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Rio +5: Earth Summit II Backslides on 1992 Promises

Mountains June 27, 1997

United Nations, New York: Presidents and Prime Ministers this week made sweeping political statements while their civil servants produced meaningless and empty statements of intent, said WWF-World Wide Fund For Nature on the closing day of the Earth Summit II.

"The Earth Summit II choked in even making promises," said Gordon Shepherd, Director of International Policy for WWF. "What the world expected was a push towards implementation of Agenda 21."

"We would have been much better served if the Heads of State had endorsed what was agreed in Rio in 1992, and then used their energy to develop funded action plans with targets and timetables for implementation," added Shepherd. "The Rio agreements were rightly hailed as a major success, but the promises made there have been betrayed in New York this week."

WWF cited the following as failures of Earth Summit II:

  1. Forests: Governments failed completely to agree on targets and timetables to implement the commitments they made in Rio five years ago, and since then through the Inter-Governmental Panel on Forests. Instead of action on key issues, such as establishing networks of ecologically representative protected areas and measures to halt illegal logging, they spent their time arguing about how many more years to spend sitting in meetings.

  2. Climate: Leaders failed to commit to a clear, near-term target for reducing carbon dioxide emissions despite pressures on the US and Japan to follow the lead by EU and Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS). WWF has been urging governments to commit to reducing CO2 emissions by 20 per cent below 1990 levels by the year 2005.

  3. Finance and Trade: Progress on these issues underpins progress needed here and in other fora, such as the climate change negotiations. Rio recognized that trade and environment should be mutually supportive. That was undermined here and no progress was made on ensuring that international economic agreements, such as the Multilateral Agreement on Investment being negotiated by the OECD, support sustainable development. In addition, governments failed to set a timetable for achieving the ODA target of 0.7 percent identified in 1972 and confirmed in 1992.

  4. Toxic chemicals: In spite of a very strong report from the Inter-Governmental Forum on Chemical Safety (established following the first Earth Summit), no specific national action was agreed to deal with toxic chemicals. WWF has been calling for urgent national action on endocrine disruptors, including through Pollutant Release and Transfer Registers and Pesticide Reduction programmes.

  5. Local initiatives: One of the most promising successes of Rio was the implementation of Agenda 21, particularly through community and local action groups, as well as small enterprises, and by some governments. WWF's Spotlight on Solutions: A People's Agenda, highlighted some of these success stories. But these will remain islands in a sea of unsustainability in the face of a complete lack of support from the international community.

"Community groups and others that were inspired by Rio didn't receive the slightest encouragement to continue their work," said Carole Saint-Laurent, UNCED follow-up coordinator. "Governments have congratulated themselves for these promising initiatives, but failed to give the needed political and financial support. The international community has failed to provide a supportive political environment to ensure the long term sustainability of local actions."

"Five years ago governments agreed on where the global community should be headed. It is a tragedy that the international community has not managed to set realistic targets for determining whether or not we have at last begun to reverse environmental damage, and improve prospects for sustainable development and poverty eradication," Shepherd concluded.

WWF was also concerned at the lack of progress in strengthening the role of indigenous peoples. In fact, five countries - Brazil, United States, Venezuela, Indonesia and Canada - actually set up a closed contact group which kept indigenous peoples organizations and NGOs out of the discussions.

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Contact: Elizabeth Foley and Someshwar Singh at +41-22-364 9553/54. Fax +41-22-364 8307