RIGHT TOPICS, WRONG ANSWERS
Will Johannebsurg turn into "Doha 2"?
By Daniel Mittler, FoE Germany, WSSD Coordinator for Friends
of the Earth International, briefly analysing PrepComm II
The agenda for the World Summit on Sustainable Development is set.
And governments have put together a challenging set of issues for
Johannesburg focussing on globalisation, poverty, unsustainable
production and consumption patterns, resource efficiency, health
and governance. Sadly, the answers Governments seem likely to give
to this ambitious list of topics are likely to be the wrong ones.
Governments so far clearly remain unwilling to reign in neoliberal
economic globalisation. To the contrary, they seem hell-bent on
making Johannesburg subservient to the free trade agenda pursued
at the WTO. The "Chairmanīs paper" agreed at PrepComm 2, which will
form the basis for negotiations in the coming months, calls on WTO
members to implement the results of the Doha WTO ministerial "so
that world trade [can] support sustainable development in all countries".
Hardly a convincing argument, considering the grave dangers the
Doha agreements harbour for social and environmental standards!
NGOs like Friends of the Earth will continue to campaign for governments
to agree clear social and ecological limits for economic globalisation
at Johannesburg. Friends of the Earth will therefore call for the
principle that multilateral environmental agreements must always
override trade rules to be established at the WSSD. If Johannesburg
becomes merely "Doha 2" then the Summit will have to be known as
"Rio Minus 10" and a key opportunity for society to regain power
in the face of economic globalisation will have been missed.
NGOs like Friends of the Earth did not succeed in making ecological
debt an official topic of the Summit. But we did get the topic on
Governmentīs radar screens. India, for example, took up the topic
in plenary and acknowledged they did so due to our campaigning.
There was also considerable press interest in ecological debt. FoEI
will therefore continue to stress ecolgical debt in the run up to
Johannesburg.
Energy is another key challenge, which will be addressed at Johannesburg,
but where governments seem unwilling to taje sufficient steps in
the right direction. Indeed, advanced fossil fuels are being offered
as part of the solution rather than part of the problem in the "Chairmanīs
paper". FoEI will oppose this and campaign for an ambitious renewable
energy use target of at least 12 % by 2010 in all industrialised
countries.
At PrepComm 2 so called "Type 2" outcomes were one of the main
topics of discussion. The idea is to include "partnership agreements"
between some states and/or stakeholders as part of the official
outcome of the Summit. Everyone can contribute their favourite project
to implement sustainable development. These partnerships have the
potential to allow for at least SOME progressive results from the
Summit, as they cannot be blocked by JUSCANZ and others. But there
are also two grave dangers associated with "Type 2 outcomes". One,
there are so far no clear criteria (in theory nuclear projects could
count, too). But two, these "partnerships" could have a negative
political effect. The "good news stories" the partnerships will
generate could keep the press occupied and thus take pressure off
governments to negotiate decent negotiated agreements ("Type 1 outcomes").
The US, for example, was clearly already speculating that presenting
attractive "Type 2" initiatives could quiet demands for progressive
agreements. Also: Business will use Type 2 outcomes to argue that
there is no problem, that the solutions are all "out there" and
that THEY happen to have them. Type 2 outcomes could thus become
part of a major greenwash of the Summit. The message going out to
the world could be that all is well and that groups like FoEI that
point to a the failure of governments to implement sustainable development,
are out of sink with the barve new world of beautiful technological
solutions delivered in partnership. FoEI has voiced these concerns,
but will have to establish a final position on Type 2 outcomes in
the coming months. We need to weigh the dangers of greenwash against
the potential of positive Type 2 agreements. What impact could inspirations
Type 2 agreements have, especially as an inspiration for people
worldwide?
ends.
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