Poverty, Development and Climate Change: The Rio Drama
Poverty, Development
and Climate Change: The Rio Drama
Poverty, Development and Climate
Change: The Rio Drama
-Col DR. ABDUL RUFF
________
ONE
Recently, twenty years after the first Earth Summit, Brazil hosted Rio plus 20,
officially known as the UN Conference on Sustainable Development in Rio de
Janeiro from June 20th to the 22nd. Leaders from more than 100 nations are
meeting in Rio de Janeiro for a three-day UN environmental summit. The
leaders were expected to put the finishing touches on a draft document approved
by diplomats from more than 190 nations that spells out a number of goals aimed
at lifting billions of people out of poverty through sustainable development.
Agricultural experts wanted food security be at the top of the agenda. But the
leaders played their own sports, entertaining the media.
Environment and development
charities say the Rio+20 agreement is too weak to tackle social and
environmental crises. Plans to enshrine the right of poor people to have clean
water, adequate food and modern forms of energy also foundered or were
seriously weakened during the six days of preparatory talks.
The moves to eliminate subsidies on
fossil fuels to boost economies and curb CO2 emissions - came to naught.
Developing countries had argued that they needed financial assistance in order
to meet the costs of switching onto a green development path. But with the US
in an election year and the EU deep in eurozone mire, any mention of specific
sums was blocked. Whereas developing countries have been demanding $30-$100bn
per year in exchange for “greening” their economies, the draft text
gives no firm numbers. As a consequence, developing countries refused to let
the declaration endorse green economics as the definitive sustainable
development path.
Governments wee set to weaken
pledges on boosting access to water and energy after a new draft negotiating
text was issued at the Rio+20 meeting. The summit text was issued by the
Brazilian host government after it assumed leadership of the talks from the UN.
It affirms that nations must not slide back on prior pledges and names ending
poverty as the “greatest challenge”. Brazil wanted the text signed
off before 130 heads of government and other ministers arrive. However, only
37% of the UN’s draft text had been agreed - which led to Brazil’s decision to
issue a revamped document.
Faced with a triple planetary crisis
- climate catastrophe, deepening global inequity and unsustainable consumption
driven by a broken economic system - the final text is neither ambitious enough
nor delivers the required political will needed.
The need to put the world on a
sustainable track, and the perils of not doing so, were outlined most
influentially in a 1987 commission chaired by Gro Harlem Brundtland, then Prime
Minister of Norway. She is puzzled that nothing has happened and said there
were “complex reasons” why governments had been unable to take the
vision further - including the power of corporations. In global political
system, corporations, businesses and people who have economic power influence
political decision-makers - that’s a fact, and so it’s part of the analysis.
TWO
More than 40,000 people, including
environmental activists and business executives, attended the Rio Plus 20
summit. The gathering marks the 20th anniversary of the landmark first
Rio Earth summit that paved the way to the 1997 Kyoto agreement to cut
greenhouse gas emissions believed to cause global warming.
Opening the conference UN
Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said officials are now in sight of a
“historic agreement.” He called on those at the summit not to
“waste this opportunity.” The Asian Development Bank’s Vice President
for Knowledge Management Bindu Lohani spoke about the importance of the
so-called “Sustainable Development Goals” for Asia. “Asia is
growing fast economically,” said Lohani. “We project by 2050,
more than 50 percent of global economy will be in Asia. Asia is also rich in
ecosystems, and therefore, very vulnerable. So with the sustainable development
goals in mind, we would be able to develop Asia, still have growth, but we’d
also be able to take care of the social and the environmental concerns at the
same time.”
Lisa Jackson, Administrator of
the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and deputy head of the US
delegation here, said the US was fully behind the “green economy” -
and that the summit could help deliver the vision. Probably more important are
the connections that are being made between businesses large and small, civil
society, academia and of course governments at the national and sub-national
level - all those things are pushing the green economy forwards. In response to
charges that richer countries were attempting to weaken prior commitments on
aid and other issues, the text is explicit: “We emphasize the need to make
progress in implementing previous commitments… it is critical that we honor
all previous commitments, without regression”.
The environmental activists say the
draft document is too weak and has no enforceable mechanisms. Stephen Howes, an
environmental analyst at the Australian National University, said it is not
surprising the diplomats failed to agree on any concrete actions in the
document, because nations must first reach a domestic consensus before taking
any action. Howes says the Rio summit has already succeeded by
producing a document, unlike the 2009 UN climate change conference in
Copenhagen. “I mean there are now detailed negotiating processes
underway, in just about all of the areas that have been discussed in Rio. And
it’s not really possible to cut across those negotiating processes, each of
them have its own dynamics, its own constraints, its own momentum, and in a
sense they have to be respected”.
The president of the Asian Development Bank (ADB), Haruhiko Kuroda, told a news
conference that rapid motorization is creating more congestion, air pollution,
traffic accidents and greenhouse gas emissions, but he said developing
countries have the opportunity for a “greener future.” The ADB, the
World Bank and six other multilateral development banks announced at the summit
that they would invest $175 billion in the next decade to help implement more
environmentally-friendly transportation solutions in developing countries. The
other banks joining in the transport pledge are the African Development Bank,
the Inter-American Development Bank, the CAF-Development Bank of Latin America,
the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, the European Investment
Bank and the Islamic Development Bank.
Mayors of dozens of the world’s biggest cities held their own summit in the
Brazilian capital to discuss measures they have already undertaken to reduce
greenhouse gas emissions. New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg says the
world’s cities have recognized they have a responsibility to take action, as
they are responsible for up to 75 percent of global greenhouse gas emission.
Even as progress at national and international level has faltered, it’s fair to
say that world cities have forged ahead. And, the reason for that is clear -
mayors, the great pragmatists on the world stage who are directly responsible
for the wellbeing for the majority of the world’s people, just don’t have the
luxury to simply talk about change and not deliver it. The measures the mayors
say they have undertaken include improved waste management practices, more
efficient street lighting and electric-powered municipal transport.
The head of the International Fund for Agricultural Development, or IFAD, said
critical decisions on food security should be made at Rio + 20. This is an
event that occurs perhaps once every decade. It creates a real sense of
urgency. A lot can be achieved if we can show the same level of determination
in alleviating global poverty and food security the way we are handling the
global financial crisis. Determination should focus on helping the world’s
smallholder farmers – something that could not have happened at the original
Earth Summit. Calls for greater investment in smallholder farms grew following
the 2008/2009 food crisis. Agricultural initiatives were launched at the G8
summit in L’Aquila, Italy and again at the recent G8 summit in Camp David,
Maryland. The smallholder farmers are the first investors in agriculture
and they’re the most. Also, they are on the frontline in terms of protecting
the environment and saving our biodiversity. And they make up a big part of the
world’s population. There are about 500 million smallholder farms globally.
That’s half of the world’s population.
The IFAD president added that productive agriculture must be climate-smart
agriculture. Smallholders have access to resources - to land, to irrigation, to
inputs, to financial services, to infrastructure - productivity increases.
They’re more conscious about preserving their land than anyone else. And
improving smallholder farm productivity has a direct effect on development.
Farmers establish “micro-enterprises” – small agriculture-related businesses.
They’re adding value to produce. And they’re adding not only in terms of
caloric value, but in terms of monetary value to their produce. They become
economically viable entities. And they begin to demand government for
infrastructure, for roads, for schools, for clinics. Communities begin to
change.
But farmers in sub-Saharan Africa,
for example, currently face many challenges. They lack fertilizers, better seeds,
and irrigation, as well as financial and social support. For example, African
farmers apply only about 13 kilograms of fertilizer per hectare. Compare that
to farmers in India where the average is over 140. In Europe, the average is
between 200 and 250 kilograms per hectare. In addition, less than 5 percent of
African farmland has irrigation systems. Most of that is in South Africa and
North African countries. So, there’s plenty of opportunity to greatly boost
crop yields without the need to clear more land. Africa has the potential not
only of feeding itself, but of feeding the world.
The president of the most
impoverished country in the western hemisphere, Haiti’s President Michel
Martelly, said the summit could have delivered more. “I feel like these
poor countries, these countries that are always being hit by catastrophe -
things have not changed much,” he told the BBC. The head of the
International Fund for Agricultural Development said agricultural investment
needs to increase by tens of billions of dollars per year. He said delegates to
Rio+20 should look for areas of common agreement, adding food security is the
most plausible.
THREE
The ever-increasing
quantity of emissions could render moot the aim that has guided international
climate diplomacy for nearly a decade: preventing the global temperature from
rising by more than two degrees Celsius above its preindustrial level. In fact,
in the absence of significant international action, the planet is now on track
to warm by at least 2.5 degrees during the current century — and maybe even
more. The known effects of this continued warming are deeply troubling: rising
sea levels, a thinning Arctic icecap, extreme weather events, ocean
acidification, loss of natural habitats, and many others. Perhaps even more
fearsome, however, are the effects whose odds and consequences are unknown,
such as the danger that melting permafrost in the Arctic could release still
more gases, leading to a vicious cycle of still more warming.
The global recession
has nudged global warming far down the political agenda and led cash-strapped
countries to yank back renewable-energy subsidies. And some big government bets
on renewable power have gone bad, most spectacularly the bet on Solyndra, the
California solar-panel maker that received a $535 million loan guarantee from
the US Department of Energy before going bankrupt last fall.
Over the past decade,
governments around the world threw money at renewable power. Private investors
followed, hoping to cash in on what looked like an imminent epic shift in the
way the world produced electricity. It all seemed intoxicating and
revolutionary: a way to boost jobs, temper fossil-fuel prices, and curb global
warming, while minting new fortunes in the process.
Much of that enthusiasm has now fizzled.
Natural gas prices have plummeted in the USA, the result of technology that has
unlocked vast supplies of a fuel that is cleaner than coal.
In order to promote nuclear plants, regimes have been implementing non-nuclear means
for electricity generation with hesitation and mischief. Renewable
energy is being wrongly implanted. Critics of taxpayer-sponsored investment in
renewable energy point to Solyndra as an example of how misguided the push for
solar and wind power has become. Indeed, the drive has been sloppy, failing to
derive the most bang for the buck. In the USA, the government has
schizophrenically ramped up and down support for renewable power, confusing
investors and inhibiting the technologies’ development; it has also structured
its subsidies in inefficient ways. In Europe, where support for renewable power
has been more sustained, governments have often been too generous, doling out
subsidies so juicy they have proved unaffordable. And in China, the new
epicenter of the global renewable-power push, a national drive to build up
indigenous wind and solar companies has spurred US allegations of trade
violations and has done little to curb China’s reliance on fossil fuels.
Nuclear power plants are thoughtlessly built in earthquake
and tsunami zones by using the scientists to make false justifications.
Spent fuel rods are stored within the plants, a practice that adds their
destructive potential to a catastrophic accident or act of nature. Nuclear
wastes are pumped into water bodies necessary for humans. States pollute water
harming human survival.
Greedy and foolish among the
mankind, unmindful of future human survival, has been destroying the world for
a long time- both humans and nature. Once abundant, clean water has now become
a scarce resource. Yet, in the ground water and surface water are being
polluted, especially by the USA and made unusable by mountain top removal
mining, fracking and other such “new technologies.” Offshore oil drilling and
chemical farming run-off have destroyed fisheries in the Gulf of Mexico. In
other parts of the world, explosives used to maximize short-run fish catches
have destroyed coral reefs that sustained fish life.
Focused on the expected short term
benefits, so-called advanced nations are destroying nature’s resources.
The newest threat, according to scientists caring for human rights, comes
from genetically modified seeds that produce crops resistant to herbicides. In
order to secure bumper crops for several years, people are destroying the
fertility of soil, animal and human life.
What shocks us is people today have
no better grasp of the consequences of their actions than superstitious and
unscientific people centuries ago.
Observations
Fortunately, none of the leaders who
gathered for Rio development conference committed suicide like the
farmers in developing nations like India where prices of essentials are sky
rocketing above the corrupt politicians and tricky bureaucrats, are
doing, making the nations criminal states. .
That is a boon for the UN, the
sponsor of the meet, and its Secretary Ban Moon.
The UN sustainable development
summit in Brazil has ended with world leaders adopting a political declaration
hammered out a few days previously. But the UN had billed the summit as a
“once in a generation chance” to turn the global economy onto a
sustainable track. But it absolutely did not do that.
World leaders who gathered, maybe
for fun, really did not take decisions that will take the world forward. These
fools did not show the leadership. They refused to correctly and precisely come
out with resolutions that will have an impact on the lives of people being
affected. It was a real lack of action that is very worrying, because we know
how difficult the situation is in much of the world in terms of environment and
poverty.
Rio summit ended with warning on
corporate power perhaps as mere formality. Only future will tell the meaning
of this warning. It is evident that the corporate power is one main
reason for lack of progress. UN nations will spend three years drawing up
sustainable development goals. They will also work towards better protection
for marine life on the high seas.
Constitutions and regimes have
failed to protect the weak from the wicked sections. It is revealed that
globalism increases deadly the powerlessness of the people vis-a-vis the
elites. Greed and over ambitions of rich and powerful sections have
pushed the have-nots to the walls.
As usual, the leaders
“fixed” the next summit. The next key date on the sustainable
development journey is 2015. The sustainable development goals should be
decided and declared by then; also, the UN climate convention will have what
some, with trepidation, are calling its “next Copenhagen” - the
summit that should in theory usher in a new global agreement with some legal
force to tackle global warming.
Global warming and rising prices are now the early warning to world
——–
د. عبد راف 
Dr. Abdul Ruff, Specialist
on State Terrorism; Educationalist;Chancellor-
Affairs(CIA); Independent Analyst-columnist;Chronicler of Foreign
occupations & Freedom movements(Palestine,Kashmir, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Xinjiang, Chechnya, etc);
and anti-Islamism are more dangerous than ”terrorism” Anti-Islamic
forces & terrorists are using criminal elements for terrorizing the
world and they in disguise are harming genuine interests of ordinary
Muslims. Global media today, even in Muslim nations, are controlled by CIA & other anti-Islamic agencies. Former university Teacher;/website:abdulruff.
Recent Comments