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CLIMATE CHANGE TALKS ADJOURN IN NEW YORK

LITTLE PROGRESS MADE DURING TWO-WEEK SESSION

The fifth session of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee for a Framework Convention on Climate Change (INC) adjourned on Friday, 28 February. While the government delegates achieved some success in reaching agreement on some of the issues under negotiation, a number of contentious issues must be resolved before the Earth Summit.With a little more than one week of negotiating sessions scheduled before the June conference, there are fears that the failure of the INC to produce a significant agreement will greatly diminish the importance of the documents to be signed by the world's leaders in Rio de Janeiro.

Working Group I is responsible for negotiating the preamble; principles; objectives; commitments for stabilization and reduction of emissions; and commitments on financial resources and technology transfer. To date, it has made little progress. The United States, which has not agreed to specific commitments on targets and timetables for stabilizing emissions of carbon dioxide continues to block any substantial progress toward a meaningful convention. On the issue of financial resources, the US$75 million pledged by the United States may be helpful. It does not, however, resolve the fundamental issues of whether funds will be provided on a voluntary or assessed basis, nor how the provision of funds will be linked to the commitments taken by developing countries.

Working Group II, which is responsible for institutional issues, has been, in effect, held hostage by the stalemate in Working Group I. Among the most important matters still to be resolved are the establishment of subsidiary bodies; reporting mechanisms; the role of non-governmental organizations; and the use of the Global Environment Facility (GEF) or an alternative funding mechanism for implementation of the convention.

The fifth session of the INC will resume in New York from 30 April - 8 May. According to Eco (the NGO newsletter of the Climate Change Negotiations), if the INC is to successfully negotiate a substantive Climate Change Convention, the following issues must be resolved:

• The US must commit to specific targets and timetables for the reduction of carbon dioxide emissions, in light of the stated commitments of other industrialized countries.
• An inter-sessional meeting must be convened between those countries that have been asked to make specific CO2 reduction commitments (primarily the OECD countries).
• The current mode of decision-making must shift from a consensus-based to a majority-based process to prevent minority views from impeding progress.
• Developing countries need to continue to push the industrialized nations to make firm, meaningful commitments.
• All participants must shift their thinking from a national to a global perspective.

PREPCOM HIGHLIGHTS

OVERVIEW OF THE UNCED PREPARATORY PROCESS

Editors' Note: Beginning tomorrow, this column will feature highlights of the previous day's proceedings in the Plenary and the three working groups.  

The fourth session of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) Preparatory Committee (PrepCom) begins today in New York. This is the final opportunity for formal negotiation on all of the agenda items, including the Statement on Forest Principles, the Earth Charter/Rio Declaration and Agenda 21. The success of the Earth Summit rests largely on the progress that may or may not be achieved during the next five weeks.

The PrepCom was created by the United Nations General Assembly to: flesh out the agenda of the Earth Summit; establish the terms of reference; and develop a general consensus on the parameters of the issues to be discussed. The PrepCom is composed of members of the approximately 170 national delegations who are participating in UNCED.  

PrepCom I was held in August 1990 in Nairobi. At that meeting, the agenda and the negotiating procedures were agreed upon and two working groups were established. Working Group I deals with the issues of atmosphere, land resources, forests, biodiversity and biotechnology.

Working Group II deals with oceans, freshwater and wastes. Countries also requested the UNCED Secretariat to prepare thirty reports on the various issues on the UNCED agenda, referred to as PrepCom ("PC") documents.  

PrepCom II, which was held in March 1991 in Geneva, was devoted primarily to the review of the Secretariat's PC documents. It was hoped that substantive negotiations on the Agenda 21 documents would begin yet little negotiation actually occurred. Nevertheless, Working Group III on legal and institutional issues was created. In addition, the delegates agreed not to negotiate a separate forest convention but a statement on forest principles to be used as the basis for future negotiations on forestry issues.  

PrepCom III, which was held in August 1991 in Geneva, continued the work of the previous two PrepComs and moved the process of defining the issues to actual negotiation. The Secretariat had prepared the initial negotiating texts for each Agenda 21 subject area (ie., atmosphere, biodiversity, etc.). These documents (cited as PC/#/Addendum.#) outline the basis for action; goals, objectives and targets; programme areas; and implementation requirements. PrepCom III also addressed the legal and institutional issues within the mandate of Working Group III and the cross-sectoral issues under the mandate of the Plenary (ie., financial resources, technology transfer, poverty, sustainability, health and education and economic issues). Very little progress was made during PrepCom III towards reaching agreement on the major programme areas within Agenda 21. Agreement was not reached on most of the text and, in several cases, substantive negotiations had not even commenced due to lack of time and problems with the availability of translated documents.

According to many NGOs and developing countries, PrepCom IV must address a number of key issues if the Earth Summit is to be a success. These include:

Resolution of the North-South debate. During PrepCom III the recurring conflict between North and South prevented substantive discussions on the central issues. Specifically, the Group of 77 stressed that their primary objective at UNCED was to raise their living standards; that UNCED has an ecological bias; and that many key issues of concern to developing countries, such as toxic wastes and desertification, had not been addressed adequately. By contrast, the North wants the South to practice conservation, better resource management and population control while the South wants the North to finance the move toward conservation, provide access to new technologies and address other inequities.

Support for the negotiating process. The UNCED Secretariat is clearly overburdened due to the tremendous amount of documentation it has had to provide. As a result, prior to PrepComs II and III, many documents were not completed or translated on time for review by the governments prior to meetings. The lack of translators and interpreters at PrepCom III also took its toll on the negotiations. If sufficient translation and interpretation services are available at PrepCom IV, it is possible that greater progress will be made.

Lack of integration between environment and development. The economic policies and practices of all countries are at the core of the problem of national and global unsustainability. To achieve sustainability, there must be a restructuring of central assumptions, institutions and practices. Until the diplomats at UNCED are willing to challenge these "sacred cows" and use their imagination, courage and/or power to blaze a new path towards sustainability, UNCED may not succeed.

THINGS TO LOOK FOR TODAY AT PREPCOM

THE BUREAU MEETING: Preparatory Committee Chair Tommy Koh will meet with his Working Group Chairs, several of the Vice Chairs of the Informal Sessions of the Plenary (such as those addressing financial resources), and some of the regional chairs this morning. Two of the possible topics will be NGO access to the meetings of this PrepCom and a work plan for the Fourth Session. There is a possibility that the Bureau will adopt a model for NGO attendance and participation similar to that which was used in the Climate Change negotiations held during the last two weeks: open access to NGOs with posted notices for the occasional closed meeting. As well, the group may discuss the necessity of using the full five weeks for the negotiations. Several of the chairs will probably request additional time later in the session to return to items such as the Earth Charter, desertification and financial matters during the period officially allocated for "Outstanding Issues." This meeting will be private.

THE CORRIDORS: There may be considerable grumbling by NGOs over the issue of access to the official PrepCom meetings. The NGO Liaison Office of the UNCED Secretariat has disclosed several possible ways to address the question of NGO access into the meeting rooms. None of these suggestions have been well received by the NGOs who have arrived over the weekend. Yolanda Kakabadse, the NGO Liaison Officer of the Secretariat, will brief NGOs on this and other issues this afternoon.

WORKING GROUP III: This working group will begin its meetings early this PrepCom. Working Group III is concerned with legal and institutional matters and has started the work of formulating the Earth Charter. A draft set of principles on general rights and obligations was compiled at PrepCom III, but discussions were not completed. The Charter is intended to be a short, concise document written in language easily understandable by the general public. At present, the various contributions from governments have brought the text under consideration to over 136 paragraphs.

At the first meeting of this Working Group, the Chair, Dr. Bedrich Moldan of Czechoslovakia, will probably begin by asking that the agenda for Working Group III be adopted and move into an opening statement that may include the outline of his own reference text for the Earth Charter, which was developed from government proposals and circulated during the intersessional period. It appears that there is a growing consensus among governments that this text could provide a useful reference point for negotiation, although some governments or country groupings may have text prepared for discussion if and when an appropriate time arises. A decision by the Working Group to negotiate around Dr. Moldan's reference text would greatly expedite negotiations and improve the chances that PrepCom IV will agree on an Earth Charter.

The preliminary draft of Dr. Moldan's reference text is summarized below:

Three Prerequisites:

a) Interdependence and Integration: "Sustainable economic and social development depends on the continued availability and integrity of the Earth's ecosystem and natural resources."

b) General Rights and Intergenerational Equity: "All States, individuals and social groups share their rights to enjoy the benefits of environment and development with future human generations."

c) Cooperation: "States, individuals and social groups shall cooperate in good faith and in a spirit of global partnership to implement the principles embodied in this Charter."

Proposed Principles:

a) The Stockholm premise: "States have the sovereign right to exploit their own natural resources and the responsibility to ensure that activities within their jurisdiction or control do not cause damage to the environment of other States or of areas beyond the limits of national jurisdiction."

b) Differentiated responsibility/international trade and resource flows: "States shall share in collective action in accordance with their responsibility and capacity, and with special regard for the needs of economically disadvantaged countries and people, which must be reflected in international trade relations and resources flows."

c) Poverty and sustainable lifestyles: "As an indispensable component of sustainable development, States and People shall strive to eradicate poverty and disease and to eliminate or avoid unsustainable patterns of production and consumption."

d) Democratic decision-making: States, individuals and social groups shall participate in democratic decision-making processes concerning their environment, and shall have due access to information essential for such processes."

e) Prevention/precaution/prior assessment: "States and people shall adopt precautionary and preventive approaches and take into account the value of the environment when planing potentially harmful activities."

f) Polluter-pays principle: "States and enterprises shall ensure that all economic transactions and products bear the full costs of the environmental risks and impacts to which they give rise."

g) Resource use and waste: "States and enterprises and individuals shall use all renewable resources at their disposal at levels that do not exceed their regenerative capacity. Wastes shall be minimized at the source, and/or managed with the least possible harm to the environment."

h) Environmental harm to others or to the Earth: "States and people shall respect the environment of others and the Earth's ecosystems and shall treat the environment in areas beyond their jurisdiction or authority in a manner at least as favorable as their own environment. Those whose activities harm or threaten the environment or development of others or the Earth's ecosystems shall be responsible for preventing or redressing such harm."

i) Public awareness, natural and cultural diversity: "States shall promote awareness of the values of sustainable development, especially through information and education, and shall preserve and protect natural and cultural diversity, particularly traditional lifestyles with a special relationship to the Earth."

j) Monitoring, assessment and information: "States, enterprises and social groups shall continuously monitor and assess the environment on which their activities have impacts, and shall openly share with others concerned the results of such monitoring and assessment."