Brussels, 26/08/2002 (Agence Europe) - Over 100 countries are taking part at the second World Summit on Sustainable Development that opened in Johannesburg (South Africa) on Monday to a backdrop of demonstrations by anti-globalisation NGOs disenchanted by these huge meetings that they fear will just be another failure. Ministers and delegates from both rich and poor countries of the planet meeting for the largest conference ever organised by the United Nations will have one week in which to reflect and reach agreement on a political declaration and a plan of action able to reconcile equitable economic development, the fight against poverty and conservation of the environment and of natural resources at global scale, in the best interests of the present and future generations. Stakes are considerable as, despite ambient pessimism, it would not be appropriate to repeat the failure of the first Earth Summit held ten years ago in Rio, which was rich in unfulfilled promises. Inviting all those taking part to put an end to "global apartheid" between the rich and the poor, Thabo Mbeki, South African President and host of the Summit, set out the aims of the conference.
The political declaration to be adopted in Johannesburg on 4 September should set out the political commitments needed for achieving an effective plan for implementing the Rio recommendations that have so far come to nothing (Agenda 21), as well as new commitments for raising the challenge of sustainable development.
Begun at ministerial level, the Johannesburg Summit will continue at the level of Heads of State and Government from 1 to 4 September, but will have to deal with the absence of US President George W. Bush, who is opposed to any further international commitment.
On the eve of his departure for Johannesburg, Poul Nielson, Commissioner for Development Policy and Humanitarian Aid, summarised the purpose of this summit, declaring in a press release published on Monday: "The world cannot allow itself a failure in Johannesburg. The challenges facing the planet and its inhabitants are simply too great. The flooding in Europe and Asia this summer eloquently recall what we can expect if we fail to achieve sustainable development. Poverty and environmental damage are global problems that call for global and urgent measures. This summit provides us with a unique opportunity to reach tangible results to guarantee a decent life for future generations. In Johannesburg, we must move from words to action at all cost. The European Union is determined to assume its responsibilities and to play a leading role in order to reach a satisfactory result. We shall do everything we can to obtain concrete, quantifiable results and timetables for the implementation of millennium development objectives, as well as a powerful political declaration. As the main trading partner of the poor countries and leading aid donor to these countries, the European Union plans to build bridges between all the partners to reach consensus. As we enter into the final phase of negotiation of the texts (Ed.: that will establish the results of the summit), we must keep our objective in sight: that of bringing the whole world together round an agreement on how to conceive our common future".
Speaking on behalf of the Union Council over which he presides, Carsten Staur, Danish Secretary of State, refuses to yield to pessimism: "The atmosphere is very constructive. The Union is positive to the new texts that have been put forward as a basis for negotiations in the areas of financing, globalisation and trade, which are more advanced than the texts from the preparation meetings in Bali in June. The EU, the developing countries in the G77 group, Japan and the United States have been active players in these efforts and the EU hopes the Summit will proceed on this basis".
Catherine Day, European Commission Environment Director General, said for her part: "The start of the World Summit has been promising and the EU is optimistic about obtaining a Plan of Implementation that would be satisfactory to the Union by the end of the Summit. However, there are still areas where a lot of work has to be done. The Union believes that a way of showing real commitment is to set quantifiable targets, implementation timetables and monitoring mechanisms in the Plan of Implementation".
The European Union supports the proposal by the UN Secretary General, Kofi Annan, aimed at making the debate move forward in five key areas: water, energy, health, agriculture and biodiversity. To this end it proposes objectives and specific actions to achieve the millennium target which is to cut by half, by 2015, the number of persons in the world living in abject poverty (1.2 billion people live on less than one dollar a day).
The success of the Johannesburg Summit will depend on the ability of those taking part to overcome the points of disagreement which persisted, on Sunday, during negotiations between diplomats meeting in camera. These concern the North-South differences concerning the rise in the level of public aid to development granted by rich countries, access by poor country products to the markets of the northern countries, and governance (good management of public affairs, fight against corruption and respect of human rights), but also the dispute between Americans and Europeans on targets and timetables that the European Union hopes to introduce in the action plan to give it a binding nature.