If the World Summit presented a formidable challenge and unprecedented window of opportunity for South Africa, so clearly does the “Johannesburg Decade” that follows it. The official text of the Implementation Plan adopted at the end of the summit shows a large overlap with the targets set by the Millennium Declaration, particularly in areas such as water, sanitation, energy and education.
How do we take the Implementation Plan’s challenges and targets forward in the next decade?
When it comes to water supply, South Africa has claimed major progress since 1994, by putting in place the infrastructure to give seven million more people access to water. But this doesn’t mean that many people have actually benefited by having access to water. There are questions about the effectiveness of the system. Is the infrastructure actually working? And what about access and cost recovery?
“All considered, the claim that we’ve already exceeded the Millennium Declaration target for fresh water access may well be an exaggeration. Some figures actually show under-consumption — because people cannot pay,” says policy analyst Victor Munnik.
The Department of Water Affairs’s plan to supply a certain amount of free water to households each month is supposed to come into force in 2003/4, so the jury is still out. It may be possible to subsidise the poor through levies on industry and richer households.
The South African government negotiating team at the summit is widely credited with having done a respectable job. They had a strategy and followed through. However, some critics argue that they unnecessarily avoided setting targets for the supply of renewable energy sources.
The Department of Mineral and Energy Affairs has elaborated a comprehensive policy for sustainable development in the energy sector, with excellent objectives, but activists say the proposed renewables target is “pathetic” and requires urgent improvement. The proposed additional 10 000GWh renewable energy contribution to final consumption over 10 years represents an increase of only 0,15% of current energy consumption.
In some chapters the Implementation Plan invokes the precautionary principle and the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities. “It was a major achievement that these two most basic Rio principles were successfully defended; but that a defence was necessary is at the same time ironic and disturbing,” says Munnik.
In terms of both these principles, South Africa has much to answer for, especially with regards to energy. A signatory to the Kyoto Protocol on climate change, the country is also one of the world’s worst offenders in contributing to greenhouse gases, and will remain heavily dependent on coal to meet its energy needs during the Johannesburg Decade.
Corporate responsibility (self-responsibility) and accountability (external enforcement) were key issues. Surprisingly, both terms made it into the final text and, as Munnik sees it, “that represents an improvement on the Rio Earth Summit [in 1992]”. The pressure is on business to deal with the demands of the triple bottom line and it’s seeking to do so through the ISO system. It won’t be easily achieved, because the dominant model remains self-regulation. Civil society will continue to play a major watchdog role.
There was significant progress in negotiations over education, with nations committing to supporting the development of national strategies to promote education for poverty reduction and ensuring that, by 2015, children everywhere will have equal access to all levels of education relevant to national needs. The United Nations General Assembly is to be asked to consider adopting a decade of education for sustainable development, starting in 2005.
“The growing emphasis on education for sustainability coincides with the drive for gender equality in, and universal access to, education,” notes Munnik. “The concept of sustainability has been mainstreamed.”
Oceans and fisheries negotiations yielded positive results – this was the only area in which an ecosystems approach was agreed upon. The commitments mean that a lot of work will have to be done in the North, where many fish stocks have collapsed, leading to exploitation of stocks in the South. This dovetails with South Africa’s continuing efforts to eliminate illegal foreign fishing in its waters, and giving formerly disadvantaged coastal fishing communities an equitable share in the sustainable harvesting of fish stocks.
Continuing widespread famine in Southern Africa underscores the urgent need for the region to follow through — in accordance with the text — in developing and implementing food security strategies by 2005.
Negotiators managed to add a target date for a more efficient and coherent application of the Convention on Biological Diversity — the key instrument for the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity, and the fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from the use of genetic resources. Agreement was reached on the objective of significantly reducing, by 2010, the current rate of loss of biodiversity.
Despite major progress since 1994 in expanding protected areas, biodiversity conservation remains a major challenge for South Africa, which is striving to follow an integrated approach to ecosystems management. This is critically dependent for its success on providing incentives for the support of communities.
On Aids, there was agreement to reduce HIV prevalence, especially among people aged 15-24, in the most affected countries by 2005 and globally by 2010, as well as combating malaria, tuberculosis and other diseases. The government’s thinking seems finally to have settled on including conventional means in dealing with the national Aids crisis. However, as Munnik points out, “intellectual property rights still inhibit medicines for major killer diseases like Aids and TB”.
Countries also committed to developing community-based initiatives on sustainable tourism by 2004. They agreed to build the capacities necessary to diversify tourism products, while protecting culture and traditions, and effectively conserving and managing natural resources.
Shortly before the summit, South Africa adopted its first set of responsible tourism guidelines, which are in line with these commitments, and which will continue to inform the national transformation process in this sector.
The Johannesburg Decade may finally see the drafting and implementation of a National Strategy on Sustainable Development. The Implementation Plan sets a deadline of 2005 for national strategies to be realised.
Some members of the African National Congress argue that the government’s Reconstruction and Development Programme is in effect South Africa’s National Strategy on Sustainable Development, but there are many sustainable development activists ready to dispute that.
“We don’t need a national summit to create a National Strategy on Sustainable Development. Each of the 400 mun-icipalities has to have an Integrated Management Plan. In reviewing those plans, each local authority could build in sustainable development indicators relevant to it. In this way, a national strategy can be built from below,” says Munnik.
For the host country, the World Summit was a defining moment. It got components of civil society working together like never before. Some civil society movements would not even have known of each other’s existence if it hadn’t been for the catalytic effects of the summit.
The fact that the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (Nepad) occupied a position of prominence had a bonus side-effect — by bringing civil society in Africa together, to discuss trade, governance and concepts of sustainability. Serious concerns were expressed about Nepad following the World Trade Organisation’s spirit of globalisation and creating opportunities for overseas capital rather than serving the interests of Africans. But at least this led to increased dialogue.