THE BUSINESS CASE AT THE WSSD

"With the world's most powerful governments fully behind the corporate globalisation agenda, it was agreed even before the Summit that there would be no new mandatory agreements. Rather the focus was to be on implementation of old agreements, mainly through partnerships with the private sector. In other words, those aspects of sustainability that are convenient for private sector would be implemented." Kenny Bruno, CorpWatch ++ [ The Earth Summit's Deathblow to Sustainable Development; CorpWatch article; September 4 ]

"In the nine years since Rio, corporations and their lobby groups have perfected their greenwash skills, convincing governments and global bodies to allow them to operate increasingly unregulated in the global market. In the run-up to Johannesburg next year, a large-scale business campaign is on the way to consolidate these gains and ward off the backlash against the neoliberal global economic model. Corporate greenwash and co-optation efforts will reach unprecedented levels." Coporate Europe Observatory

"... you can be sure that business ISN'T going to be ignored in Johannesburg. For one thing, UN secretary-general Kofi Annan has invested too much personal capital in his Global Compact to allow the little matter of the WSSD to jeopardize relations between the UN organization and its friends in the business community. For another, business will make darn sure that the Johannesburg summiteers listen to it ... be in no doubt that the BASD initiatives at the WSSD are also designed to support the covert and overt lobbying by business to remove - at least dilute - anything that smacks of being anti-enterprise. The message from the corporate community will be: 'Trust us'."
Tomorrow Magazine

"We expect to rely heavily on the private sector to ensure sustainable use of resources," Emil Salim, WSSD Preparatory Committee Chairman, said when asked what will be new at Johannesburg compared with the UNCED 92. "In this sense, mining companies will be invited to seek new modes of operation. ... Big automobile makers like Renault, Toyota, Honda, Ford and Volkswagen, together with oil companies like BP and Shell, will also have to develop a new strategy of sustainable mobility. Many initiatives of this kind will be launched. All big businesses must become good planetary citizens. They can continue to do what they are doing, on the condition that they do it better."

Since UNCED, business worked on re-shaping their image from that of polluters to partners in sustainable development, a correction that even found its way into the Agenda 21 as the only reference to business in the document - no binding rules or regulations to hinder environmentally and socially damaging business activities. Since then, business lobby vehicles such as the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) have successfully promoted their agenda of "free markets", new technology and economic growth as essential to further sustainable development.

Business is very much in favour of the Global Compact, an initiative launched by Kofi Annan in 2000. Corporations that join the initiative, commit themselves voluntarily to a non-binding set of environmental, social and human rights principles. As there are no monitoring and enforcement mechanisms, NGOs fear that the Global Compact serves as an ideal corporate greenwash instrument in the run-up to the WSSD, thus heavily questioning the credibility of the UN.

The early stages of the WSSD preparatory process saw the founding of a new business lobby group, the Business Action for Sustainable Development (BASD), aimed at rallying the collective forces of world business in the lead up to the WSSD. "Put simply, our message going into the Earth Summit in 2002 is that business is part of the solution," Sir Moody-Stuart, head of the BASD, explains.

There are many activities in the business sector that actually further sustainable development as many companies have found environmentally and socially responsible behaviour promoting sales among concerned customers and concepts such as EcoEfficiency eventually cutting costs. The business imperative for the WSSD is to consolidate government support for voluntary action rather than binding rules or enforceable accountability mechanisms for corporate behaviour.