Developing countries need aid to meet Johannesburg targets on drinking water, sanitation, Sustainable Development Commission told

Commission on Sustainable Development
Eleventh Session
28 April 2003
PM Meeting



At Round Table, Current Anti-Poverty Efforts Described
As ‘Tiny Fraction’ of What Is Needed to Reach Development Goals



The United Nations must shore up donor aid and resource provisions if it wants developing countries to make progress towards the Johannesburg Summit’s target for fresh drinking water and sanitation services, Ronnie Kasarils, Minister for Sustainable Development of South Africa, told the Commission on Sustainable Development this afternoon, at its ministerial round table on “Priority actions and commitments to implement the outcomes of the World Summit on Sustainable Development”.

Those and other Johannesburg Summit targets required adequate funding, he said, noting that, apart from the Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs, few speakers had raised the issue of development targets during the Commission’s morning meeting. He said water management involved a wide range of participants in agreement with the relevant country and municipality, noting that the Kyoto Protocol’s report had a reference that incorrectly endorsed the privatization of water.

Also addressing the round table, Nitin Desai, the Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs, said that to achieve the Millennium Development Goals, the international community should be raising 100,000 people out of poverty, providing sanitation to 200,000 people, and providing safe energy to 400,000 people every day. What was currently being done, mainly at the country level, was nothing compared to those figures, covering just a tiny fraction of what was needed. The international community should be asking what could be done to strengthen national capacities.

If people were to rise above poverty, it would be due to what was accomplished in other areas, such as human resource management, he said. Policy coherence was key to obtaining results and should be translated into closely monitored procedures at the country level.

The discussion was the first of three interactive ministerial round tables involving major stakeholders being held at Headquarters this week. The dialogues are intended to bring together all major participants in the fields under discussion: poverty eradication; sustainable consumption and production patterns; natural resource management; health and sustainable development; and the institutional framework for sustainable development. Also participating were representatives of nine major civil society groups -- women, children and youth, indigenous people, non-governmental organizations, local authorities, workers and their trade unions, business and industry, the scientific and technology community, and farmers.

Regarding the challenges of water management, David Kemp, Minister for the Environment and Heritage of Australia, said good governance had been essential for making better use of water, a scarce resource in Australia, the world’s driest continent. Getting States that shared water resources to cooperate had not been easy, he said. Australia offered entitlements as an incentive for landowners with water, a significant part of its inter-State water management system.

Borge Brende, Norway’s Minister of Environment, said that to date no international organization existed to develop and monitor a global programme of action concerning water. Such an entity should exist and involve the energy, environmental and health sectors. Mr. Nobs of Switzerland agreed, stressing the need for an institutional entity to address water decentralization, water resource management, particularly in rural areas, and cooperation at the national and international levels. Internationally agreed water goals must be a priority, he said.

A representative of the youth group said education in production and consumption must be focused on youth and children. It was the only transitional major group, in that its members would become the future educators, policy-makers, producers and consumers.

Ms. Osorio, the Environment Minister of Venezuela, said industrialized countries had a high level of responsibility when it came to changing patterns of production and consumption. It was important to recall the importance of ethics in sustainable development, or it would be an uphill battle in changing those patterns. The neo-political market model –- unbridled capitalism -– did not include the notion of sustainability. Goals should be set to engage in follow-up and monitoring to avoid the destruction of the planet.

Ms. Osorio also said gender equality was a crucial issue. Venezuela had developed a land registry regime that gave priority to women heads of household, enabling them to get bank credits in rural areas. It had also reformed financial system, giving women easier access to credit. Marina Silva, Brazil’s Minister of Environment, and the representative of the women’s group echoed that claim, saying governments must make gender equality a central theme in implementing the Johannesburg goals and recommended the Commission highlight the need for gender budgeting.

The Minister of Environment of Morocco, Mohammed Elyazghi, said it was inconceivable that non-viable practices in consumption continued, when so many were living in poverty. Developed countries must be in the vanguard when it came to fundamental changes in production and consumption patterns. If they assumed their responsibilities, humanity could avoid the degradation that had made economic and social development proceed at the expense of the environment.

The representative of the farmers group said, in selling their products on commercial markets, farmers faced three problems -– market distortion by government policies, such as subsidies and taxes; market distortion by the private sector; and imposing the health and sanitary regulations of developed countries.

Other speakers at the meeting included ministers and representatives of Australia, Austria, Canada, France, Gabon, Ghana, Indonesia, Japan, Mali, Pakistan, Senegal, United Kingdom, and the United States. Representatives of the major civil society groups also spoke.

The Commission will meet again at 10 a.m., Tuesday, 29 April, to continue its high-level ministerial segment on the future work programme and methods of the Commission.




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