US, not yet made fully manifest), policies of quality with a distinction of sustainable performance…

-Other points are weaker in this necessary transformation of production and consumption models, such as consumers, inability to find mechanisms that offer short-term rewards (lack of fair or adjusted prices or tax breaks), sustainable consumption (Forum ECOSOC Oct. 4) and especially limitations in institutional capability (WBCSD, B Stigson) which would be more decisive than technical barriers or willingness of businesses.

-Changing the conditions of the domestic market seems inevitable.
One could even think of another new White Paper, this time to satisfy the real needs of consumers and citizens in a sustainable way.

-Finally, this vision must also incorporate the "waybill" for the process, the institutional procedures for decision making and Economic and Sector policy review within the EU (Cardiff Process), its overlapping the Socio-Economic (or Lisbon) Agenda and environmental policy as such (the Sixth Action Program). All this is taken in under the framework concept and the Community Strategy for Sustainable Development (or Gothenburg Strategy) and converges in time within the annual cycle of accounting for actions and policy revision at each of the EU's Spring Summits. This is basic to finding out if we are making progress or not in the right direction, beyond but also within the increase in GDP.

Sense of direction

The key question is not so much How good is the situation? rather Are we progressing enough in the right direction?, in other words, towards more sustainable development. It is in this sense that we must be helped by the package of "structural indicators" that are being consolidated within the scope of the EU in order to cover the social, economic and environmental dimensions of sustainable development, and whose evolution is included in the Annual Synthesis Report presented at each of the EU's spring summits. It is basic to so-called Governability because it is useful in evaluating the coherence and effectiveness of policies, as well as ensuring transparency, control, public information and even public participation or, in any case, that of the more active groups or stakeholders, by means of mechanisms for consultation foreseen by the Commission, such as the so-called "Roundtable on Sustainability". This process involves us all, in showing us whether, for example, in environmental terms, the compass of environmental sustainability shows progress in all key aspects or not.

Conclusion

It is undeniable that the EU has its own agenda, before and after the summit, which is quite different from that of the US. Therefore, making good on the results from Johannesburg depends a great deal on the European Union and its ability to, in the first place, legitimise itself before the Third World -through the selfsame process already begun towards more sustainable development (even though it is more an intention than a reality, at least it's something) and especially, in the second place to respond, even if it also is only intentional, to the two large claims that remain pending following Johannesburg, from the less-developed countries. These are access to markets, respecting and surpassing Doha concessions, and especially financing development and reducing poverty, as was reiterated by the President of South Africa, Thabo Mbeki, in the Summit's opening ceremony. To this end, the agreements from Monterrey, which in fact are practically an attempt to recover the levels of Official Aid for Development from 1992 during the Rio Summit, are clearly insufficient. Nor do they enter into the development of stable systems for safely providing a true World Fund, whether it is for reducing poverty or for development. It will only take on a body and capacity if some global taxation is considered, whether it be on the most speculative movements of capital (similar to the so-called Tobin tax) or on the trade of certain resources, such as energy and in particular fossil fuels, or fuels for international traffic, such as kerosene for aviation, as was proposed in 1997 by the EU itself.

The EU has yet another reason for leading this process of change, and that is the opportunity it is offered by expansion to make this accelerated process of development for a significant part of Europe an example of sustainable development. And that would place candidate countries at the head in many areas of production, services and consumption, responding to a qualitative leap, called "leap-frogging", for which they are better placed because they will have to renew many infrastructures and productive and service capacities, and will be able to do it with hugely innovative and sustainable technology! That would be the definitive test for the EU's capacity for leadership.o

Johannesbug, one step forward, two steps back?

Josep Xercavins i Valls
Co-ordinating Professor of the Ad Hoc Secretary's Office, at the UPC 1 , of the World Forum of Civil Society Networks - UBUNTU 2
Collaborating Professor of the UNESCO Chair in Technology, Sustainable Development, Imbalance and Global Change at the UPC

After first giving a analysis clarifying the historic process and the evolution of international politics that led to Johannesburg, the author argues that the meeting there was not really about sustainable development but was really a further step towards the current supremacy of international neoliberalism.

First preliminary consideration: after Rio compared to after Johannesburg

At one or other of the meetings of the Catalan Committee in preparation for the summit3 I reflected on some things that now, as I write this document, it seems apt to quote (although not word for word). They all refer to the Rio Summit, which I did not attend. In the summer of 1992 I was reading about sustainable development for the first time.

a) "Before, during and immediately after the Rio Summit, there was no general sensation that the summit or its results were anything out of the ordinary".

b) "Only ten years after the exceptional Rio Summit another summit as "paradigmatic" as Rio cannot be expected".

To give this document a structure, I would say in this respect that one month after the end of the Johannesburg Summit, first that point b) is certainly absolutely true, although sometimes it is not easy to understand due to a lack of historic perspective. We could not and cannot therefore expect Johannesburg to have been and to be what Rio was.

Secondly, perception of an event like Johannesburg (immediately before, during and afterwards) is always very much conditioned by a lack of objective perspective and too many subjective feelings. Although even at Rio feeling a) was very common, it is clear that there will not be a sufficiently clear and correct analysis and a more objective perspective of Johannesburg for a long time.

The above point should also be greatly emphasised for another reason; and from my point of view the most important one. From today's perspective, although it is very clear that the results of Rio were generally quantitatively and qualitatively exceptional (paradigmatic), it is also very true that the way that institutions and society in general (at a world, continental, state and local level) have assumed them as their own, is the reason why it is now such an important benchmark.

It is therefore also true that the way in which everything that took place at Johannesburg (and in the long and highly fruitful process or preparation) is directed, used and developed by the institutions and by society itself in general, will be what determines the importance of Johannesburg 2002.

Second preliminary consideration: success or failure and/or optimism or pessimism

In our culture - our western civilisation - our communication is becoming ever simplified and lacking in content; such extremely simplified explanations are often required, thus making fuller and more accurate explanation and understanding extremely difficult. Fortunately, this is not the case of this document. Therefore, if it does not fulfil a different aim, that will be no fault but mine.

Judged in simplified terms, the summit was a failure and gives reason to be pessimistic. At least I am aware of having been one of those people who, at this level of simplification, may have contributed to giving this sensation, even though I may have attempted otherwise.

In this regard, apart from repeating the reflections mentioned in the previous section, the following points should be added here: first, that no single person can get a sufficiently broad view of everything that took place at Johannesburg (and in preparing it): simply because this was not humanly possible; secondly, that the contexts in which a summit like this develops are extremely specific in how they are seen, conceptualised and developed and in their results and analysis. Feelings of pessimism or optimism or success or failure cannot therefore be applied to the summit as a whole; they do not provide anything substantial. We may be more or less pessimistic or perhaps (to express it better) we should be concerned to a greater or lesser extent about the current world situation (of that I am convinced although I am sure that, even though it is an increasingly general concern, it is not shared by everyone). It is also very valid to think that the summit's official results are not those we believe to be necessary or good; and so on. It is also clear that all these postures will always respond to a specific perspective of ideological analysis (which will be very clearly stated in my case and which, in fact, will determine the general tone of this document). Failure for some people may thus be success for others; i.e., what must almost certainly have happened is that some specific opinions have imposed themselves on the views of others. However, I do think that we should be able to analyse and understand accurately where we are and where we are going. We shall then be able to value each step (whatever it may be) and always try to ensure that the next step taken is forwards, even though sometimes, as the old Leninist saying goes, "two backwards steps are needed to go one step forwards".

In short, I shall try to avoid evaluations that do not add anything and I shall try especially to find keys for analysis that allow for more in-depth evaluations than simplistic and banal codes of perception. I shall do this, however, from a clear ideological perspective of analysis, according to which (also evident) the initiatives that have been taken are not those the world needs. For this reason, if a simplified result were to appear in this document it would indeed be that of failure.

I shall also (and this is also another important preliminary consideration) bear in mind that what I wanted to and was able to follow, to a lesser or greater extent (and it was not easy to do so) was the official summit. Unfortunately, I did not, however, follow the thousands of parallel events of a diversely official nature and/or the civil society's Global People's Forum that was run alongside (albeit too far removed from) the official summit. Analysis of all that mentioned above: the whys and wherefores of society and its institutions assuming as their own what Johannesburg was, will take some time to give us the real scope of the whole summit.

1. The contexts of Johannesburg

1.1. Stockholm, Rio and Johannesburg; sustainable development beyond the environment

The World Summit for Sustainable Development, held in Johannesburg from 26th August to 4th September 2002, was, as is well known, a United Nations system summit. This means (as always, and there have been many, especially in recent history) an extraordinary meeting on a subject specified by the United Nations General Assembly, at its maximum level of Heads of State or Government.
This specific summit took place in the setting of what are known as the "UN Environment Summits": the first of which was held in Stockholm on the "Human Environment" in 1972; the second was in Rio on the "Environment and Development" in 1992; and this most recent summit on "Sustainable Development" was the third.

This seems to be the right moment to mention that the change in name of these summits is very much connected to changes society itself has experienced and assumed regarding environmental matters, and the role played in this by the emergence and development of the concept of sustainable development and sustainability in general. Although it is not the subject of this text, it is however clear (if only to me) that the very concept of sustainable development and of sustainability, despite having originated in the perception of limitations of a basically environmental type (in the 1970s and 1980s), has progressed a great deal. Furthermore, this conceptual development did not remain at all removed from the development of problems faced by humanity on the planet over the last few years of the 20th century. (It should not be forgotten, for example, that the phenomenon of globalisation was not perceived as such at Rio; the word did not even exist!). The sustainability of human life on the planet can thus only be understood as at least a three-fold and inseparable social, environmental and economic interconnections. Building the sustainability we wish to be inherited by future generations will depend on the type of global and local society (and the degree of social equality, cultural diversity and individual and collective freedom) we wish to construct. It will also depend on the interrelationships we wish for in the services provided by the earth's habitat - with our (in small letters) environment (in capital letters) -and on the economic methods used (i.e. the assignation of probably increasingly scarce resources, the use of which we should restrict for ourselves while at the same time making them available to everybody, once and for all).4

1.2. The Rio Summit - The Earth Summit - and Johannesburg

The main context for the Johannesburg Summit is the Rio Summit! It is no coincidence that it is often called Rio+10 rather than Jo'burg! This is not just a question of language, because there was a Rio+5 Summit (conceptually, officially named and thought up as such) in New York in 1997.

That, however, is not exactly what it was supposed to be. Its very name, the Johannesburg Summit on Sustainable Development, should have been a new and relevant step towards the sustainable development of human life on the planet. Perhaps it should be added here that this was, at least, what many people wanted.

The patient reader, however, should be allowed to take things in while at the same time being informed that the words uttered there were indeed just words rather than resolutions. In fact, even officially, the essential aim of the Johannesburg Summit was to analyse how the Programme or Agenda 21 approved at Rio (and, generally everything approved at Rio) was being implemented. It was also to analyse the results achieved and to draw up a plan of action or implementation to be followed and thus progress in introducing the programme5. In short, therefore, Rio was and still is the main benchmark. Although the Jo'burg debates questioned even the principles of Rio, ultimately (in this regard) Rio remained intact. No one can take it way from us, at least for the moment.

The consequences of the absolute and relative differences between the contexts of Rio and Johannesburg should be considered, explained and defined at this point.

First, however a mention of what was Rio really about.

1.2.1. What was Rio really about? The Rio Agenda 21 6

Table 2, which will be used at different points in this text, shows, among other things, a significant part of the index of the results from Rio. It specifically shows those from the "Programme or Agenda 21: a plan of action for sustainable development" approved at Rio.

Note should be made of the subtitle of the main result of Rio: "a plan of action for sustainable development". The headings of sections I (Social and Economic Dimensions) and II (Conservation and Management of Resources for Development) should also be observed.

Rio then was not therefore clearly an "Environmentalist Summit"! It clearly was, yet it went a lot further! Among other things, it was the moment at which the very concept of sustainable development acquired the scope mentioned at the end of section 1.1. of this document. The concept of sustainable development had emerged in 1987 (5 years before) and, for the moment, the notion was still focused on its more environmental aspects. It was precisely a World Summit - faced with the whole world's problems, which therefore (it could not be otherwise) was forced to start asking how to develop and how to do so in a sustainable way, a world that was in the main poor and under development- that had to bring the social, environmental and economic co-ordinates of development to the forefront, or at least to give them equal importance. Rio did this! It did so at a moment when there was not so much awareness as there is now of the world's serious social problems; with globalisation as it currently stands!
1.3. The development of the international political situation in the 1990s; the contexts of Rio and the contexts of Johannesburg

Using table 1, created by myself from very diverse sources, I shall try to place and compare the absolute and relative contexts of Rio and Johannesburg. This is both essential and extremely useful.

Rio 92 took place, among other things, at a moment in history when despite all the problems (the Gulf War is not an entirely insignificant example), was certainly totally exceptional. The complete end to real communism and the bilateral world; what was certainly the greatest international distension for several decades; what could be called an uncertain political and international future that should certainly favour a system like that of the United Nations, as regards its internal forces (more characteristic and progressive programmes and more important leaders, etc.) being able to play a more forceful role than ever.
Without knowledge of other possible analyses, if there are any, I, at least, can only understand the quantity, the quality and the importance of the agreements reached there.

Furthermore, however, it is not only the case because of Rio itself, but also because Rio produced a knock-on effect that continued for nearly the whole of the 1990s. This decade has been called the decade of progressive UN summits: Cairo and Population, Copenhagen and Social Development and Peking and Women, etc. All the summits effectively brought about very important and progressive declarations and plans of action. The only unfortunate but definitive feature of them is that these have not been implemented! In some cases this lack of implementation has been virtually absolute or total.
This clearly fundamental situation has also led, and is being witnessed at the moment (and experienced once again at Johannesburg) to the UN having gone from a highly significant recovery and reawakening after all the years of the Cold War, to a fresh downturn. This is even more heartbreaking as regards the role we would surely wish it to be able to play. Member states do not comply with what they approve.
Why has this come about and why is it the case? It is because the world's rich and powerful states have been taking another path for some time now. Reagan and Thatcher started the development of a great conservative and neoliberal revolution. This has a great deal to do with the fall of real communism but it did not become fully evident until well into the 1990s.

The instruments for implementing the more international aspects (the majority in this case) of its policies are not the United Nations (the status quo of the bipolar world, reviving after the end of real communism), but rather the old (but reshaped to play a new leading role) Bretton Woods institutions. These basically include the IMF (International Monetary Fund) with its structural adjustment policies (conditioning loans to developing countries to reduce the public sectors and policies of these countries). They include, to a different extent, the WB (World Bank) by determining the bases for international co-operation based more on the private sector, by means of DFI (Direct Foreign Investment), than the public sector, by means of ODA (Official Development Aid). These institutions, as is known, are totally controlled by the world's rich and powerful countries (the democracy of these institutions is basically proportional to the GDP of member countries). They were complemented, a few years later, by the most controversial and, despite its significance, undefined of the international organisations: the World Trade Organisation, WTO, established in 1994, as an instrument to deregulate international trade.

The globalisation (the type of globalisation) resulting from these policies, very much facilitated by the development of ICT (information and communication technologies), is what defines an exceptionally different context for Jo'burg than for Rio.

In simple but comprehensible terms, especially in the language of our Europe: on a world scale in the 1990s, the neoliberal framework sown in the 1980s imposed itself relentlessly on a social democratic or Keynesian framework. Although the results, especially on a macro scale, are truly alarming (more absolute and relative imbalances than ever; greater poverty than ever; greater environmental problems than ever), we are still experiencing the expansion and predominance of this economic paradigm, in which the market and trade have changed from a means for human development to an end in themselves.

This is, in my opinion, the main reason why all those progressive UN programmes from the 1990s, in UN language, are very "socially democratic" on a world scale yet are not worth the paper they are written on.7 Going back to our Europe: rather than building a more equal world in all senses with cohesion funds (political), a choice has been made in fact to continue enriching the world's rich and powerful countries (the minority) at the expense of increasing the impoverishment of the world's poor countries (the majority) and the serious impact on the environment of everyone.

In this respect and context, Johannesburg is thus neither a success nor a failure (a dialectic mentioned earlier): it is one more victory, for the moment, for the "world neoliberal framework- a predominance of private management and a deregulated market" over a possible "world social democratic framework - with a predominance of public management and a regulated market". The latter would, in principle, respect people more and the planet that protects them. On a world scale, the basic public agent for the social democratic framework would be the UN as there is no other for the moment. I shall therefore refer to it sometimes as the "UN framework".

2. The state of the world8 and international politics and Johannesburg

2.1. The Kofi Annan Report, January 2002, on the implementation of the Rio Agenda 21: "Agenda 21 and Sustainable Development Good Plan, Weak Implementation" (9)

It is clear that a World Summit should respond, among other main initial co-ordinates, to an analysis of the corresponding situation. In this case, taking into consideration the very relevant language of the Worldwatch Institute, it would be an analysis of "The State of the World". For the Johannesburg Summit, however, as mentioned in section 1.2., this analysis might be said partly to have been one of the main aims of the summit process itself. In fact, that is what it was. That is what the large amount of preparatory work and number of meetings (PrepComs) on a state, continent and world, etc. scale was trying to achieve. These certainly gave the summit some very necessary and positive results that have still not been properly or explicitly gathered together.

From this analysis and result, a valuation of the degree of development and implementation of programmes and challenges approved and defined by the Rio Summit was to emerge.
What, therefore could be better than the Report of the Secretary General of the United Nations himself to give us this valuation. This was included in a report made public in January 2002, to mark the first world PrepCom. Its title was significant: "Agenda 21 and Sustainable Development - Good Plan, Weak Implementation".

I will quote here, practically literally, some of the headlines from the press headlines summarising this report, which referred to aspects related to the management of ecosystems:

- Degradation of the soil affects at least two thirds of the world's agricultural land
- Drinking water is increasingly scarce in many countries because of agriculture that consumes 70% of water.
- One quarter of the world's fish stocks is affected by indiscriminate fishing and half are totally exhausted.
- Over 11,000 species are considered to be threatened and over 800 have become extinct
- There has been a net loss of 4% of the world's forests in the last decade
- World fossil fuel consumption increased by 10% from 1992 to 1999
These were mentioned after dealing with population and poverty, also in very familiar and worrying terms, and after having referred to economics in the following terms:
- In the 1990s, most countries enjoyed economic development. Not all countries benefited from this growth. The gap between the quality of life in Africa and other regions grew larger. Economic and social conditions in transition economies also deteriorated
- Globalisation has shown it has a very volatile side. Financial crises in Mexico and East Asia
- Official Development Aid, ODA, decreased in the 1990s
- Direct Foreign Investment, DFI in developing countries grew until 1994, fell notably until 1998 and thereafter remained stable
- Government subsidies in all countries have increased

2.2. The UN Report to the Johannesburg Summit: "Global Challenge, Global Opportunity; trends in sustainable development" (9)

A few days before the start of the official summit, the United Nations Social and Economic Affairs Department issued this report. It is in line with the previous report and many other reports of its own programmes (UNEP and UNDP for example) of other international organisations, such as the WB and the OECD and of other organisations like those mentioned and referred to.

Nothing substantially new or surprising there! This situation has now been witnessed and analysed for some time and its seriousness can be referred to in a wide number of bibliographical sources (4)

2.3. The "Millennium Development Goals" (UN Millennium General Assembly)10, the "Doha Ministerial Declaration "11 of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) and the "Monterrey Consensus"12 of the UN Summit for the Financing of Development

Taking up the thread of section 1.3., a fresh look at table 1 (the last rows) shows the international political situation in which the Johannesburg Summit took place.

I have stated repeatedly and in different ways that, in my opinion, this is the context that really influenced and determined Johannesburg. This is, furthermore, quite logical and normal.

All the Summits + 5, which took place to review what we have referred to and defined as the most progressive summits in the history of the UN, were held at the change of millennium (for reference purposes). Each and every one of these reviews gave rise to disenchantment as they were seen often to have been totally unfulfilled (the Copenhagen Summit on Social Development, for example). As the 1990s came to an end, there had even been a return to the past (the Peking + 5 Summit on Women in New York).

Parallel to this, globalisation and evidence that the benefits that they might bring were anyhow not reaching the developing world (quite the opposite was happening) were clearly becoming established as the new, supreme international context. From a more environmental perspective, non-ratification and/or non-compliance with the 1997 Kyoto agreements are yet a further indication of this situation.
It could be stated that, in this regard, the 20th century finished at Seattle with the failure of the WTO meeting there. This was connected with the "official" creation of what is known as the "anti-globalisation" movement. The origins of both, however, are older and go back to 1994 when the WTO was established and the revolt in Chiapas took place. It should be mentioned that the failure of the WTO Seattle meeting, viewed in perspective, seems to have been the result of two factors. One was the great pressure effectively from the "anti-globalisation" movement. The other, not at all insignificant, was the position of the G77 (the name given to a certain, very weak and contradictory political regrouping of over 120 developing countries), which had been strengthened, as is characteristic in the meetings of international organisations, by the pressure and often connivance between this group and the accredited NGOs that still choose to participate "within the system". This analysis is not the subject of this document either but is another detail necessary to interpret what is happening in the world and the role played by different agents of differing influence.

The year 2000 was the year of good resolutions and the UN also made its own watered-down versions! The Extraordinary General Assembly, the Millennium Summit, approved the so-called well-known "Millennium Development Goals" in its declaration.

Thus, when Johannesburg arrived, everyone recognised not only the Rio objectives but also both sets of objectives (the Rio + Millennium Summits). However, greater emphasis was given to those of the Millennium (because they were newer) and they were considered to be the guiding principles for humanity at the time. They are, nevertheless, only objectives (too modest for some people like myself) and "as could not be otherwise given the context we are in", do not identify and/or specify the necessary methods and the ways (economic, and institutional, etc.) that they should be achieved.

2001 will need many books to be written about it for a long time to come in order for it to be even slightly assimilated. It included the emergence of the new social movements (the first Porto Alegre with the slogan "another world is possible", the events of Genoa, among other events, associated with the "anti-globalisation" movement; etc.). It also included the more explicitly important failure of the UN Summit of Durban on Racism (with the addition - as yet not sufficiently evaluated - of a significant internal rupture in the NGO movement). It ended, it seemed, with the events of 11th September in the USA.

However, a few weeks after those events that were so important in many ways (and also so socially demobilising), ministers from the WTO member states met at Doha, an Arab Emirates city isolated from the world, and reached an agreement that they had not managed to make at Seattle. Effectively, the "Doha Ministerial Declaration of the WTO"8 is an agreement to reactivate a round of liberalisation of world trade. It is the largest that has ever been undertaken. Apart from trade in goods, just about everything was included in the negotiations (even services as essential as education and health) (13).

The most unknown but most quoted agreements from the discussions and final documents of Johannesburg were those from Doha. The liberalisation of world trade is, according to the Doha agreements, the cornerstone for the new direction of world economic policy. An unprecedentedly deregulated market will be the setting in which the world's problems (of poverty, the environment and of cultural diversity, etc.) are resolved.

The final preliminary step took place five months before Johannesburg: The Monterrey World Summit for Financing Development. This led to what is known as the "Monterrey Consensus" (9).

The summit was, in fact, a mandate from the Millennium Summit to specify the precise methods, instruments and ways to finance development. What was this so-called consensus (risen fully from the ashes of 11th September and the trade concerns of Doha)? The headings of the document's main sections give an explanation:

- To mobilise international resources for development: Direct Foreign Investment (DFI) and other private channels
- International trade as a development tool (i.e., to go full steam ahead along the deregulating path set out at Doha)

- Official Development Aid (ODA) from developed countries should increase to 0.7% of their GDP (doesn't that sound rather old hat?)
Apart from being expressed in slightly more progressive terms as regards debt, the "Monterrey Consensus" is therefore theoretically an agreement within the international neoliberal framework.

3. The official results of Johannesburg (14)

3.1. A general view

As with any UN system summit, Johannesburg yielded the two most usual results: the political declaration and the Plan of Action (the latter could be given and has been given a countless number of synonyms: plan of application and plan of implementation, etc.); They ought to be, respectively, the expression of political objectives (the declaration) and of ways of achieving these (the Plan of Action).
One of the features that explains the nature and very special characteristics of the results of Johannesburg is that the meeting was attended without any prior consensus. The result of the four world preparatory committees (PrepComs), the last of which was attended by ministers and held in Bali, led to a lack of agreement that was quite obvious and explained thereafter. It is a very interesting and pedagogical exercise and therefore highly recommendable for people who wish to go into greater detail in the subject, to compare the document from Bali8 (where the points of disagreement among the negotiating parties can be seen in brackets and in bold) and the final document from Johannesburg. This comparison shows in precisely what direction the disagreements were resolved. We shall deal with this later.

The fact that the start of Johannesburg was marked by disagreement meant that the Plan of Action, which itself should be the most important task and result of the summit, was even more so. The whole official summit and, to some extent, all Johannesburg revolved around this debate that took up the first week of the summit.

The political declaration was therefore less representative than they usually are. It was never negotiated publicly. Until a few minutes after its formal approval by the plenary meeting, the text everyone had was substantially different and substantially more progressive. The final text, distributed after having been approved (!), albeit (in my opinion) even more progressive than the plan of action, lacks any real value and therefore I will not mention it expressly. The declaration's only positive feature was its statement that "Multi-lateralism is the future".

3.2. The Plan of Action

We have just mentioned that the Plan of Action is a summit's fundamental official document. That is how it should be and is especially true of Johannesburg.

The structure of the document, currently being definitively edited, is very reminiscent of the Rio Agenda 21. That is a good thing. This appears once again in table 2.

However, this may be one of its only good aspects.

Once again, however, here too everyone needs more time for reflection and analysis. Although I monitored the development of the official summit very closely, a single person could not follow it all. Both at the PrepCom in Bali and Johannesburg I decided, therefore, to follow the negotiation of chapters V (sustainable development in a globalising world), IX (Means of implementation - finance and trade) and X (Institutional framework for sustainable development) of the Plan of Action. According to the internal jargon of the summit, these chapters were grouped together under the general name of Governance. In any case, that also clearly explains the general basic content of this document and what influences me in making this first valuation, which, I repeat, needs more time for a clear perspective.

What is the main criticism that is bound to be made of the plan of action or its implementation? It is precisely that it is not what it says it is! Once again we are faced with a long list of persistently long-term objectives, (10-15 years, in which so many things will happen, many of which may be considered as excuses for these objectives not having been met, even though in fact no real attempt will ever have been made to meet them). The objectives are almost never quantified and, I repeat, lack any type of explicit, clear financial and institutional commitment.

Monitoring the negotiation of governance in the Plan of Action thus enables me to state (without doubt unfortunately) that what this plan of action does do, as analysed in section 2.3., is transfer responsibility for solving the world's main social and environmental problems to the market! (with no intention of regulating it, moreover). States, especially the rich and powerful ones, have shrunk from any financial and institutional commitments within the framework of the UN system. The international economic and financial institutions, however, especially the World Trade Organisation and private resources, have practically exclusively the only framework within which and by which the challenges involved are to be tackled (and who knows what guarantee there is of this when no one is able to demand accountability of anyone else).

3.3. The "Type-2 Partnership" agreements

The categorical nature of the above paragraph will mean the reader needs more information to establish his or her own criteria with respect.

"Type-2: Partnership" agreements should therefore be mentioned.
It is likely that in the future this term will eventually change. The terminology used here is that which was used, first, at the PrepCom III in New York, and secondly, that developed at the PrepCom IV in Bali. It is certainly too illustrative to go down in history.

Type-I summit agreements are those approved as such by the summit. They are the political declaration and the Plan of Action, etc. Type-II summit agreements are those listed and considered to be results of the summit, although not explicitly approved by the summit, i.e., by the extraordinary plenary meeting of the UN General Assembly.

This subject was very controversial at Bali. Moreover, not everyone agreed on the need for at least a general regulation to include and foresee the types of political accountability these agreements should have, when they should be examined and in the presence of whom.

At Johannesburg we discovered that there were some 300 acts of presentation and proposals of partnership, parallel to the official summit. These took place in the same building and in other buildings associated with Johannesburg 2002. They were included on the agenda of the official summit and can still be explicitly found on the summit's official web site as summit results!
As the nice, healthy word as "partnership" implies, these are agreements among partners and are usually, but not necessarily reached together: governments, companies, international organisations, universities and NGOs, etc. that propose projects in the summit directorate general, i.e., on sustainable development.

There could be no nicer solution, could there? There certainly could not, if it were not for the fact that they have not been set within the type-I agreements - i.e., nowhere is it clear what the relationship is or whether there should be any, between the approved objectives (political declaration and plan of action) of the summit and the objectives of these partnership agreements. If it were not for the fact that because they are not accountable to anyone, either at the start (and therefore why this project and not another may be of greater priority but not be so beneficial for some partners) or the end (of the objectives that are really met and of the collateral impact, etc.) of the performance thereof; if were not for the fact that when the Plan of Action states that additional funds must be found, it envisages putting them into these partnership agreements and not into funds under some kind of public authority "control"; if it were not, in short, because not even the slightest general regulation (like that studied at Bali) was considered at Johannesburg.

In my opinion there are too many "if it were not fors" for it not to be clearly the opening up of a new channel for the neoliberal framework to be (now virtually) the only benchmark of international policy. It is surely a new step towards the privatisation of "international co-operation". This will also be mentioned at the end of this document.

3.4. Other results

Among all of the results of which I am still not aware and can therefore not refer to (apart from those outside the official summit), I do wish to mention those that go by the name WEHAB (Water and Sanitation, Energy, Health, Agriculture and Biodiversity). These are studies and debates on some key and more environmental aspects of sustainable development. They are also very interesting and important results of the official summit that I wish to at least mention in this document.

3.5. A first look at the results of the summit from the perspective of the UN

I still think that the reader (if anyone has reached this point) must think that my ideological bias is so strong that I cannot find anything good in the results of the official summit.

If this is the case, I suggest that he or she d go back to the summit's official web site and read the document "Key outcomes of the summit" (14), written, of course, by the UN itself.
Apart from some very nice but old-fashioned hot air and great praise for partnerships (the only place where $ investments are mentioned), there is nothing more substantial to be found.

However, the previous section was intended to show that there were many very positive results. These were not achieved in the areas I followed but were very clear in many other aspects. The fact the summit took place and the impact on social awareness that it must have meant for sustainable development on a world scale are undoubtedly very clear examples.

4. Some final evaluations of the results of the Official Johannesburg Summit

4.1. Johannesburg "was not a summit on sustainable development"

In a summit on sustainable development it is to be hoped that much of the effort would be geared towards sustainable management of, to give an important example, water (a renewable, scarce resource under a lot of anthropocentric pressure). A simplified but not untrue assessment, especially to justify the title of the section, would be that Johannesburg discussed (or worse still, it partly defined) why water would be best managed "privately".

Although an attempt has always been made to consider water and other essential services provided by the earth's ecosystem as public assets, it seems that they too also need to be privatised. If we carry on in this way we shall end up by imposing private property rights on water (which I continue to give as an example but not only as that) so that the market should manage it as efficiently as possible.
These, as well as the previous and the following reasons (see section 4.3. below) show how far the summit really was from progressing towards sustainable development.

4.2. Johannesburg, a further step in the international neoliberal framework

At Johannesburg we experienced one more step towards the supremacy of what we have named the international neoliberal framework. Prompted by Doha, the UN (currently the only possible body for a system of public management of world problems) has consented, at Monterrey and Johannesburg, to this step being taken.

The above statement has been repeated enough and should not be repeated any more. However, expressed thus it may seem that the UN itself that has taken these steps. This is not the case.
The UN is an international organisation of member states. In the current status quo it is these states that are sovereign! The results of a UN summit come from a diversely long and complex negotiation process among these states. However, everyone knows that some states wield greater influence than others. The negotiations of both Bali and Johannesburg, in fact, were basically three-way negotiations among the USA, the EU and G77. There was also some rather sporadic active participation by countries such as Switzerland, Canada and Australia but not many more. The European Union however played a very minor role. According to analysts, the well-known lack of standard policy and a common foreign policy explain this weak role. In practice, therefore, the real negotiation, the disagreement of Bali and of the first week of Jo'burg, was between the USA (and, among other things, its current unilateralism) and the regrouped but weak and contradictory G77 (a group of over 120 developing countries) + China. I will not say that the negotiating position of the G77 + China expressed explicit disagreement with acting within the neoliberal framework. I will say, however, that they generally expressed, more "primarily", a claim to getting out of the hole they are in and which they do not think they will be able to get out of in the current dynamics of international politics. However, on Sunday 1st September, the USA undertook in just a few hours (without electricity and typists, and leaving out the EU) to break the stamina of the G77 + China so they should take that step.

In short, I do not think there is any doubt that Jo'burg was another clear victory for the USA (and the EU on the rebound) and its positions in international politics. These are basically to consolidate itself as the only world power by bringing about the international structural reforms necessary for the interests of its economic sectors. These need to continue expanding in order to continue making a profit and thus make the market itself bigger, especially for their products. These products can therefore be produced in conditions in which there are fewer social and environmental controls and thus a greater profit margin.

4.3. Final reflection: globalisation, trade and sustainable development 15

Trade has been the basis for the most positive advances in human history. Conceptually and ethically, the idea of exchanging what one does best and more efficiently with what somebody else does best and more efficiently has no side effects.

An exceptional increase in world trade is perhaps definitive evidence of what is known as globalisation.
Nevertheless, when trade is more speculative than real (e.g. when it involves the transfer of a product among its diverse, more profitable zones of production- because of profit margin), or when trade has significant collateral impact (e.g., trade over large distances involves, among other things, energy consumption that would be unfeasible with "truthful" energy prices), or when "trade-aid" is not real aid (e.g., surpluses of the subsidised agricultural overproduction of the world's rich and powerful countries end up destroying weak local economies in the primary sector of poor countries), then trade becomes one of the most unsustainable activities (sometimes from a social and sometimes from an environmental perspective) of highly controversial globalisation.

The social, environmental and economic sustainability of human life on the planet therefore urgently needed the Johannesburg Summit to set to rights some of the most harmful tendencies for humanity itself. The more it has fundamentally validated the positions that most favour the most unsustainable trends of globalisation as it is, the less it has been a summit on sustainability.

Naturally Johannesburg will have given rise to progress but for the moment the "step forward" has been accompanied by "two steps back"o

References

1 --Technical University of Catalonia (Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya). (http://www.upc.es)
2 --UBUNTU is an ancient African word used to refer to humanity - sharing, being aware of and being in harmony with all creation. As an ideal it encourages co-operation among individuals, cultures and nations. The UBUNTU World Forum was set up in Barcelona, in the 2001-2002 period and responds to a call by Federico Mayor Zaragoza, and has the support of the Catalan institutions. http://www.ubuntu.upc.es
3 --An initiative by the UNESCO Centre of Catalonia (http://www.unescocat.org) and the UNESCO Chair of Technology, Sustainable Development, Imbalance and Global Change at the UPC (http://www.catunesco.upc.es)
4 --"What we are talking about when we refer to sustainable development"; Josep Xercavins i Valls; La Vanguardia 25-11-01, pp 34-35
5 --These objectives were clearly stated in the UN General Assembly of December 2000, announcing the Johannesburg Summit.
6 --http://ubuntu.upc.es/pag.php?lg=cat&sec=biblio&p=intro or "Agenda 21: a plan of action for sustainable development; United Nations"
7 --"Ten years of world chaos"; Josep Xercavins i Valls; La Vanguardia, 4-07-02, pp 34
8 --The "State of the World Reports", translated and published in Catalonia by the UNESCO Centre of Catalonia, have been produced since the 1980s by the WI (Worldwatch Institute) and, among many other things, have given us this language.
9 --http://www.johannesburgsummit.org/; The official UN Summit web site!
10 --http://ubuntu.upc.es/pag.php?lg=cat&sec=biblio&p=intro
11 --http://www.wto.org/wto/english/thewto_e/_minist_e/min01_e/mindecl_e.htm
12 --http://www.un.org/esa/ffd/0302finalMonterreyConsensus.pdf
13 --"Putting the WTO in its place"; ATTAC; Susan George; Editorial Icaria, 2002
14 --http://www.johannesburgsummit.org/html/documents/ summit_docs/2009_keyoutcomes_commitments.doc
15 --Globalisation & The Crisis of Sustainable Development; Martin Khor; Third World Network, 2001

Different views of the Summit on Sustainable Development
Wasant Techawongtham, Rita Mishaan, Nahid Pilvar, Chaacha Nwita, Geoffrey Lean, Tajudeen Abdulraheem

2002 Reuters-IUCM Media Awards---The Best Summit Story

Given the power of the media in its capacity to influence how people and politicians think and act -whether they are in a small village in the south of France, the teeming metropolis of Hong Kong, or a hacienda in Mexico- news gatherers who reported on the World Summit on Sustainable Development had a unique responsibility to maintain the quality of the information they delivered.

Reuters Foundation and IUCN decided to reward outstanding examples of environmental journalism that seized the moment to enhance public awareness of the most pressing issues that the Summit addressed.

The Reuters-IUCN Awards, established in 1998, aim to raise global awareness of environmental and sustainable development issues, by encouraging excellence in environmental reporting worldwide. This year's global environmental journalism competition was dubbed "The Best Summit Story" with a focus on the Johannesburg Summit.

Over 150 entries from countries as diverse as Brazil, the United States, China, Russia and Kazakhstan, Jamaica, Algeria, Mozambique, Panama and Hungary were received for this year's competition. The author of The Best Summit Story, selected from amongst six regional winners will receive a cash prize of USD 5,000 at the Global Awards Ceremony taking place in Washington, DC, on 3 December 2002.
In this issue of Medi Ambient. Tecnologia i Cultura, Reuters and IUCN would like to share some of the examples of inspired and thought-provoking reporting on the Summit from this year's competition. If for no other reason, the Johannesburg Summit deserves praise for the excellent work of journalists the world over who help enhance global awareness of the critical issues and demonstrate their courage, creativity and talent.o

Achim Steiner
Director General of IUCN-The World Conservation Union

Note: IUCN and Reuters cannot be held responsible for the content of the articles. The choice of articles for publication in Medi Ambient. Tecnologia i Cultura did not in any way influence the decision of the jury.

In the beginning was the summit
Wasant Techawongtham
Deputy News Editor for Environmental and Urban Affairs, Bangkok Post.

The much-anticipated Earth Summit II ended in Johannesburg on Wednesday, leaving behind much disappointment and bitterness among many participants.

The 10-day summit was notable for its abundance of rhetoric and absence of commitment. World political leaders made high-sounding speeches and multinational corporation chiefs staged a show of willingness to help improve the global environment.

But in the end, the world is left with a tome of political declarations that are likely to remain just words on paper never to be translated into concrete, meaningful action - just like Agenda 21, the product of the first Earth Summit 10 years ago in Rio de Janeiro.

Green activists were particularly incensed. They believed the summit was hijacked by big business with the support of rich countries.

"We feel betrayed. The leaders of the world have behaved as if they were corporate executives." said Friends of the Earth president Ricardo Navarro. The World Wildlife Fund dubbed the summit, known by its acronym WSSD, the "World Summit of Shameful Deals".

They are right to be frustrated and angry. They have waited 10 years for this conference. They expected it to pick up where the Rio summit left off.

Agenda 21, the blueprint for sustainable development coming out of Rio, was a disappointment, not for lack of noble goals but for lack of concrete actions by almost all countries. The Johannesburg summit was supposed to address this serious shortcoming and produce more action-oriented, timebound agreements. Nothing of the sort has happened.

The only bright spot coming out of Johannesburg was the announcement by Russia and Canada that they would ratify the Kyoto Protocol on climate change soon. If that comes to pass, it would put the protocol over its target of being ratified by at least 55 countries with at least 55% of industrialised carbon emissions needed to come into force.

This is a triumph for the Kyoto supporters who were concerned about its fate after the United States, with 5% of the global population emitting 36% of greenhouse gases, pulled out of the pact.

The Russian and Canadian announcements came after Europe and other parts of the world were hit by devastating floods that lent concrete urgency to the need to deal with global warming.

UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan implored the world "not to expect miracles at conferences such as this". He maintained that "partnerships between government, NGOs and business" are the only way that progress should be made.

The three-way partnership on which Mr Annan places his hopes has been talked about for years. It seems like an ideal arrangement to have the three sectors work together towards sustainable development.

The problem is that their goals are quite incompatible. When the business elite talk about sustainable development, what they really mean is development without interruption or hindrance. They may be willing to pay a little extra for "cleaner" technology or some social causes. But ask them to produce less and make less profit to protect the environment, and the answer is likely to be no.

As for politicians, most would go for economic development rather than environmental protection, simply because it draws popular votes and financial support from the business world.

It took the unprecedented floods that hit Europe to convince the Russians and Canadians to jump on the Kyoto Protocol bandwagon. It will take similar catastrophes or worse to convince politicians to pay more attention to the environment rather than conduct business as usual.

Mr Annan said: " Johannesburg is not the end of everything, it is a beginning." The question is whether it will be a beginning of the end.o

The Johannesburg Summit. Success or failure?
Rita Mishaan
Journalist, Latin America

Thirty years after the Stockholm Conference and ten years after the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, the WORLD SUMMIT ON SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT was held in Johannesburg, South Africa (August 26 to September 4, 2002), generating great expectation worldwide.

The agreements arising from the summit were the Political Declaration and a Plan of Action, results which highlight the commitment to reducing the number of people in the world who have no access to drinking water and treatment of waste water, defence of biodiversity and fishing resources. However, no commitment was achieved with goals for encouraging renewable energies.

In the Political Declaration, countries assume "a collective responsibility to advancing and reinforcing interdependency and mutual support among the pillars of sustainable development -economic development, social development and environmental protection- at local, national, regional and global levels". Also specified is the commitment to eradicate poverty, and it is pointed out that the huge distance that divides humanity into rich and poor, as well as the increasing distance between the developed and developing worlds, presents a great threat to global prosperity, safety and stability.

But what does all this mean to the average citizen?

The planet's societies were expecting a magic wand to solve ancestral problems that we ourselves have been carrying along, by means of DEVELOPMENT that benefits a minority. No one is left unaware that poverty rates (40% of the poor of the world live in developing countries, to which corresponds 11% of worldwide consumption) are rapidly increasing while a smaller number of rich people controls the greatest percentage of the world's economy (15% of the world's population lives in rich countries, to which corresponds 56% of consumption).

This formula for DEVELOPMENT has proven to be inefficient and unsustainable. Planet Earth, on which we live and which has in turn proven to be the only Planet in the Solar System on which we humans can survive, cannot withstand much longer this formula that guarantees to continue with processes of social inequality and increasing environmental degradation.

This disparate growth widens the gap between rich and poor among countries and within countries. If we add the accelerated population growth (the population is currently over 6.2 billion inhabitants, and projections for 2025 could reach 8 billion), this multiplies social problems and means a greater load on already scarce natural resources.

The continual complaints directed at the policy of northern countries towards the South, due to their unwillingness to assume responsibility for the destruction of the environment and exploitation of southern peoples, takes on greater significance when we in the South do not want to acknowledge our lack of willingness to respect democracy, human rights, transparency, governability and to stop the destruction of our ecosystems. Nevertheless, those of us from the South continue to request greater economic resources for Official Development Assistance (ODA) which, according to agreements from the Earth Summit, were set at 0.7% of the GNP of industrialized countries and which, to date, are only fulfilled by 5 countries.

So, who is truly responsible?

If we listen to the defeatist voices of communicators and politicians regarding the FAILURE of the Summit, I ask myself: Did the world really expect to change in ONE SUMMIT what has been an ancestral process of social and environmental deterioration? With a magic wand maybe? The five rings? Isn't it true that the story of humanity and its DEVELOPMENT is what teaches us through experience and history the best road to follow?

Human intelligence is what differentiates us from the other living worlds and gives us the ability to learn and improve processes. The Summit is part of these processes, and it is up to each and every one of us to take hold of these processes.

In a democratic society, we are all responsible for national duties, as is the case in the context of the concert of nations of Planet Earth. Appropriation of the commitments established in the Summit awards us a strengthened framework for how we can improve things and how this formula of DEVELOPMENT can improve to everyone's benefit.

The preamble for true "SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT".
"UBUNTU"
(which in old African means)
"IT IS EVERYONE'S RESPONSIBILITY"
Here's to OUR SURVIVAL!!!!!!!! o

Earth summit, no panacea
Nahid Pilvar
Tehran Times (Iran)

Tehran, Sept 8, IRNA -Discrimination is the main cause behind poverty in the world, a member of the Majlis Social Commission, Reza Niktalaei said, adding that the difference in the levels of using sophisticated tools and equipment has resulted in widening income differences.

Speaking to the English-language paper "The Tehran Times" in an exclusive interview here on Sunday, he said that, "If the reasons behind a lack of realization of goals of the first Earth Summit in Rio 10 years ago are studied carefully, more practical solutions will definitely be found.

During these summits, he added, considerable energy is wasted to cater to public opinion. Some global powers that want to evade accountability for their humanitarian responsibilities support such summits, and through propaganda create hope in developing countries.

He went on to say that the propaganda is not proportional to the international measures taken to eradicate discrimination to reduce poverty, and increase environmental protection. The environmental degradation will gradually intensify to higher levels, for instance.

Answering a question on the influence of different countries on items submitted to the Johannesburg Summit for ratification, he noted that the management of these problems is not possible through measures taken at the national level alone, because natural, cultural, economic, and even security boundaries will gradually vanish.

Thus, the world is still waiting for international measures, while unfortunately these measures are frequently mere propaganda.

"I dare say that the new world order, in spite of its appearance, has contributed to a widening of the gap between the developed and developing countries. However, developing countries experience development at different speeds," opined the official.

Thus far, independence and global freedom, for instance, have not materialized and this destructive situation will continue to be a fact of life for millions of the poor and deprived in developing nations, he continued.

The Tehran Times further pointed to the Earth Summit in Johannesburg, South Africa, and added that the summit ended late Wednesday while the participating countries - through consultation and coordination -intended to pave the way for a better environment and life for human beings sharing the planet.

The participants wanted to find ways to fight poverty, unemployment, disease, water shortages, and environmental problems, wrote the paper in its Face to Face column.
They also wanted to find a solution for the poor countries' heavy debts to the rich nations, it concluded.

Wake Up Africa! No One But You Can Build This Continent
Chaacha Mwita
Journalist, Kenya

"The world we have created is a product of our way of thinking. It cannot be changed without changing the way we think" - Albert Einstein (1879-1955).

Slightly less than a fortnight ago, Africa hosted the world to discuss sustainable development. At the moot - attractively christened the United Nations' Earth Summit - in Johannesburg, South Africa, it was clear that sustainable development, especially in Africa, is not easy to achieve.

Ten years after a similar meeting was held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, there was nothing positive to report. Almost all targets had disastrously refused to be met and there was no indication that any would be met soon. Poverty had risen, illiteracy had mutated, gender inequalities had widened, clean water was still a dream for the majority, foreign debt had increased and continues to weigh down a rich but paradoxically limping Africa, democracy is wishful thinking in many African countries, including our own, and the list goes on.

Notably, most of these problems depended upon the good will of the developed nations to solve them. For instance, the problem of foreign debt cannot be solved overnight unless those countries we owe money to decide to cancel these debts.

In last year's World Development Report, the United Nations rightly accused the developed world of consistently breaking promises which, if fulfilled, would have seen the world of the poor improved - albeit slightly.

Through strictures within the World Trade Organisation, the developed world consistently makes, forces and wins the argument that to liberalise and globalise means to use a country's muscles to win - beginning with protecting their own markets from imports from poor countries while swamping the poor countries' markets with their own goods, which are deemed to be superior and cheaper. It would seem that to be developed is to be superior and to remain on top by all means.

Which is why in the so-called exhibition centred around Kenya, for instance, you will find nothing from Kenya exhibited. We produce nothing for the world and yet expect to develop in a sustainable way. In Switzerland, for instance, they have refused to use cheaper butter from other countries to bake their breads. Even though local butter makes baking expensive, to protect local farmers, local bakers use local butter. Why can't Kenya wear its own clothes and shoes? No matter what you think, if we can afford to produce them, we can afford to wear them.

It should be emphasised here that summits are occasions to brag which is why and angry Mugabe, without any due regard to international protocol, was blustering off to Tony Blair about how 'free' Zimbabwe is! Mugabe who has calamitously failed to bring joy to Zimbabwe in his 20-something years of ruling that rich expanse of fertile Africa, was bragging about… what? And Africans around the world cheered him on!

Development is not words. Development is deeds. Before Mugabe fell out with the West after the latter refused to give him money, he was known in his own home country as "the visiting President of Zimbabwe" because he spent most of his time and the country's money shopping in the West. He wasted resources like all African big men do on frivolities, on rewarding his toadies, on hosting ostentatious state cocktails and so on - on everything but development! And here he was ignorantly and indignantly blasting a person, who despite his failures (which unlike Mugabe he has the grace to admit) has led his country to greater prosperity by reducing unemployment and bolstering the health sector, among other achievements, in less than half Mugabe's time in power!

Summits are places for talk and showing off which is why George W. Bush's America sent a low-key delegation to Johannesburg even as other Heads of State and Government made appearances in person. Bush is a pragmatic American. He is too busy at home fighting terror and striking it in the hearts of America's enemies to waste his time joining other heads of State and Government just to talk. He has other better avenues for showing off such as flying over Iraq with more than 100 of America's latest state-of-the-art jets, some of them unmanned!

Africa wake up! Sustainable development - or any development for that matter - starts with individuals. And individual can only develop if the individual decides to develop i.e. development is a state of mind. If for instance governments cannot provide you with clean water according to the Rio agreement, why in God's name can't you provide yourself with it by boiling your water before use?

Just for the record, a person is what a person consumes. Biology teaches that there are only two forces that make an individual - heredity and the environment. Nothing is wrong with our genes, biology has confirmed. Only our thinking - a way of problem-solving that we acquire from our environment as we grow up - is warped!

You cannot think the same way, do things the same way every time you act, and expect to get different results. Forget it. For you to get different results, you must think and act differently.

Africa will be worse off in days to come because Africa is feeding its thinking machine - the brain - on junk food. Look at what Africa's children are reading. Listen to what they listen to from radio stations and matatus around the country. Watch what they spend their time hogging down from morning to evening on TV screens. Absolute crap! Hardly mind-building!

Contrary to common postulates, this young generation of Africans is not the hope of Africa. It is the very bane of Africa and hence our responsibility to put them on the way to sustainable development - a dream some of us have lost - by building their brains before they commit mass suicide.

Finally, the best development - that whose impact is felt across the board within the shortest time - is sudden. It is bold. In a word, it is 'disruptive'. Such is the nature of development.
Many people saw apples fall, by only Isaac Newton asked why. Africa must follow Newton's example. If the continent is to develop, therefore, it must be ready to ask and answer tough questions. This must necessarily entail a disruption of our cool and measured way of life in which we ape only the nasty, degrading and irrelevant from the developed world and not the underlying structures that make them what they are - discipline, hard work, patriotism, merit, principle, and immense sense of worth and pride in the self and (the best of them all) constantly shifting thought-processes.

They came. They talked. And weaselled. And left
Geoffrey Lean,
journalist. The Independent (UK)

They came. They saw. They concurred. And that just about sums up what 10 world leaders achieved at the Earth Summit in Johannesburg last week. They did reach agreement, but whether what was agreed will make much difference to the twin crises they had all flown in to address - deepening world poverty and environmental deterioration - is doubtful indeed.

They came, they confessed to each other, from a world in deep trouble. Chancellor Gerhard Schröder of Germany told his fellow leaders how his country and the Czech Republic and Austria had just been hit by "the biggest flood disaster in their history", showing "that climate change is no longer a sceptical forecast, but bitter reality". From the other side of the globe, Saufatu Sopoanga, Prime Minister of tiny Tuvalu - which is due to disappear under the Pacific as sea levels rise with global warming - had a similar tale to tell. Just a few weeks ago he had "a very scary experience. It was at low tide, with no strong winds, when 10-metre waves washed right across the land".

Tony Blair reminded the gathering that "a child in Africa dies every three seconds from famine, disease or conflict". The day before, on his way to the summit, the Prime Minister had spoken of the billion people in the world without safe water to drink, the 2.5 billion without basic sanitation, the felling each year of an area of forest two-thirds the size of the United Kingdom, and the destruction and degradation of a third of the planet's coral reefs.

"We know the problems," he told the summit. "We know the solutions. Let us together find the political will to deliver them".

They came, they saw... well, what did they see? A modern conference centre in the prosperous suburb of Sandton, all gliding escalators and cavernous halls, set in a plush shopping mall where signs for Gucci, Versace and Armani jostled with posters urging sustainable development; it could have been anywhere in the richest parts of the world. And they saw at least some of the more than 9,000 government delegates, more than 8,000 representatives of business and pressure groups, and more than 4,000 journalists, crammed into a building that the fire regulations said should have held only a third that number.

Some, such as Mr Blair, also went to see the teeming slum of Alexandra, where more than 350,000 people live in destitution within sight of the luxurious centre. But in all honesty it seemed that many delegates went less to see than to be seen, especially by the television cameras.

The leaders spoke in a huge assembly hall on the top floor of the eight-storey convention centre. The press was herded into a cavernous basement. In between, the hard negotiating went on in a series of committee rooms, with most of the toughest bargaining taking place amid relatively small groups in rooms off a fourth-floor corridor thronged with lobbyists.

Security was tight, so tight that the shops and restaurants around the conference area had to bring in supplies for the entire period before the summit began: food was stored in giant refrigerated vans in car parks beneath hotels. Everywhere the participants went they had to go through security scanners, manned by (mostly) friendly police, calibrated to go off if you left even a single coin in your pockets.
And they concurred. Or rather, the heads of state made speeches while their ministers and officials toiled through the nights in less public rooms to finalise a 65-page plan of action, and a much shorter declaration of political will. Mind you, that in itself was no mean achievement, given the differences they began with.

The preliminary negotiations had been disastrous, so delegates arrived in Johannesburg with more than 400 points of disagreement on the plan of action, and without having even begun to discuss the declaration. To reach any agreement from that start was like winning a Test Match after being forced to follow on.

And it was as well that they did. For as John Prescott, the Deputy Prime Minister, told me in the only interview he gave during the summit, the whole system of multilateral negotiations built up through the United Nations over the past 50 years was at stake. If we fail here, he warned, things would "unravel on a scale we have not seen before".

Some senior figures in the Bush administration wanted exactly that to happen, since they find international agreements on everything from the environment to human rights, and from development to arms control, an unnecessary restraint on the activities of the world's only superpower. For everyone else it was therefore tremendously important that agreement was reached. Some seemed to get carried away by their relief. Margaret Beckett, the UK's chief negotiator, emerged from the negotiating room to profess herself "delighted" by the summit's meagre results. "I am in no doubt," she added, "that our descendants will look back on this summit and say that we set out on a new path".

John Prescott, in conversation, was more circumspect, describing it as "a small step for mankind". Fair enough - but it is less clear whether the step is forward, backward or sideways.

There was one important advance - the acceptance, in spite of determined opposition from the United States - of a target of halving the number of people in the world without even basic sanitation by 2015. But this was no more than a corollary of a target already agreed by world leaders at a summit in 2000, to halve the number without safe drinking water by then. It would have been outrageous if it had not been agreed, and it was cynical of an isolated US to hold the rest of the world to ransom on the issue.

That was about the only genuine advance. After a detailed comparison of the plan of action with previous agreements, Friends of the Earth concluded that it contained only one other new target, on establishing marine reserves - and even that was rather vague.

There was some slight progress towards making multinationals more accountable and looking at the over - consumption of resources by rich countries. But that is not much to show, especially after the EU, the conference chairman Nitin Desai, and leaders such as Mr Blair had set up concrete targets and timetables as the touchstone of the conference's success.

Against these gains the summit relaxed a previous target on halting the accelerating loss of wildlife species, agreed a timetable for renewing fish stocks that critics say will actually weaken existing measures, and slightly eroded some of the principles for protecting the environment laid down at the Rio Earth Summit 10 years ago and in subsequent negotiations.

Other steps were either sideways, or marching on the spot. Most disappointingly, the summit failed to agree a target for increasing the proportion of the world's energy generated from clean renewable sources such as the sun and the wind. No issue better exemplified the twin concerns before the conference. For two billion people are without any form of modern energy, having to rely instead on wood and animal dung - which give off smoke full of chemicals that kill some two million people a year. Providing clean, renewable sources instead would cut this death toll, preserve precious topsoil by maintaining tree cover and leaving enriching dung - and also combat global warming.

Before the summit, a task force set up, on Mr Blair's initiative, by the G8 leaders - under the co-leadership of Sir Mark Moody-Stuart, the former chairman of Shell - recommended concrete measures to bring renewable energy to a billion people by the end of the decade. But this, and all subsequent attempts to set even the most modest of targets, were shot down by Big Oil, represented by the OPEC countries and the oilman in the White House. They inserted clauses promoting nuclear power and the very fossil fuels that cause global warming.

This again was the height of cynicism. For even if oil, gas, coal and nuclear power were unlimited, free, and caused no pollution, it would be simply impossible to get them - or grids carrying electricity generated from them - to the millions of villages scattered through the Third World. The sun, wind and other renewable sources which are distributed free by nature can therefore relieve poverty and protect the environment without even damaging the interests of the fossil-fuel and nuclear lobbies.
There were, therefore, plenty of villains at the summit. The US blocked the setting of any new targets or timetables, largely on ideological grounds - and overwhelmingly succeeded. The simmering frustration of delegates and activists finally boiled over when they booed and heckled Colin Powell - the most sympathetic member of the Bush administration - when he addressed the summit on Wednesday. The unprecedented scene provided vivid proof of the US's isolation, not just on the environment but a whole range of international issues.

The OPEC countries shamelessly used the drawbacks of the UN system to oppose renewable energy. Most of the developing countries understandably wanted targets, some passionately. Latin America, led by Brazil, even put forward proposals to quadruple the use of clean energy by 2010. But in UN negotiations, all the Third World joins together in a single bloc, which traditionally takes its decisions by consensus. OPEC exploited this by refusing to agree to targets, making it impossible for developing countries to do so. With the US and allies such as Australia, Japan and Canada also opposed, the EU - their only proponents - caved in.

The UN also must take some share of the blame. Britain's Stakeholder Forum for Our Common Future - a normally uncontroversial organisation which has perhaps worked more than any other worldwide with the UN to prepare the summit - became so frustrated that it published a long catalogue of instances where the UN had set up failure by taking the wrong decisions. And Mr Blair also won himself a wooden spoon by making only the most fleeting visit, spending just enough time to speak and be attacked by Robert Mugabe and Sam Nujoma, the President of Namibia, before leaving stony-faced, even earlier than scheduled, to give a press conference on Iraq.

Had he himself shown an ounce of the political will he called for, he could have made a difference, for example by working with Chancellor Schröder to secure a renewable energy target. But the possibility of tabloid stories about the cost of his hotel room if he had stayed overnight apparently weighed more heavily with him than the issues he professed to care about so deeply.

It is hard to overestimate the damage done internationally by the cursory treatment of the summit by the absent President Bush and the transient Mr Blair, while they were apparently preparing for war. The rest of the world got the impression, rightly or not, that they were obsessed with the impossible task of trying to bomb out terrorism while caring little about tackling the poverty that gives rise to it. This will surely be immensely counter-productive.

There was, however, one genuine hero: Tewolde Egziabher, a slight, asthmatic Ethiopian who heads his country's environment protection agency. Twice, by the sheer force of his somewhat diffident personality, he turned the whole conference around. On the first occasion, the summit seemed set to take a big step backwards by giving the World Trade Organisation, which allows no obstacle to free trade, the power to override international environment agreements. This threatened to nullify treaties which, for example, control trade in hazardous waste and toxic chemicals, phase out the substances that destroy the ozone layer, and enable countries or refuse imports of GM crops and food. Just as everything seemed lost, Mr Egziabher made an impassioned late-night speech that shamed the rest of the Third World and then the EU into voting down the plan. No one could remember a personal intervention having such an effect. Then he did it again, personally frustrating a US move to negate the small progress made on corporate responsibility.

The South African government also deserves praise for skilfully handling the negotiations and mounting a logistically flawless conference. And there were silver linings. The biggest was a hugely significant by-product of the summit: the announcement by Russia and Canada that they were moving to ratify the Kyoto Protocol combating global warming. Their ratification, under the complicated rules of the treaty, would bring it into force. This alone would make the summit a success - and do more to stimulate the spread of renewable energy than the proposals that had been defeated.

Then the summit confirmed a series of other targets, notably those of the Millennium Summit two years ago, which set out goals for halving dire poverty by 2015, and the Monterrey Summit earlier this year, which unexpectedly led to promises of big aid increases by the US and the EU. These set out a framework which, in principle at least, binds even the Bush administration to tackling the poverty and environmental crises.

Next, the development and environment lobbies came closer together, with groups such as Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth helping to lead the fight to tackle world poverty. The combination could be immensely powerful for the future.

And finally the fringes of the conference launched well over 100 partnerships between business, governments and non-governmental organisations to take practical action to address the crises (Greenpeace and business even buried the hatchet to campaign together on global warming). What they will achieve remains to be seen, but they mark a new development for the UN in involving the rest of society in its affairs. Many believe that it marks the beginning of change. "The summit's decisions will be forgotten in a year", says Felix Dodds of the Stakeholder Forum. "But Johannesburg may be remembered as the start of a new kind of international action".

If that is so, it may mark a big step forward after all.

Catalogue of failure: how they scored

Water

The one unambiguous success in the summit's plan of action. Leaders agreed to halve by 2015 the number of people - 2.4 billion - without basic sanitation, after an isolated United States dropped dogged opposition to setting the target. If implemented, this could do much to reduce the 2 million deaths a year, mainly of children, caused by drinking contaminated water. In fact, the world had already agreed at an earlier summit to cut by half the number of people without safe drinking water.
Score: 10/10

Energy

The big disappointment of the summit. The US and OPEC would not endorse a target for renewable energy. They killed off a Brazilian proposal backed by the rest of Latin America and other developing and developed countries to quadruple the world's use of clean energy to 1 per cent by 2010. They even sabotaged a much more modest EU plan for a 1 per cent increase over the decade. The summit did at least discuss energy: the US and OPEC stopped previous meetings addressing it.
Score: 1/10

Agriculture and fishing

The summit agreed that the Global Environment Facility, the world's main funding mechanism for global environmental problems, should be allowed to finance the fight against the desertification which threatens one third of the world's land area. It undertook to rebuild fish stocks "where possible" by 2015, but critics believe this may undermine existing agreements. It refused to phase out agricultural subsidies or to support organic and fair trade products, and left the door open for GM crops.
Score: 3/10

Biodiversity

The plan hinted at action to tackle the greatest extinction of species since the dinosaurs died out, by obliquely referring to "the achievement by 2010 of a significant reduction in the current rate of loss of biological diversity". But this wording is much weaker than an undertaking "to stop and reverse the current alarming biodiversity loss" which the world's governments agreed only last April. The summit took a step backwards - and no one expects anything much to be done anyway.
Score: 0/10

Over-consumption

The summit agreed a weaker text than expected, promising to "encourage and promote" a 10-year programme to combat over-consumption in rich countries, rather than to actually set it up. The EU pressed for action, but the US, Canada, Australia and Japan vigorously resisted. Proposals to support labelling of environmentally friendly goods were defeated. But the action plan does say that countries must develop better policies on consumption and production.
Score: 3/10

Corporate accountability

Suprising headway was made, mainly due to pressure groups, who forced it on to the agenda. Governments accepted that binding rules could be developed to govern the behaviour of multinational companies. The US resisted tooth and claw, and tried various ploys to exempt itself, even after the matter was settled. But the plan of action stops short of setting a timetable for the regulations, or even firmly saying that they should be introduced.
Score: 4/10 o

What the Jo'burg World Summit Should Know
Tajudeen Abdulraheen
Justice Africa

The world conference on sustainable development began on Monday. But from the point of news and politicking around the various aspects of the agenda, the conference began several years ago. Johannesburg 2002 is just a culmination of the bitter struggles since the last Summit in Rio in 1992.
As it is typical of these huge UN jamborees, the wording of resolutions, the final communique and agenda for action have been agreed in advance and subjected to all the kinds of compromises, bullying by powerful states and alliances of vested interests that make many critics dismissive of such broad platforms.

A conference of 65,000 delegates and participants beggars disbelief even in this day of fantastic information and communication technology. However, the conference should not be dismissed purely on the issue of size. A positive way of looking at it could be that it is because so many people, organisations, governments and corporations and non-governmental organisations care so much about our environment and our continued existence in it.

It is a tribute to the tireless efforts of the global environment movement that the conference continues to grow in size since the first one in 1972. One of the secret weapons the movement has used is to broaden its base beyond "the earthy sort" who seeks a return to some nostalgic state of simple existence close to nature. That dew-eyed approach made it easier for many especially in the Third World to dismiss international environmentalists (predominantly led by Westerners) as a conspiracy to keep the poor countries backward and deny us the growth and development that technology has brought to their societies.

Some of that criticism persists today but the environmental movement has grown more sophisticated in its critique of governments and corporations for their destruction of the earth, which is our collective loan from future generations. Also some of the direct tragic experiences of different regions of the world especially the poor south in the last few years whether Bhopal in India or the Niger Delta areas of Nigeria or the consequences of the French nuclear testing in the western Sahara, etc have educated people that the illusion of perpetual technological progress is not sustainable. Faith in machines as the solution to our problems is now being tempered with building faith within ourselves, between us and our neighbours, communities and the different layers of humanity, from far and near.

It is the closest the world has come to accepting the old socialist dictum of "an injury to one is an injury to all". In the 70s, the talk of global warming, carbon dioxide emissions, radiation levels, pollution and pollutants seemed too technical for many people. While we may not be any wiser about the technical details, many can now see the effects. You do not need exhaustive investigation to realise that Lagos, Cairo, Nairobi or Jo'burg, which is hosting the conference, are not sustainable cities. That there is something wrong with the climate; the balance between nature and human beings and the impact that these have on the quality of life in these and many of our major cities. Even the famed green Kampala is beginning to show dry patches here and there and it seems to be worsening cumulatively. Sometimes the heat rivals that of Dar-es-Salaam or Accra. So we can all agree that something is wrong even if we disagree on what is to be done.

The creative response of the environmentalists is to identify the structural framework of our existence (the individual, family, community, government, corporations, the market, etc) and allocate roles that can be played by all of us in making this earth if not better than we found it then less dangerous for future generations. Everybody has a role to play.

Our lifestyles, consumption patterns, all have impact on the environment. Even if you cannot control governments or large corporations, you can control what you eat, how you dispose of your rubbish, what your children are taught at home, etc. In recent years, the main success of the global environmental movement was to link the environment to the Third World debt crisis, poverty and global inequality between classes, peoples, nations and regions of the world.

It has thus built a comprehensive critique of power rations that various anti globalisation forces, anti-capitalist, pro-people forces can coalesce around. Just as the west thought there was no longer any ideological challenge to its free market greed, the environment movement has become a powerful centre for dissension and alternative ways of imagining and living in the world that stresses cooperation instead of competition and fairness between all human beings and between us and our environment.

So if governments feel the need to be there and major corporations are wearing their green labels in Jo'burg it is because the demands of the peoples of the world can no longer be ignored. Unless you are Bush whose conspicuous absence, yet again, is no being missed. As the leader of a country that holds the record for disproportionate pollution of the world and whose corporations and institutions are guilty of environmental terrorism across the world, it would be expecting too much for Bush to be there.
Even his father prevaricated till the last minute in 1992 and arrived there at the head of a wrecking crew. For Bush Jr, quite frankly, I do not think he gives a damn. Let me share with you a recent anecdote I heard about him.

To show his environmental awareness and community spirit, he advised parents to let their kids "wash the neighbours' cars!" How can he understand people talking about reducing cars on the road to reduce pollution or big Ghandian philosophical musings like "there is enough in the world to satisfy our need but not enough to satisfy our greed"? No, Bush is better off at home in Texas, planning his next environmental campaign: Bombing the people of Iraq to make the world safe for oil! o

Global disorder

Lluís Reales,
Journalist. Director of "Medi ambient. Tecnologia i cultura"

It is still too soon to be able to say whether Johannesburg was a success or a failure. The results of Johannesburg should be understood as yet another stage in the process that started in 1972 in Stockholm, which had its most noteworthy moment in Rio de Janeiro and its latest episode at the World Summit on Sustainable Development. What the summit did leave though, was some evidence and trends that, without a doubt, will be key when assessing whether Johannesburg was, in perspective, a success or a failure.

Success or failure? That was the question that the participants of the Johannesburg summit were asking themselves the day after. Those who did not rush off just after the disappointing speeches from the heads of State and Government, were able to enjoy a good conversation over a drink with other participants from any other place in the world. To assess what had happened, off the top of their heads. The same place -Sandton fort-, when the wall that "protected" the summit had been taken down, seemed to be somewhere else. Time even seemed to be going by more calmly, more slowly. Johannesburg's pleasant southern winter was conducive to conversation and comments about the evaluations of the international press.

Most of the papers, whether local or international, tended towards the idea of "expectations that had not been met". "Dialogue of the deaf" or "Planet without agreement"; "Have the ten days of the World Summit on Sustainable Development changed anything?" read some of the headlines that could be found in the press the days following the meeting. By speaking to people -also by reading the small print in the newspapers- you could see the nuances. The representatives of the European Union declared moderate satisfaction. The G-77, which brings together developing countries, offered complaints and frustration about the results of the summit. Most non-governmental organisations expressed their disappointment and heavy criticism of the developed countries. They stated that the summit had been taken over by big companies with the support of the rich. The United States and its allies preferred not to say too much because during the previous negotiations they had shown their interest that the summit should be watered down and minimal. On the other hand, the organisers, the United Nations, tried to project an optimistic message with the argument that the action plan left enough tools on the table to be able to advance towards sustainable development and that it is an open process. Therefore, the future will say whether Johannesburg was a success or a failure and, from this point of view, it is still too early to carry out a precise assessment. In any case, what is unarguable is the importance of the historic perspective and the international context to try and understand the public perception left by Johannesburg if we compare it, for example, with what was left by the Earth Summit of Rio de Janeiro. In addition, in regard the meeting a decade ago we have the advantage of being able to analyse the process that was started then with some degree of perspective.

Rio in perspective

The Rio conference meant that the international community was able to attain adulthood in environmental awareness. It was a meeting with great symbolism in regard to expressing environmental concerns. This was reflected in the agreements for environmental protection that the heads of states and governments signed. As a result of the meeting, many countries set up environmental plans, dedicated economic resources and encouraged changes in legislation, in many cases by creating ministries of the environment. From an international perspective, the work of Rio meant that many development agencies re-guided their actions based on the criteria of Agenda 21, probably the most specific and valuable document that came out of the 1992 Earth Summit. The environmental themes were incorporated into the political agenda in different phases of the public proceeding.

In addition, Rio proposed new instruments for international environmental governability. A set of international laws, some set up through conventions- the Conventions on Climate Change and on Biological Diversity and the Convention against Desertification- and others through treaties -commercial control of toxic substances, on organic pollutants. The Commission on Sustainable Development, created from Agenda 21, has also been very significant, and it has added strength to the debate on the matter between all the social actors -institutions, non-governmental organisations, businesses, and so on.

Another of Rio's great legacies was the idea of sustainable development that, despite its ambiguity, due to the different interpretations it is given depending on who is using it, has been incorporated into our everyday vocabulary. In fact, it has served as new ground - though not yet common - for discussion and dialogue between opponents. It has become a conceptual meeting point between representatives of established power and those who defend social change.

The 1992 Earth Summit was also notable for the protagonism and significance of the Global Forum. This is where the seed environmental and innovative social thought was really sown and developed. It should be said that in Johannesburg, though for different reasons, the Global Forum held in Nasrec was far less present, and even less so for the media. In Rio de Janeiro, there was a flow of communication between the official and the alternative meeting that did not happen in Johannesburg. One of the main returns of the protagonism of the Global Forum ten years ago, was the spectacular increase of non-governmental organisations throughout the world who found their legitimacy in the reflections provided by the Rio meeting.

Civil society reacted and encouraged numerous initiatives, however, in contrast, governments, companies and municipalities have been much more lukewarm in their commitments. This does not mean that these actors have practiced immobilism, however, the risk has been minimal in the face of the magnitude of the challenges. It is true that many companies have worked to redesign their manufacturing cycles and their products and that quite surely business innovation in search of eco-efficiency and setting up Agendas 21 in local areas are the most notable results of the process initiated in Rio. However, from a broader political point of view, ten years on, Rio started a process of unfulfilled promises. Although the governments committed themselves to decreasing environmental degradation and to reducing the differences between rich and poor countries, the indicators do not show any change in these tendencies. Rather, it is quite the opposite: some of the rich are even richer and the vast majority of the poor do not even live in decent conditions. It is clear that the governments are not the only ones responsible for this situation, but undoubtedly they have not kept many of the promises and commitments that they made in Rio. From an environmental point of view, the advances have been an increase in protected areas on the planet, a decrease in the production of CFCs and total emissions of carbon dioxide, which have settled at the levels for 1998. However, human pressure on natural resources, ecosystems and carbon sinks has continued to grow. In addition, the number of species and habitats in danger of extinction, the destruction of virgin forests and the poor quality of fertile land have increased and we have continued to overexploit the seas. Therefore, the global ecological crises have not subsided.

Another of the Rio commitments that has not been fulfilled is the promise that was made by the rich countries to transfer resources to developing countries to promote Agendas 21.

The international context that was favoured by the fall of the Berlin wall and the symbolic and real end to the Cold War generated a situation that led us to believe there was a change of attitude by the North towards the South. Nothing could be further from the truth. The United Nations estimated that to promote the Agendas 21 in developing countries, 600,000 million euros would be needed a year between 1993 and 2000. Of this astronomical figure, 125,000 million euros were to be obtained from co-operation to development. This is what the states signed in Rio, where they committed themselves to the objective of providing 0.7% of the Gross National Product (GNP) in funds for development. The figures speak for themselves: in 1992, the co-operation to development via this channel was approximately 69,000 million euros; in 2000 it decreased to 53,000. There has been no political will to comply with what was agreed. What does all this lack of compliance mean? One of the keys can be found in the decisions taken only two years later in the city of Marrakech.

Blind trust in the market

1994. Marrakech. The most powerful states on the planet decided to set up the World Trade Organisation (WTO), to culminate the Uruguay Round. Just two years after Rio - where it had been agreed to reinforce the role of the states to promote the common good-, Marrakech weakened the regulating power of the states. The central theme of international politics over the last ten years has been a process to create a world market, without borders, so that the capital and certain goods can circulate freely, based on the laws of offer and demand. The result of liberalising the markets has become the dogma of political work, far beyond public policies in favour of sustainability. Therefore, the agreements of Marrakech and the creation of the WTO produced an absolutely contrary trend, with a completely different genetic code to that of Rio.

Over the last decade, neoliberal globalisation has been radically imposed as the dominant model of globalisation (it should be remembered that this concept did not become popular until two years after Rio, where the term economic liberalisation was used). Its impacts have made themselves felt. In the first place, the indicators show that an economic model that is based on the transformation of natural heritage into raw materials for the market accelerates the environmental degradation of the planet: it exploits the forests, it erodes the soils and pollutes the atmosphere.

Secondly, the pressure on many southern countries, and also on Eastern European countries, to guarantee the trust of investors, has accelerated the exploitation of its resources. To stabilise foreign currency and pay the external debt, the only solution is to place the greatest amount of resources (gas, wood, oil, etc.) on the global market. This is the only alternative for making believe that you are part of the club of the chosen ones.

The third notable impact of neoliberal globalisation has been the setting up of unregulated frameworks that favour the flow of capital. In this way, transnational companies freely choose the political and legislative area that is most favourable for them, to set up their businesses in the world. What happens then is that the political aspect depends excessively on the economical aspect and leaves governments with hardly any margin of manoeuvrability to promote environmental protection and other social regulations.

In any case, although neoliberal globalisation was expressed in 1995 with the creation of the WTO, the solid strength and economic and political groups that defended it and practised it had been present in Rio. In fact, the documents of the 1992 Earth Summit state their support for a market without restrictions. The Agenda 21 itself recommends fostering sustainable development through liberalising trade, so that both can support each other mutually. Opting for a multilateral trading system was also evident. Therefore, the neoliberal genetic code that Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan so brilliantly symbolised and practised during the eighties, was even less absent in Rio de Janeiro. It acted with much more discretion than a decade later at the Johannesburg Summit. Therefore, of the Rio agreements, it is clear, although reading between the lines, that the mobility of goods and capital without conditions and without regulations was part of the environmental solution of the planet, and in no case was it part of the problem. And although it is true that, on occasions, a market without excessive restrictions can generate greater efficiency in the use of resources, the indicators make it quite clear that, on a planetary level, neoliberal globalisation, that today dominates the rules of the game, has not been a good travelling companion to the preservation of the environment and for doing away with poverty.

Ten pieces of evidence seen in Johannesburg

Johannesburg. 2002. The World Summit on Sustainable Development is conditioned by the international dynamics of recent decades and is therefore held in a context that conditions it. On the one hand, neoliberal globalisation, although questioned by broad social movements, was imposed. On the other hand, the terrorist attacks of September 11th in New York clearly contributed to moving the environmental problem down on the international political agenda. Security rules. In any case, the Johannesburg meeting, seen in situ, showed some evidence that we will look at below. We have chosen ten pieces of evidence, but it is undeniable that many other processes from those very intense days could be highlighted. The choice is, therefore, subjective and made from a journalistic point of view.

1) A summit on development and globalisation. Johannesburg was first and foremost a summit on development and globalisation. It also dealt with environmental matters, but, as we started to see in Rio, the main concern of the southern countries is development. The bottom line of the debate. The bottom line of the debate was what kind of development we want and whether hegemonic economic globalisation, which has sunk the advances made in the Rio agenda, really works. The United Nations, who organised the event, placed a complex but adequate focus on the discussion table. The questions were well formulated.

2) Poverty and the environment. In Johannesburg it was clearly explained that eradicating poverty and protecting the environment are two sides of the same coin. Nobody doubts that one cannot be reached without the other. Therefore, there is an international agreement about the aim to eradicate poverty, which is the basis of many environmental problems and also of international terrorism. The disagreements come from the strategy for eradicating it. Whilst some blindly trust the ability of the market to regulate itself and lead towards sustainable development, others defend equity, which identifies development with more rights and resources for the poor. The North American Secretary of State, Colin Powell, openly expressed the first position during the summit: "Sustainable development is a marathon, not a sprint". We can only win it by opting for the market.

3) Maturity of social movements. In Johannesburg, there was a convergence, made explicit by the Ecoequity coalition, between the movement for development and the environmental movements. Both work together in the same boat, rowing in the same direction. Rio legitimised and fostered the appearance of many social movements that now have the challenge of how to organise themselves more efficiently and to work together on a global level.

4) Globalisation from the south. At the summit, the consolidation of a strong social movement in the poor countries that want a type of liberalisation that is not neoliberal, was clear. This movement had its greatest expression in the demonstration that went along the road that separates Alexandra, a marginal area, from Sandton, the fenced fort that hosted the meeting between the heads of state and government. The motto of the demonstrations was "Land, shelter and food". It is a movement that interrelates social justice, the environment and human rights.

5) Sustainability in regions and municipalities. In Johannesburg it was clear that to advance towards sustainable development we must give more power and resources to the sphere of decisions that are closest to the citizens, which are the ones that got the greatest support from the Rio commitments. In the same way, we must also try to have a greater presence of local and regional areas in the United Nations system.

6) Protagonism of business organisations. Whilst in Rio, business presence had been discreet, in Johannesburg it was clearly visible. The driving force of sustainable development, whether there is greater or less trust in the possibilities of the market, requires us to re-think ways of manufacturing and consuming. The participation and interest of companies and the organisations that represent them is vital.

7) The great power of the WTO. There is no doubt that the World Trade Organisation is one of the institutions that today determines the dynamics of economic globalisation and, therefore, its policies have a great influence on the environment. An influence that most social movements and many countries consider to be excessive and that, in addition, is not subject to any democratic control. In fact, the most decisive moment of the Johannesburg summit took place on Monday September 2nd. The delegates had agreed to do away with a sentence from the political declaration, introduced by the United States and its allies, which would have given the WTO the last word in conflicts between free trade and environmental protection. Quite surely, if this agreement had not been reached, the summit would not have achieved an agreed political declaration.

8) Lack of political leadership. The speeches of the heads of state and government who went to the summit showed a lack of international political leadership for re-thinking the current dynamics of neoliberal globalisation that makes politics depend on economy and the interests that move it.

9) The cleavage between the rich and the poor. At the end of 2002, two thirds of humanity will not be living in decent conditions, whilst a third of us will be enjoying an unsustainable lifestyle. The great challenge is how to achieve a certain balance in a planet that is increasingly more fragile.

10) Protagonism of the European Union. In Johannesburg, the European Union, under its Danish presidency, played the role of arbitrator between the United States and the G-77, which brings together developing countries. Can the model of European construction, based on cohesion and an ambition for solidarity, become a source of inspiration for re-thinking international reality and the United Nations system? For some people who participated in the Johannesburg summit, and for many people who were not there, Europe could have a great role in the upcoming world if it forgets its following of the United States and is able to design a globalisation with a social democratic inspiration as opposed to neoliberal globalisation.

Success or failure? It is still too soon. However, what is clear, is that the World Summit on Sustainable Development has left the sensation that the homework had only been half done. A few weeks later, the Prestige tragedy in the waters of Galicia, Spain, showed the incongruence of a system that allows an oil tanker with a "pirate flag" to spill hundreds of tons of viscous fuel and to provoke an ecological, economic and social disaster of enormous proportions. It is a clear demonstration that the international community should look for alternatives to global disorder and place political decisions of legitimate economic interest based on the common good in the forefront, and liquidate interests, such as in the case of the Prestige, that are disguised as economic ones but that belong to speculators without scruples.

Interview with Víctor Viñuales, Director of the Fundación Ecología y Desarrollo
An interview by Lluís Reales

Víctor Viñuales trained as a sociologist. Founding director of the Ecology and Development Foundation (Fundación Ecología y Desarrollo - ECODES), he is also director of the Life project. Zaragoza ciudad ahorradora de agua and Zaragoza ahorra papel...y árboles (Saragossa, a Water-Saving City and Saragossa Saves Paper… and Trees). Compiler of the book Eficiencia del agua en las ciudades (Water Efficiency in Cities). Evaluator of environmental projects for the European Union. Member of the Governing Council of the Governing Code of Sustainable Enterprise. Ex-Head of Service of Saragossa City Council. Ex-expert coordinator for the Spanish Agency for International Cooperation, and Project Evaluator for the Secretary of State for International Cooperation and for Latin America under the Foreign Office.

When and why was the Ecology and Development Foundation created?

The Ecology and Development Foundation was born in 1992, for the initial purpose of creating opinions and encouraging public debate, as well as to carry out projects to demonstrate in a practical way the social, environmental and economic feasibility of sustainable development.

What are your goals?

Our goal is to contribute and offer proposals to achieve sustainable development by means of generating ecologically sustainable alternatives that are socially just and economically feasible. We are an eminently proposal-based organization.

What are your main fields of research?

In the area of Corporate Social Responsibility, ECODES is the only Spanish organization present on the stakeholder council of Global Reporting Initiative. Furthermore, in the area of CSR analysis of listed companies, ECODES is partner and representative in Spain of the Sustainable Investment Research International (SiRi) Group, which is an organization that is present in thirteen countries and has a staff of 130 analysts. The information drawn up by SiRi is used by different institutional investors to create investment products that incorporate criteria of Corporate Social Responsibility. We are also partners in Spain of the British organization EIRiS. And, since 1999, we are the publishers of the ECORES journal, which is the first Spanish language publication that deals with matters of Corporate Social Responsibility.

What is Socially Responsible Investment understood to be? And Corporate Social Responsibility?

When we talk about Socially Responsible Investment (SRI) we refer to the investment decision-making process that takes into consideration social and environmental questions as well as traditional financial considerations (liquidity, security, profitability). In other words, this is an investment methodology that takes into consideration criteria of corporate social responsibility or sustainability when making investment or savings decisions.

What incentives do you propose in order to encourage this type of investment?

Public Administrations, Civic Society Organizations (CSOs), trade unions and financial institutions can adopt certain specific measures to encourage Socially Responsible Investment, thereby encouraging sustainable or socially responsible business practices.

The actions proposed by the Ecology and Development Foundation during the last World Summit on Sustainable Development held in Johannesburg had a dual goal:

To create incentives so that companies that are proactive in the area of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) or sustainable enterprise may be compensated in financial and product markets.
To allow all social groups that are interested in CSR to have the opportunity to decide on the ultimate destination of their financial resources, so that delegating savings management to financial intermediaries doesn't prevent their resources from being applied to financing business activities that are compatible with sustainable development.

What role do non-governmental organizations play in your proposals?

NGOs, as with any physical or legal person, hold investments in investment portfolios and positions in debt markets. In this sense, they have the opportunity to implement formal policies for managing their financial resources in accordance with their convictions. This would mean discriminating among financial products according to criteria of sustainability, as well as selecting financial suppliers according to criteria of corporate social responsibility. Additionally, as opinion-leading organizations in certain social areas with an important social base, CSOs should take on an educational role in order to get financial entities to broaden their offer of financial products that incorporate social and/or environmental criteria that are compatible with sustainable development.

What can trade unions do?

Trade unions, as with NGOs, hold investments in investment portfolios and positions in debt markets. Additionally, in some countries, they have major responsibilities in managing pension funds. Their financial decisions could steer business activity towards sustainability by means of indirect support of business behaviour that is compatible with sustainable development. This would mean discriminating among financial products in accordance with criteria of sustainability, as well as selecting financial suppliers in accordance with criteria of social responsibility or sustainability. As organizations with a broad social base, they should motivate their sympathizers to use their money individually, through savings and investment, in favour of sustainable development, by means of the practices described above. Trade unions enjoy a wide range of social behaviours. They are called to carry out an educational task so that financial entities offer financial products that incorporate social and/or environmental criteria that are compatible with sustainable development. Likewise, in places where worker representatives direct policies for investing employment pension plans, trade unions should demand that the pension funds incorporate policies of social responsibility, thereby stimulating behaviour in accordance with sustainable development in the business world.

What about financial entities? Is the offer great enough in the financial market for socially responsible investments?

As reflected in the action plan resulting from the Johannesburg Summit, financial entities must be aware of the role that financial intermediation can play in obtaining sustainable development. Financial entities should, along the lines of what was established in the UNEP Statement by Financial Institutions on the Environment and Sustainable Development, be sensitive to the positive impact their activities could have on sustainable development. In this sense, financial entities should, even in their own interest, incorporate criteria of sustainability in all their financial products. Likewise, proper management of customer bases requires attention on the part of financial entities regarding sustainability in designing and offering their investment and savings products. Financial entities should use their power as institutional investors to hold a running dialogue with companies on the financial and social importance of adopting criteria of sustainability or corporate social responsibility in business management. Financial entities, in their capacity as institutional investors, and given the fact that adopting criteria of Corporate Social Responsibility or sustainability seems to be a good indicator of the future economic-financial performance of the company, should add social and environmental analyses to traditional financial analysis. For the time being, those following this line are few, especially in Spain.

What is the role of Public Administration? How could it promote and spread this type of initiative?

The different governments should condition public assistance for the business sector to their adopting formal policies of Corporate Social Responsibility or business sustainability, along the lines of what was recently adopted by the Dutch government. Likewise, governments should encourage the adoption of criteria of information transparency on the part of business in matters relating to the social and environmental impact of their activities, in order to allow investors and consumers to make their purchasing and investment decisions according to parameters of sustainability, as has been promoted by the French government. Governments should encourage the elaboration of legislation such as that approved by the United Kingdom or Germany, which requires pension fund managers to issue reports on which social, environmental and ethical considerations are taken into account in their investment strategies. Governments should foment and promote research and the holding of conferences and forums on Socially Responsible Investment and Corporate Social Responsibility, within the framework of intersectoral alliances (public sector-private sector and non-profit sector), as is being done in several European countries, and as was proposed at the Johannesburg Summit.

Is there an awareness among business and consumers?

Most Spanish companies operating in different markets and obliged to turn to international stock markets have begun to feel pressure from the SRI. They have also witnessed the prestige and profitability of being present in the large indices of sustainability. Even so, they are still taking their first steps. In regard to consumers, a survey done by MORI in 2001 on CSR shows that a high percentage of consumers seems ready to pay more for products that accredit good labour practices, respect for the environment, etc.

As the Ecology and Development Foundation, you participated in the Johannesburg conference. What is your evaluation of the results attained?

Following the World Summit on Sustainable Development held in Johannesburg, it can be stated that world leaders have wanted to take on few concrete commitments in favour of sustainable development. Only in a few areas, such as that related to water and sanitation, have deadlines and measurable goals been set. However, and despite difficulties, the three pillars of sustainable development -the social, environmental and economic pillars- have been placed on the table for the first time in an integrated way, and this has contributed to increasing awareness in public opinion and politicians regarding these questions. In particular, regarding Corporate Social Responsibility, the ECODES is satisfied by the importance given this matter during the Summit, which was present on the agenda mostly due to the corporate scandals that occurred in recent months. Diverse commitments were reflected in this sense in the Implementation Plan as well as the Political Declaration.

Do you think there is a clear desire on the part of companies to advance toward socially responsible investment?

They will have no choice. Institutional investors the world over are starting to consider that Corporate Social Responsibility is a good indicator of the quality of corporate governance, and a good indicator of the future financial performance of a given company. The tendency seems to suggest that social and environmental analyses will soon become a part of the usual practices of value analysis. Any company that does not want to be left out of an important segment of savings should begin to formalize its policies in the area of Corporate Social Responsibility. In this sense, it should be remembered that 13% of assets invested in American investment funds already incorporate RSC criteria in the selection of companies in which investments are made.

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