Do not get the aims wrong. The Johannesburg Summit is already a success. The avalanche of articles, reports, stances and documents that it has given rise to has no doubt contributed to an international awareness of how serious the threats facing the Earth are, and the magnitude of the challenges facing mankind. Despite seriously failing to speak of the population aspect and of world population (this being out of the question in the official document for either political or religious reasons), as I said, despite this, public opinion has been bombarded with information and warnings that will no doubt have some effect. But this does not mean there is any guarantee of success all the same. On the contrary, the likelihood that these summits will result in positive operational results is somewhat slim. Why such scepticism? Because I have the impression that the participants continue to give priority to traditional demands in these great joint ceremonies between rich and developing worlds, which are in no way appropriate to the aim of sustainable development. Partly through intellectual laziness and above all in order to defend specific interests not always acknowledged, the rich and industrialised countries remain obsessively fixed to the idea that growth is the only absolute criteria for their economic and social good health, and the representatives of developing countries, for their part, obstinately give first place to two demands that are a source of so much misery for their populations. They believe it is essential to: a) make money, money, money and still more money; and b) expand their agricultural exports. Rich and poor are doubly wrong as the aims cited are not the right ones and, on such a base, no agreement except an agreement for outward show is possible between the two groups.
Partial review of the notion of growth. Just a few words of explanation, beginning with the industrialised countries. There is a truth that no-one I know dares to proclaim: economic growth as it is calculated and interpreted today is partially incompatible with sustainable development. I am not unaware of the effort that economists and statisticians in the EU are making to introduce new values into evaluating growth, through indicators that take into consideration criteria other than the volume of production and activity, by linking growth more to the environmental situation and social wellbeing. Neither am I unaware of the fact that many of these new indicators are already used in Community statistics. In this field, as in many others, Europe is well ahead and is pointing out the road for the others. But we are still far from the decisive revision that is necessary. For the time being, a discovery entailing a radical fall in oil consumption would be reflected in the result figures and in a fall in activity (for the oil industry), and a discovery eliminating a serious illness of some kind would make the turnover of hospitals fall. The industrialised world must understand that "sustainable development" implies measures that apparently (I underline) may, as a first approach, give the impression of slowing down growth.
Arms or agricultural development? In most poor countries, spending on arms by far exceeds that on education, health and agricultural development. The conditions and the arrangements for financial aid must become far stricter, by avoiding generic promises and large allocations in favour of countries involved in conflict or ineffective international organisations. Financing must be directed towards targeted projects: access to drinking water, energy efficiency or renewable energies. Claims relating to the expansion of agricultural trade should be rejected: they have nothing to do with sustainable development. On the contrary, any opening up of European borders in this field causes a sinister gathering of international trade vultures which encourage and organise monoculture in under-fed countries for export, which is a disaster for the natural environment and for subsistence farming that should on the contrary be encouraged as an essential element to ensure the ex-Third World's autonomy with regards food supplies.
From Albert Einstein to Edouard Goldsmith. Neither forced encouragement to economic growth, nor badly thought out subsidies or the expansion of agricultural trade are valid priorities for the Summit under way. The leaders gathering in South Africa should seek inspiration from other sources. For example, a phrase of Albert Einstein often quoted but rarely meditated on: "if the bees disappeared, Man would only have four years to live". Or the following affirmation by British environmentalist Edouard Goldsmith who says that "when the rules of the WTO in the agricultural sector are applied as they stand, we shall have two billion additional refugees in the slums". Or the latest study by the WWF announcing that, at the present rate, Earth's resources will be exhausted within forty years and mankind would then, in order to survive, have to be transferred to another planet. The weakness of these forecasts lies in their unrealistic timeframe. Man, in fact, would no doubt be able to resist for more than four years after the disappearance of the bees despite the essential role that bees do indeed play in plant reproduction. The arrival of two billion new refugees in the slums as a consequence of world competition in agriculture would be slower than Mr Goldsmith predicts. And forty years for organising the relocation of mankind to another planet is not very long. These chronological exaggerations allow some commentators to express irony about the announced content of such quotations and to recall that the predictions of the Club of Rome on exhaustion of natural resources have not proved correct. But timeframe mistakes should not make us less vigilant or make such warnings any less credible.
All sectors of enterprise. One should not forget either that sustainable development is an overall objective, and that the aspect on "safeguarding natural resources" is no doubt an essential element (an urgent one too given atmospheric warming, the water crisis and the violence of deforestation) - but it is not the only one. As far as the EU is concerned, it must confirm and apply its Lisbon and Gothenburg strategy which comprises a series of elements that are all indispensable. We would like to remind you of a few: - the reduction in greenhouse gas emissions; - the taking into consideration of resistance to antibiotics and the long term effects of certain chemical substances; - defence and as far as possible the reconstitution of biodiversity (so many crimes have been committed in the name of obsessive growth in farm profitability!) and the fight against soil erosion; - the restoration of fish stocks and the health of the sea in general; - the decline and more effective re-use of waste; - the fight against poverty and against social exclusion; - financial viability of retirement systems and public health systems; - and revision of transport systems.
Reasons for doubting. An essential part of these aims do not come from the Johannesburg Summit but from European internal policies. The international policies do also, however, have immediate consequences. For the ecological aspects, it is obvious: there is no point in fighting against the greenhouse gas effect in a country or a region if nothing is being done in the neighbouring countries. But it is also true in other fields, such as agriculture. The developing countries would be badly advised if they continue to call for purely and simply putting an end to subsidies to agricultural activity in the industrialised world. The result would be the death of agriculture in Europe and in the United States, which is not only unacceptable for those primarily concerned but also and above all it would be a disaster for the underfed populations of today and tomorrow, as food aid policy and emergency assistance can only exist thanks to European and American agricultural production, while the self-sufficiency of the under-nourished countries and continents is something that will take a long time to accomplish.
To what extent are the different aspects cited taken into consideration as they should be taken into consideration in Johannesburg? I can only end as I began: for now, there are more reasons for doubting than for feeling confident.
(F.R.)