Contents:

• Background information
• Current developments
• International and political developments
• Media releases
• Contact information
• Related links

BACKGROUND INFORMATION

Introduction

In February 2000, President Thabo Mbeki, on behalf of the South African government, made a formal offer to the United Nations to host the Ten-year Review Summit of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development in 2002 (UNCED 2002), popularly referred to as the Earth Summit 2002, in South Africa.

Earlier this year, the United Nations decided that the Summit would be held outside the United Nations Headquarters and preferably in a developing country.

The overwhelming support for the South African offer among UN member states culminated in a resolution of the Second Committee of the 55th Session of United Nations General Assembly on Environment and Sustainable Development, on Friday, December 08, 2000, formally accepting with gratitude the offer of the South African Government to host the global event in South Africa.

The Summit is scheduled to take place in June 2002.

The Second Committee of the 55th Session of United Nations General Assembly on Environment and Sustainable Development also resolved that the Ten-year Review Summit:

• Should focus on the identification of accomplishments and areas where further efforts are needed to implement Agenda 21 and other outcomes of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development and should focus on action-oriented decisions in areas where future efforts are needed to implement Agenda 21, address, within the framework of Agenda 21, new challenges and opportunities, and result in renewed political commitment and support for sustainable development, consistent, inter alia, within the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities.
• Should ensure a balance between the economic development, social development and environmental protection as independent and mutually reinforcing components of sustainable development.

The Second Committee of the United Nations General Assembly decided to call the final event of the 10-year review the "World Summit on Sustainable Development".

The Committee also:

• Stressed the importance of early and effective preparations for the Summit and a comprehensive assessment of progress achieved in the implementation of Agenda 21 and the other outcomes on the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development to be carried out at the local, national, regional and international levels by Governments and the United Nations system so as to ensure high-quality inputs to review the process, and welcomes the preparatory activities carried out so far.
• Welcomed the work undertaken at the regional levels in close collaboration with the respective regional economic commissions to implement the action programmes for sustainable development that could provide substantive inputs to the preparatory process and the summit itself.

The Committee also resolved that the United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development acting as the preparatory committee should:

• Undertake the comprehensive review and assessment of the implementation of Agenda 21 and other outcomes of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development on the basis of the results of national assessments and sub-regional and regional preparatory meetings.
• Identify major constraints hindering the implementation of Agenda 21 and propose the specific time-bound measures to be undertaken at all levels.
• Address new challenges and opportunities that have emerged since UNCED within the framework of Agenda 21.
• Address ways of strengthening and institutional framework for sustainable development and evaluate and define the role and the programme of work of the Commission of Sustainable Development.
• Propose a provisional agenda and possible main themes of the Summit based on the outcomes of the preparatory activities at the national, sub-regional, regional and international levels, as well as taking into account the input of the major groups.

There is general consensus among UN member states that the Agenda 21 principles agreed at Rio in 1992 should not be renegotiated. The Earth Summit 2002 should review the successes and failures of countries in meeting their commitments made at Rio in a frank manner and furthermore reinvigorate the global commitment to sustainable development.

The event will be a global summit of world leaders.

The Earth Summit 2002 should deepen the global commitment to sustainable development through a new "global compact", and bring a new spirit into the environmental debate.

There is wide consensus that the primary focus of the Summit should be on "poverty, development and the environment". Poverty and underdevelopment are seen as the fundamental threats to environmental security and sustainable development.

The South African Cabinet has formally decided that the Earth Summit 2002 will be held in Johannesburg.

Background and overview

In the preamble to the Earth Summit, held in 1992, the context of the development constraints that the world was facing at the time was summarized as a call to the realisation of the interaction that exists between the economy, social structures and the environment. This remains true in the present day as we live in a world where the disparity between rich and poor continually increases bringing us to the realisation that we as custodians of the future generations have to assure ourselves of a safer, more prosperous future in which we deal with the environment and development issues in a balanced manner.

In 1992 the Heads of State and senior government officials of 178 countries got together to chart the road ahead for a global partnership that would ensure that all nations would have a safer and more prosperous future. The indicators through which this dream would be reached included Agenda 21, a statement on the management, conservation and sustainable development of all forests, formulation of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Conventions on Biological Diversity; Desertification as well as a Statement on Forests. In principle these guidelines provided the basis for:

• Rights and responsibilities of nations to pursue human development and well-being.
• The blueprint on how to make development socially, economically and environmentally sustainable.
• Economic development and maintenance of all forms of life.

The focus on the needs of the developing world was fundamental in the formulation of Agenda 21. A commitment was made that the global partnership would provide the economic indicators to achieve sustainable development and that the richer nations would endorsed their responsibilities to guide developing nations in their tasks to achieve a balance between population, consumption, technology and environmental change.

At the UN General Assembly Special Session (RIO+5) in 1997, South Africa committed itself to have its national sustainable development strategy in place by the year 2002. South Africa has since 1995 actively participated in meetings of the UN Commission on Sustainable Development and annually submits a National Country Profile Report on progress made towards sustainable development. In terms of our National Environmental Management Act 1998, section 26, all levels of government in South Africa are required to submit reports on their progress in terms of sustainable development practices every year. The inclusion of sustainable, people-centred development as a principle in national policies and legislation promulgated since 1994, serves to confirm South Africa's commitment to sustainable development as fundamental for achieving a better quality of life for all.

The requirements of elements contained in Local Agenda 21, such as integrated development planning, co-operative and developmental governance, and promotion of a safe and healthy environment, are built into the South African Constitution (Act 108 of 1996). The White Paper on Local Government 1998 tasks local governments with the responsibility, among others, for environmental stewardship and adopting a more sustainable approach to planning and development. South Africa is one of 11 countries in the world that have formally embarked on a national Local Agenda 21 Campaign assisting local authorities in making the global agenda towards sustainability part of their daily activities. This process, in conjunction with decentralisation policies originating at national level, is transforming local governance and re-orientating local development towards sustainability. As part of this effort, South Africa has been promoting awareness of Local Agenda 21 by hosting several Local Agenda 21 conferences.

South Africa reported to the United Nations in 1997; 1998; 1999 and 2000 on its progress in the active implementation of Agenda 21.

A major theme of Agenda 21 is the need to eradicate poverty by giving poor people more access to the resources they need to live sustainably. Poverty is not caused in isolation and cannot be solved in isolation. The struggle against poverty is the shared responsibility of all nations, and with South Africa's commitment to justify Africa in the global community the need to address poverty remains vital in our progression to economic upliftment and restoration of human dignity. The recognition of the need to address poverty is symbiotic to the need to enable people to accept this responsibility and manage the resources in sustainable manner. Sustainability is a long-term process that enhances the protection of resources while entrenching effective utilisation. The partnership in sustainable development does not only reflect the economic and technological transfer of knowledge, but allows for governments to address foreign debt relief in order to use their own resources to finance development. Financial assistance and the provision thereof in partnership, as seen within our African vision, is a development tool that provides ways to address environmental concerns while maintaining basic services to the poor and needy. SADC recognizes that resources know no border therefore as developing countries we have adopted protocols that deals with regional management of shared resources i.e. the protocol on shared water courses, protocol on wildlife conservation and law enforcement, protocol on health (UNDP assessment. Poverty in 2025. 1000 million people living in poverty in Sub Saharan Africa, compared to world total of 1500 million - 66% of world population).

Background information | Current developments | International and political developments | Media releases | Contact information | Related links