Poverty and unequal development are seen not only as the greatest threats to the environment and the quality of the lives of people in the developing world, but also as a real threat to the long-term security of the developed world.
In September last year President Thabo Mbeki told the Millennium Summit at the United Nations: “The poor of the world stand at the gates of the comfortable mansions occupied by each and every king and queen, president, prime minister and minister privileged to attend this unique meeting.
“The question these billions ask is: what are you doing, you in whom we have placed our trust, what are you doing to end the deliberate and savage violence against us that, every day, sentences many of us to a degrading and unnecessary death?”
In December last year the UN General Assembly agreed to hold the World Summit on Sustainable Development in South Africa. The challenge for the 2002 10-year review is to put development on the agenda, together with poverty, lack of livelihoods, access to health care and debilitating debt.
The world summit will not seek to renegotiate Agenda 21, but review progress on its implementation and to agree on action to strengthen future implementation. All these events should be seen as a continuum a gradual global paradigm shift towards a more sustainable future.