SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT STRATEGIES

There has been much progress in environmental legislation, environmental impact assessments and the like. Sustainable development does not work without serious commitment on the national and regional level.

The low priority environmental issues are being given compared to economic and social issues at national level (also to be seen by looking at the decision-making competence of the environment ministries which is usually surpassed by the ministries that govern key economic issues and have little interests in ecological matters they often affect), often goes along with the scarce involvement of civil society. Necessary forums and mechanisms to yield broad participation have not been established; consequently, the awareness of the public for the value of natural resources and the consequences of patterns of production and consumption is rather low.

Although many countries have established lots of international environmental instruments, monitoring and enforcement on the national level have been rather weak. Serious political decisions at the highest level have not been taken and strong economic and financial incentives for the national economy to follow the political lines are poorly developed (energy taxes, polluter pays principle etc.).

In 1997, UNGASS recommended to develop national sustainable development strategies (SDS) in every country by 2002 to ensure that current trends of environmental degradation and loss of natural resources are effectively reversed at both global and national level by 2015. The SDS are intended "to ensure socially responsible economic development while protecting the resource base and the environment for the benefit of future generations" and to serve as supplement to the results of UNCED and the global targets agreed on under international environmental conventions.

Over the last years, National Councils for Sustainable Development (NCSDs) have been established to ensure effective implementation of the Earth Summit agreements on the national level. NCSDs can be seen as national level counterparts of the CSD, regularly reporting to the CSD from the national level. Just as the CSD being a forum to co-ordinate different countries' interests, the NCSDs are to co-ordinate the plurality of national stakeholder interests while trying to develop national sustainable development strategies. During 2001, the NCSDs have been preparing national assessments of sustainable development progress to feed into the preparations for the WSSD.

In November 2001, the International Forum on National Sustainable Development Strategies was held in Accra, Ghana. The Forum reviewed experience to date in national sustainable development strategy development and implementation. It aimed to reinvigorate the dialogue on national sustainable development strategies, and to encourage all countries, both developing and industrialised, to continue advancing their efforts in this regard. Report of the Forum can be downloaded here.