ON THE ROAD TO EARTH SUMMIT 2002
FINANCING FOR SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT

New Ideas, Perspectives and Obstacles for the World Summit 2002

Workshop, January 2002: Since the Earth Summit 1992 in Rio, one of the main obstacles of the process towards Sustainable Development is that no adequate sources of financing have been made available, and thus hardly any progress was made. Financing together with technology-transfer are two of the 'cross-cutting' issues in the process pressed by the South, but ignored by many industrialized countries, not standing up to the promises they made in 1992. At the Rio Summit, the UNCED Secretariat estimated the financing needs of Agenda 21 to be in the region of US$600 billion per year, including $125 per year on grant or concessional terms. But in 2000, official development assistance (ODA) fell to its lowest level ever and while foreign direct investment has increased tremendously, it is not spent primarily in countries whose population is in absolute poverty nor on measures that directly benefit the most disadvantaged groups.

The year 2002, with both the Financing for Development as well as the World Summit on Sustainable Development conferences, holds a great opportunity for the development of approaches and ideas on how financing and sustainable development can be brought to a new life. It's a unique chance to find strategies for both to solve the ongoing social and humanitarian crisis in developing countries and to redirect global financial flows for the Financing of Sustainable Development in developing as well as industrialized countries.

This workshop for some 40 participants aimed at identifying synergies between the negotiations on the Financing for Development conference and the preparations for the WSSD. Participants shared their visions, strategy proposals, or "wish lists" for both processes with regard to financing for sustainable development.

The report of this workshop is for downlod here.