Nous nous sommes rendus à Rio+20, la Conférence des Nations Unies sur le développement durable, avec la ferme intention d’en repartir munis d’un plan concret, un plan également adressé aux ministres des finances, du développement et de l’environnement qui nous indiquerait les changements à opérer « dès le lundi matin prochain » en vue d’atteindre notre objectif d’un développement durable pour tous.
Ce plan, nous l’avons.
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We came to Rio+20 determined that one outcome of the UN Conference on Sustainable Development must be a plan for what ministers of finance, development and environment and ourselves need to do differently Monday morning, June 25th – if we are to achieve sustainable development for all.
We have our plan.
We came to Rio+20 knowing that inclusive green growth is the pathway to sustainable development, and the evidence here is that this international community agrees.
The analysis behind the World Bank’s report Inclusive Green Growth: The Pathway to Sustainable Development framed many of the conference debates and helped facilitate a new focus on natural capital accounting – a fundamental component of inclusive green growth.
According to the 59 countries, 86 companies, and 17 civil society organizations that supported the World Bank Group-facilitated 50:50 campaign – as well as many others – natural capital accounting is an idea whose time has come.
In fact, natural capital accounting events filled the Rio Convention Center, and government and civil society groups alike highlighted the importance of moving beyond GDP.
This new energy and emphasis around this issue may be the most important outcome of Rio+ 20.
Only a very short time ago, we were drawing blank looks when we mentioned "natural capital accounting." This week at Rio, everyone is talking about it. Walls are plastered with flyers about it. And our event on it yesterday drew such a crowd it was standing-room only.
With three presidents, two prime ministers, one deputy prime minister, a host of ministers, top corporate leaders and civil society groups in the room, we announced that the 50:50 campaign to get at least 50 countries and 50 companies to commit to acting on natural capital accounting was a success. The latest tally: 59 countries, 88 private companies, 1 region, and 16 civil society groups signing on to the Gaborone Declaration, recommitting to other natural capital initiatives, or agreeing to join forces with this movement.
La semaine dernière, l’Inde, l’Éthiopie et les États-Unis organisés un Sommet pour des actions concrètes en faveur de la survie de l’enfant, avec la participation de représentants venus du monde entier. Cet événement est à la fois opportun et fondamental : l’enjeu est de renforcer davantage les engagements pris sur le plan national et international ainsi que la responsabilité des pays dans la réalisation du quatrième objectif du Millénaire pour le développement (OMD), qui vise à réduire la mortalité infantile. Si de nombreux progrès ont été accomplis dans ce domaine, il est des pays qui risquent de ne pas remplir cet objectif à l'horizon 2015 et qui ont le plus besoin de notre soutien et de notre coopération.
La semana pasada, los Gobiernos de India, Etiopía y Estados Unidos organizaron una Cumbre de Llamamiento a la Acción para la Supervivencia Infantil, con la participación de líderes mundiales y nacionales. Se trata de un evento oportuno y fundamental, destinado a fortalecer aún más el compromiso mundial y de los países y la responsabilidad de estos en el logro del objetivo de desarrollo del milenio (ODM) 4: reducir la mortalidad infantil. Aunque hemos observado una mejora sustancial en esta meta, los países que requie renmás de nuestro apoyo y asociación podrían no alcanzarla para 2015.
A successful inclusive green growth strategy has to address the question of how we generate and consume energy. Indeed, the energy question is where poverty and climate pressures meet. One in five people worldwide lives without electricity. Two in five use wood, charcoal, dung or coal to cook and heat their homes, usually at risk to their health.
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China's Loess Plateau, before and after restoration through a landscape approach.
Photos: Till Niermann, Wikimedia Commons (CC), Erick Fernandes/World Bank.
Yesterday, I joked that I didn't want to come to another Agriculture and Rural Development Day. I wasn’t trying to be flip, and I was only half-joking, but not for the reasons you might think.
I said that we need to be coming to “Landscape Days” – where we have the foresters in the room with the farmer and with the fishers and with the producers and with everybody in the research community.
The bottom line is that we can't achieve food security, or nutrition security, without preserving the ecosystem services that forests provide. We can't sustain forests without thinking of how we will feed a growing population. And we can't grow food without water.
Art at the Rio+20 Pavillion reminds those passing by: "The future begins with the decisions we make in the present." UN Photo/Maria Elisa Franco
While negotiators were getting their teeth stuck into the newly circulated text at Rio Centro, I meeting-hopped today around the city to meet with legislators, NGOs, and the private sector.
There may not be the buzz of `92 – yet. But, the sense of urgency, action, and recognition of the need to up the level of ambition at Rio was evident among these critical groups.
In the magnificent Tiradentes Palace, over 300 parliamentarians from more than 70 countries gathered for the first ever World Summit of Legislators organised by GLOBE International. They were there to agree a new mechanism for scrutinizing and monitoring governments on delivery of the Rio agreements (past and present). Also a new Natural Capital Action Plan.
Cette semaine, la ville de Rio de Janeiro va se transformer en scène internationale pour accueillir des dizaines de milliers de participants à la Conférence des Nations unies sur le développement durable.
Cette grande scène mondiale qu’est la conférence Rio+ 20 va permettre à ceux qui souhaitent agir — acteurs publics, du secteur privé et de la société civile — de montrer comment il est possible d’accélérer les progrès à condition de changer nos modes de croissance.
This week, the governments of India, Ethiopia and the United States will host a Child Survival Call to Action summit, with the participation of country and global leaders. This is a timely and critical event, aimed at further strengthening global and country commitment and country accountability for MDG4, to reduce child mortality. Though we’ve seen substantial improvement on this goal, the countries that need our support and partnership most may not reach it by 2015.
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Photo: The scene at the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, where the conference adopted the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development and the Agenda 21 programme of action, among other actions. UN Photo/Michos Tzovaras.
This week, the city of Rio de Janeiro will become a global stage, home to tens of thousands of people attending the UN Conference on Sustainable Development.
Rio+ 20 is an important global stage upon which those committed to action from government, the private sector, and society can show how they plan to demonstrate that we can accelerate progress, if we change the way we grow.
We need a different kind of growth, a greener and more inclusive growth. We think it is affordable with help to those for whom upfront costs may be prohibitive. We think we should be able to value natural resources differently within our economic model. We think that with the right data and evidence we can avoid the irreversible costs of making wrong decisions now. And we can have economic systems that are much more efficient.
The International School of Kenya just hosted its last football tournament of the year. Teams from Nairobi’s poor neighborhoods dominated the event. Rain was pouring and many of the players were playing barefoot, but they still thrived, outperforming many teams from schools where the rich take their children.
In the 10-11 age group, the top three places went to teams from destitute neighborhoods, including Kibera, which some people have (wrongly) dubbed as the world’s largest slum. Kibera Sports Academy stood at the top of the podium, while second and third places went to Inspiration Kenya and Peace Academy respectively.
Many people, including Kenyans, consider slums the epitome of misery. The common wisdom is they breed disease, crime and many other forms and manifestations of poverty. Why then are slums growing bigger, with people migrating to them in ever increasing numbers?
Teachers in Tanzania are absent 23 percent of the time; doctors in Senegal spend an average of 39 minutes a day seeing patients; in Chad, 99 percent of non-wage public spending in health disappears before reaching the clinics.
These and other service delivery failures have been widely documented since the 2004 World Development Report, Making Services Work for Poor People.
But why do these failures persist? Because they represent a political equilibrium where politicians and service providers (teachers, doctors, bureaucrats) benefit from the status quo and will therefore resist attempts at improving services. For instance, teachers are often the campaign managers for local politicians. They work to get the politician elected, in return for which they get a job from which they can be absent. Powerful medical unions ensure that their members can work in the private sector and neglect their salaried government jobs. The losers are the poor, whose children don't learn to read and write, or get sick and die because the public clinic is empty.
I enjoyed talking with everyone who signed into the live chat this week. If you missed it, you can catch up with the conversation at World Bank Live.
We talked a lot about the importance of moving beyond GDP to a more holistic way of measuring development that incorporates the value of natural resources. We also discussed inclusive green growth as the path to sustainable development, the need for better oceans management, expectations for Rio +20 – the UN Conference on Sustainable Development – and what people want to see in any sustainable development goals (SDGs) that emerge from the conference.
The hour flew by, and there were several questions that I didn’t have time to get to. I’d like to address some of those now.
On June 5, World Bank Vice President for Sustainable Development Rachel Kyte will host a live online chat about Rio +20 and sustainable development at live.worldbank.org. Submit questions now, and then join Rachel Kyte and economist Marianne Fay on June 5 at 14:00 GMT/10 a.m. EDT.
Rio +20 is coming up in a few weeks. Some 75,000 leaders, advocates, scientists and other experts are expected in person, and tens of thousands more will be watching online to see how the world can advance sustainable development.
Many of us have been advocating for greener, more inclusive growth since before the first Earth Summit at Rio 20 years ago. We’ve seen economic growth lift 660 million people out of poverty, but we’ve also seen growth patterns run roughshod over the environment, diminishing the capacity of the planet’s natural resources to meet the needs of future generations.
The growing global population needs world leaders to do more than just check in at the UN Conference on Sustainable Development, Rio+20 – it needs them to move the needle now toward truly sustainable development practices.
