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Sustainable Development an Uphill Climb |
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By Katiana Murillo*
For
the first time since the Johannesburg Summit, also known as Rio+10,
the environment ministers from Latin America and the Caribbean are
meeting this month for five days in Panama to evaluate the region's
progress in sustainable development.
SAN JOSE - "Without mechanisms for technical
and financial cooperation, sustainable development in Latin America
and the Caribbean is an uphill climb," Costa Rica's environment
and energy minister, Carlos Manuel Rodríguez, said in a conversation
with Tierramérica.
Rodríguez and his colleagues from throughout the region are meeting
Nov. 20-25 in Panama to assess environmental policies for the first
time since the World Summit on Sustainable Development, held in
Johannesburg, South Africa last year.
The challenges are enormous in a region where 40 percent of the
population lives in poverty, more than 300 million hectares of land
are degraded, and less than one percent of gross domestic product
is invested in sustainable development.
At the Johannesburg summit, the ministers presented the Latin American
and Caribbean Initiative for Sustainable Development (ILAC), which
calls for a 10-percent increase in the use of renewable energy sources
in the region and fomenting technologies to improve water quality.
- TIERRAMERICA: Has the region made progress in environmental terms
since Johannesburg?
- RODRIGUEZ: Johannesburg was complicated. The agreements were very
general and the goals a bit idealistic, given that they were not
based on clear commitments for cooperation between the (developing)
South and the (industrialized) North. Without mechanisms for financing,
implementation and monitoring, the task is an uphill climb. In the
regional context, there is a similar situation. Now there is greater
political will, but it is not enough. If this will is not supported
by a process of technical and financial cooperation, the will is
going to fade and the environmental issue will not be a priority.
- What are the main challenges for the environment ministries in
Latin America?
- The biggest challenge is to see how, in the regional context,
we implement the commitments made in Johannesburg, how we ensure
follow-up and continuity of the agreements from Rio (1992 Earth
Summit) and how we create new mechanisms for technical and financial
cooperation. Another challenge is how to tackle key issues like
water, climate change, biodiversity, and governance as fundamental
axis of this effort.
- According to the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP), income
disparity in Latin America is greater than in any other region.
How can sustainable use of natural resources be achieved when access
to them is so unequal?
- In many countries, improving the economy is not linked to improving
human development. Social investment is long term and, if it is
to be productive, there must be congruent policies, but there aren't.
For example, deforestation in the region is not promoted by ranchers,
loggers or peasant farmers, but by governments through their development
policies. There are short-term decisions to give land to peasant
farmers in order to keep a political promise, without realizing
that it is condemning the people to poverty because often the land
is not agriculturally productive.
- What should be done?
- We must make an effort to identify policies that promote sustainable
activities, with clear objectives that are verifiable over time.
A great deal of political maturity is lacking throughout this process.
Social and political stability have to be coordinated if environmental
policy is going to work.
- Is there sufficient regional leadership to influence difficult
global decisions, like the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, which aims to curb
climate change and increase the use of clean energy?
- On key issues like climate change and biodiversity the region
has had a uniform and positive position. There will be differences
among us, and those must be resolved internally, but the region
has matured a great deal from the political-environmental perspective.
* Katiana Murillo is a Tierramérica contributor.
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