UNGASS, and perhaps to an even greater extent, the 3rd Conference of the Parties of UNFCC at Kyoto later this year are events that offer excellent opportunities for the South to turn the international negotiating tables on the North. 

UNGASS is convened to review the progress made in the five years since the Earth Summit at Rio.  There hasn’t been any.

The North dragged the countries of the South to Rio and made them sign the two Conventions - to conserve biodiversity and to mitigate climate change - in which the South had less than immediate interest.  The carrot was that Agenda 21, a programme of action with in international price tag of $125 billion per year, would be adopted and the appropriate funds and technologies would be made available.  The stick was the implied threat of political ostracism in the international community for those who did not sign the deal.

The North got its conventions.  The South got left out in the cold.  The total additional funds resulting from Rio were less than $1 billion per year, and even all of that went to the GEF - which expressly forbids the use of these funds for anything other than implementation of the Conventions, leaving Agenda 21 with exactly nothing.

At the moment, the North wants - needs - only a small number of things from the South.  But it wants them badly enough to be willing to pay for them, particularly if it is forced to.  These are, more or less in order of priority, slowing down the rate of population growth, stabilising energy consumption (to reduce carbon dioxide emissions), access to biological resources.  Southern negotiating strategy has to be based on getting the best price for these “resources”.

At UNGASS and at Kyoto, southern delegations must start by asking for a critical and objective evaluation of the Rio agreements.  It is clear that no one can justify or explain the inaction of Agenda 21.

And on all the issues of interest to the North, it must now assume the initiative, become the champion and demand implementation of the Rio accords.

On biodiversity, the South needs to stand in solidarity to protect its advantages in terms of resources and redress its deficiencies in terms of access to technology.  Biodiversity is even more important to survival in the South than in the North.  Poor populations depend much more directly and vulnerably on nature.  Their interest can be met only by insisting on issues like farmers rights and capacity building.

On climate change the South now has to grab the entire initiative.  It can easily do so, since not a single country in the North has even begun to try to meet its commitments under the UNFCC.  In any case, several studies, including those of the United Nations University and the Tata Energy Research Institute have conclusively shown that the largest burden of climate change will fall on the developing countries. The South now must, loudly and clearly, demand full and immediate compliance by all northern countries with the agreements they themselves initiated and signed. The South must now become the champion of climate change mitigation.

Any further negotiation of global issues must be made contingent on full financing being made available for Agenda 21.

To reverse the imbalance in global negotiations, then, it is clear that southern delegations will have to achieve a much higher level of solidarity than exists today, and do exactly what their northern counterparts have been doing all along:

In the long run, however, the South must realise that its people can never realise the goals of sustainable development.  If they simply copy northern consumption patterns or productions systems, and they will have to evolve their own priorities for the future.  On the other hand, if they do so, they will automatically be negotiating in the international arena from a position of strength.  q

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