EARTH SUMMIT 2002: THA GAP CAMPAIGN

The GAP Campaign towards the Earth Summit 2002 aims to broaden the public awareness about the overlapping issues of environment, poverty and health. Three pillars make up the GAP Campaign: the Green Agenda for preserving the environment and keeping human impact within the Earth's capacities, the AIDS Agenda as sustainable development in Africa cannot be achieved without addressing HIV/AIDS that is taking heavy toll on the most productive groups of African society, and the People's Agenda that addresses the need to fight the underlying causes of poverty, e.g. missing access to opportunities and resoruces, the negative effects of globalisation and consumption patterns of the North. The campaign is an initiative of the Mazingira Institute, Nairobi, Kenya, and the Heinrich Boell Foundation Nairobi Office.

In the last three decades, various international conferences such as the Stockholm Conference on Environment, the Rio Earth Summit on Environment and Development, the UN Habitat, Social and Women’s Summits have addressed the urgent issues of health, environment and ecology, poverty, gender democracy and conflict management. Current statistics on the HIV and AIDS pandemic, poverty, malnutrition, the ecology and violent conflict, indicate a frightening situation, and a need to act to ensure that political commitments made at the Summits are implemented.

The GAP campaign, focuses on three agendas: the Green Agenda, the Aids Agenda and the People’s Agenda.

The main thrust of the Green Agenda is that of developing a culture that places priority on conservation before consumerism. For instance, the United States of America (USA), in declining to sign the Kyoto Protocal, has demonstrated that it places consumption before conservation. Studies show that high consumption patterns exist globally, particularly among middle to upper income earners, in urban areas, which has negative impact on environment (such as deforestation, biodiversity loss and degradation). However, consumers and business companies recognise their personal responsibility in changing their consumption habits to promote sustainability, as they are aware of the impact this has on the environment.

The primary emphasis in the AIDS agenda is that it is important to ‘put life before profit’. One cannot discuss sustainable development in Africa without reference to HIV and AIDS, as the heavy toll it is taking on the most productive sector in Africa, has a negative effect on development as a whole, which is unsustainable. There is a growing appreciation for the need to give priority to caring for AIDS patients, while allowing companies to do their business and earn some profits. What this campaign seeks to do is to create a win-win situation by respecting the right to life, and the right of companies to make some profits.

The People’s Agenda gives prominence to the gap between the ‘haves’ and the ‘have-nots’, and the need to share between the rich and the poor. High levels of poverty have been identified as being responsible for vulnerability towards HIV and AIDS, and for some degradation of the environment. Intense deliberations have been going on, on the three agenda, but the existing gap linking them should be addressed, as they are inextricably intertwined, and the effects or impact of one agenda, affects the other two. This is the primary goal of the GAP campaign: to have discussions at the Summit and in the preparatory process, focus on the linkages between the three agenda as they are related to each other and to Sustainable Development. Supporting this campaign means supporting the most basic human and ecological needs, and the respect for people’s lives, dignity, right to a good quality life, and to active participation in developing a culture for sustainable development. For us ‘Greens’, when we talk about Environmental Security, it compasses everything in the economic, and socio-political sphere.