ENVIRONMENT: UNEP Points to New Ways Ahead

By Sanjay Suri Reprint | | Print |

Sanjay Suri

LONDON, May 23 2002 (IPS) - A new report by the United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP) does more than survey the scene and make broad suggestions: it lists specific policies that need to be adopted to protect the environment.

The recommended actions are aimed at preventing the plunge towards doom on many environmental fronts described in the Global Environment Outlook released by UNEP Wednesday.

The 450-page report prepared with an input from more than a thousand experts comes as an eye-opener ahead of the World Summit on Sustainable Development to be held in Johannesburg from August 26 to September 4.

The report makes a projection of what earth will be like 30 years from now. If environmental damage is not checked, earth is hurtling towards destruction of 70 per cent of its natural land surface by the year 2032, water shortages for half the earth rising to 95 per cent in the Middle East, two billion new mouths to feed and extinction of hundreds of species of birds and mammals.

The report says the number of people hit by disasters went up from 147 million a year in the eighties to 211 million a year in the nineties. The world faced more than 100 billion dollars of losses from natural disasters in 1999.

India alone, the report points out, is losing about 10 billion dollars a year, or 4.5 per cent of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP), to human-induced land degradation.

The planet is now at ôcrucial cross-roads”, the report says. Future generations will depend on the choices made today on forests, oceans, rivers, mountains, wildlife and other life support systems, the report says.

Of the three pillars of sustainable development – social, economic and environmental – environment is ôunder siege”, the report says. There have been some notable successes as with action to stop widening of the ozone layer, but also ôspectacular failures”, the report says.

In the light of this situation the report asks for several new policies and courses of action. These include the following:

– A rethinking on institutions that were set up to perform different functions from those they are expected to exercise today. This should lead to new linkages between global and local levels, with implementation passed on to local authorities wherever possible. More exchanges should be set up between public institutions, think tanks and the private sector.

– Within civil society the monitoring of political will and performance must be strengthened to make them an effective watchdog over the private sector, governments and international organisations.

– Policies must be developed for specific localities and situations. Environmental policies should be incorporated into political sectors and levels of government, especially into economic decision-making.

– Multilateral Environmental Agreements (MEAs) are fragmented, overlapping and work piecemeal at present. There are more meetings and reporting requirements than many governments can cope with. A coherent body of international environmental legislation is needed. Joint financial systems should be set up to cover MEA provisions. UNEP should be mandated to strengthen co-ordination among MEAs.

– A form of sustainable trade is needed. Sustainable trade is defined as an international exchange of goods and services that yields positive social, economic and environmental benefits. Western trade barriers restrict the ability of developing countries to grow economically and finance sustainable development expenditure. Research must be conducted immediately on the impact of trade liberalisation on environmental and human well-being.

– Promising new technologies can help secure basic goods and services but they remain largely the province of commercial interests in developed countries. Technology transfer has been carried out successfully through the multilateral fund of the Montreal Protocol. That can be a model for more such transfers.

– Environmental goods and services should be costed rather than considered as free. That will lead to an appreciation of the immense value of environmental assets. Such attempts have been made and need to be developed and validated.

– The market should be made to work for sustainable development. A plethora of instruments exists that can make the market work for sustainable development, including tradable permit schemes, removing market barriers and environmentally damaging government subsidies, subsidising the start of environmentally sound businesses, creating markets for environmental services, encouraging disclosure policies and recycling tax revenues. With the right push these can be made more effective than command-and-control measures.

– Build partnerships between government, industry and others to shape the markets for environmental goods and services using tools such as legislation, incentives, market mechanisms and other methods of influencing market and consumer behaviour. More green goods should be brought to the market.

– NGOs should play their role in independent review at national level, drawing attention to policy failures and poor performance. This may irritate those targeted, but is a strong motivation for good performance.

The report says that two contrasting scenarios that can be adopted are Markets First or Sustainability First. Market forces can help sustainability but it is sustainability that must be the aim because it brings far reaching changes in vales and lifestyles if it is brought by firm policies and cooperation between all sectors of society, says the report.

ENVIRONMENT: UNEP Points to New Ways Ahead

By Sanjay Suri Reprint | | Print |

Sanjay Suri

LONDON, May 23 2002 (IPS) - A new report by the United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP) does more than survey the scene and make broad suggestions: it lists specific policies that need to be adopted to protect the environment.
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