Draft DPI/NGO 2007 Declaration on Climate Change: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 15:16, 14 July 2007

Here is my revision taking into account comments made during the Planning Committee on document organziation and other ideas proposed since in various emails to me.

One important change. You will notice that I have not delved into the details of why this or that topic is important. That omission is intentional. If we go down the route of fleshing out issues beyond the basic threat, then we will have a huge and not very helpful debate in the Conference.

What we want I suggest to you is instead to narrow the substance to a statement of the threat's scope and that we have a plan to craft an NGO approach, articulate the plan to develop a report and have our debate on various specific topics during the year.

I hope this approach meets with your approval.

Larry Roeder

Draft Declaration for 2007 DPI/NGO Conference

We, representatives to the 60th Annual DPI/NGO Conference, have gathered from 5-7 September, 2007 at the United Nations Headquarters in New York to consider the potential risks associated with climate change and what the NGO community might contribute to reducing the threat. We have also consulted with NGOs associated with DPI (the UN Department of Public Information) who could not attend.
We have concluded that Climate Change is the most serious threat of our times to humanity, the environment and all of Earth's species, one that harms all of our interests.
We have also concluded that while the threat has been obvious for decades, policy makers in governments and the private sector have allowed lesser priorities to prevent implementation of enough constructive action, thus accelerating the danger and its magnitude.
To reduce the threat's impact before it is too late, we ask the entire NGO community to unify behind a common vision and the search for fresh approaches, regardless of any one NGO's specific mandate, and be a vocal but constructive partner for change with the UN, governments and local societies. To that end, we have recommended specific steps.
We also express our deep appreciation to the United Nations for hosting this conference and to the people of the City of New York for their graciousness and hospitality.

Next Steps

While NGOs focus on a broad range of topics, they are all impacted by the climate. Therefore, we recommend a harmonized approach to Climate Change that links us, whether we are focused on gender, age, health, agriculture, the indigenous, livestock, poverty, food security, peace, sustainable development or other issues.

We recommend that this Declaration be given to the United Nations Secretary General at the end of the 60th DPI/NGO Conference in New York. We also agree to develop a joint report over the next twelve months of practical policy recommendations to define new approaches to key priority issues identified in the New York conference. This report will also be presented to the Secretary General at the DPI/NGO conference in Paris in 2008.

The NGO Special Report on Climate Change will not cover all topics. That would be impossible. It is instead a tool to stimulate action beyond 2008 and a permanent conversation on improving how NGOs collaborate and influence policy makers on this important threat, regardless of individual mandates.

Guiding Principles for the report

The report should articulate a practical, common strategy that engages the UN, governments and all civil society in order to include the best ideas.
The NGO/DPI Executive Committee should provide a website to list important NGO-led related programs and efforts to support the report such as workshops and virtual committees.
The report should be shared with the entire NGO community, all member States of the UN and especially organizations already working on disaster prevention and climate change (too many to be listed here).
We are particularly concerned about reluctance by some major contributors to greenhouse gas emissions to seriously address the issue and that insufficient resources have been made available to protect the poor and disadvantaged such as the elderly and disabled.
We reaffirm the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development and recommend an integrated UN mechanism to implement all environmental treaties and a culture of disaster prevention, reduction and resilience.
Climate change is a direct threat to social equality, environmentally sound development, poverty reduction, the prevention of disease and food security.
We concur with the fundamental principle enunciated throughout UN documents: that all future generations have a right to enjoy their ecological heritage and a safe environment
We acknowledge the importance of the 1992 UN Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED)[3], [4], and the Framework Convention on Climate Change which was signed and ratified by most Member States of the United Nations including many who have not ratified the Kyoto Protocol.
We recognize the precedence of productive contributions of UN partnered NGOs and call on all NGOs to continue that tradition, drawing on experiences and principles established through conventions, treaties, covenants, UN Conference action plans, and UN General Assembly Resolutions and Declarations.

Contents of the Report

This paragraph will be written in the past tense in the final Declaration:

Conference participants are requested to recommend specific report chapters that will be the basis for virtual workshops which collaborate over the coming year. Any NGO associated with DPI or ECOSOC may make recommendations, whether they attend the 2007 conference or not; but all recommendations must be received by NOON, September 7, 2007. Each chapter will contain a specific recommendation and rationale. Brevity is important. We can not hope to include every specific concern, however, if the networking caused by this effort is successful, further reports are also possible and encouraged. Send recommendations to (an email address) or (use designated conference procedure).

Topics already recommended for inclusion in the report are:

The General Threat and A Harmonized approach that cuts across parochial interests. This chapter is the most important one because it ties the threatened interests and recommendations together into one fabric.

Adaptation consequences of climate change
Age
Agriculture
Bio-Fuels
Coastal and small island societies
Compliance with international environmental law.
Convention on the Prohibition of Military or Any Other Hostile Use of Environmental Modification Techniques (ENMOD, October, 1978)
Gender
Geo-Engineering
Health
Hunger and Food security
Indigenous populations
Livestock and animal welfare
Nuclear Energy
Poverty, Labor and Livelihood Protection
Reducing greenhouse gases and conserving carbon sinks
Sustainable development
Water

@@ Line 1: / Line 1: @@
-# We, delegates to the 60th DPI/NGO Conference, have gathered from 5-7 September, 2007 in New York City to review the impacts of climate change and to consider how the NGO community can work together more effectively to mitigate the risks of climate change through reducing greenhouse gases and conserving carbon sinks and to prepare for adaptation to the actual and expected consequences of climate change in support of the purposes of United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change[http://www.un-documents.net/unfccc.htm#article-2].
+Here is my revision taking into account comments made during the Planning Committee on document organziation and other ideas proposed since in various emails to me.
-# We are particularly concerned about the reluctance on the part of some of the major contributors to greenhouse gas emissions to seriously address the issue and that insufficient resources have been made available to protect the poor and disadvantaged from Climate Change.
-# We concur with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change[http://www.ipcc.ch] on the anthropogenic causes of climate change and on the urgency of effectively addressing the issue, and affirm that climate change represents an imminent threat to is a direct threat to our common efforts to reduce poverty, hunger and disease.
+One important change. You will notice that I have not delved into the details of why this or that topic is important.  That omission is intentional.  If we go down  the route of fleshing out issues beyond the basic threat, then we will have a huge and not very helpful debate in the Conference.
-# Climate Change is a direct threat to socially equitable and environmentally sound development, poverty reduction and the prevention of disease;
-# We recognize that the solution to climate change lies not in the fragmentation of issues but in addressing the complexity and interdependence of issues and thus we commit ourselves to spending the next twelve months to develop a harmonized NGO approach to Climate Change, one that links all NGOs, whether focused on gender, agriculture, indigenous peoples, livestock, livelihood protection, peace-building, sustainable development or other issues.
+What we want I suggest to you is instead to narrow the substance to a statement of the threat's scope and that we have a plan to craft an NGO approach, articulate the plan to develop a report and have our debate on various specific topics during the year.
-# We call on all participants in the 2007 DPI/NGO Conference to join together in common cause to articulate a practical strategy, list NGO-led programs of worth and craft a common report on those efforts for dissemination throughout the NGO community.
-# We recognize that the international community has accumulated much experience with disaster prevention and commend the many organizations that are already working on the Climate Change issue. Our effort must be added value, not separate.
+I hope this approach meets with your approval.
-# We acknowledge the importance of the 1992 UN Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED)[http://www.un-documents.net/rio-dec.htm], [http://www.un-documents.net/agenda21.htm], and the Framework Convention on Climate Change which was signed and ratified by most Member States of the United Nations including many who have not ratified the convention's Kyoto Protocol. Under this Convention, the precautionary principle was clearly enunciated, and a firm obligation was incurred to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and to conserve carbon sinks.
-# We reaffirm the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development and call for a more integrated mechanism for implementing all environmental treaties.
+Larry Roeder
-# We recognize the precedence of productive contributions of UN partnered NGOs in enhancing the environment, civil rights, peace, etc and call on all NGOs to continue that tradition, drawing on experiences and principles established in years of obligations incurred through conventions, treaties and covenants, through commitments made through UN Conference action plans, and expectations created through UN General Assembly Resolutions and Declarations.
-# We are concerned that the solution proposed should never be equally bad or worse than the problem they are intended to solve. For this reason we do not consider nuclear energy as the solution to Climate Change, (unless significant new safety and environmental improvement are included in the programs) and have grave reservations about some of the biofuel proposals.
-# We are concerned with the use and development of geoengineering approaches such as shooting sulphur into the atmosphere to reflect solar radiation, dumping iron into the ocean to stimulate plankton growth and sequester CO2, using airplanes to deliver particulate matter to create clouds to increase earth's albedo, and planting fast-growing trees such as eucalyptus that severely deplete groundwater resources.  In keeping with the precautionary principle, it is essential that there be thorough and public critical review of the impact of such techniques on animal, plant and human life and on the planet itself.
-# We are deeply concerned with the use of deliberate and secretive weather modification and weather control, including weather warfare.  Superpower militaries have quietly made advances to control weather, perfecting ways to exploit the powerful energies for tactical advantages in war and with disregard for the environmental consequence.
-# We call for rigorous adherence to and enforcement of Convention on the Prohibition of Military or Any Other Hostile Use of Environmental Modification Techniques (ENMOD)[http://www.un-documents.net/enmod.htm] which entered into force October, 1978.  We call for a review and strengthening of this important convention.
-# To guide our work over the next year, we have agreed on several principles.
-# We concur with the fundamental principle enunciated throughout UN documents: the principle of intergenerational equity- rights of future generation to their ecological heritage, and to a safe environment
-# We also support the labour principle of "fair and just transition" enunciated by the International Labour Organization.
-# NGOs, the United Nations, other international organizations, including labor and governments must work together; and implement the principle emerging from the commitment in UN Conference on Women: Equality, Development and Peace, and in Habitat II - States must ensure that corporations including transnational corporation comply with all applicable national and international law, including international environmental law.
-# We must foster a culture of disaster prevention and resilience, and associated pre-disaster strategies, and recognize that the use of the term "reduction of disasters" has coopted the expression of disaster prevention
-#* (Conference participants can recommend a set of other priorities here. Once combined, these may form the basis for virtual workshops that collaborate over the coming months.)
-# We express our appreciation to the United Nations for hosting this conference and the people of the City of New York for their graciousness and hospitality.
-Note: We propose that a final version of This text should be presented to the UN Secretary-General for the September 24 Summit on CLimate Change.
+----
+== Draft Declaration for 2007 DPI/NGO Conference ==
+# We, representatives to the 60th Annual DPI/NGO Conference, have gathered from 5-7 September, 2007 at the United Nations Headquarters in New York to consider the potential risks associated with climate change and what the NGO community might contribute to reducing the threat. We have also consulted with NGOs associated with DPI (the UN Department of Public Information) who could not attend.
+# We have concluded that Climate Change is the most serious threat of our times to humanity, the environment and all of Earth's species, one that harms all of our interests.
+# We have also concluded that while the threat has been obvious for decades, policy makers in governments and the private sector have allowed lesser priorities to prevent implementation of enough constructive action, thus accelerating the danger and its magnitude.
+# To reduce the threat's impact before it is too late, we ask the entire NGO community to unify behind a common vision and the search for fresh approaches, regardless of any one NGO's specific mandate, and be a vocal but constructive partner for change with the UN, governments and local societies. To that end, we have recommended specific steps.
+# We also express our deep appreciation to the United Nations for hosting this conference and to the people of the City of New York for their graciousness and hospitality.
+=== Next Steps ===
+While NGOs focus on a broad range of topics, they are all impacted by the climate. Therefore, we recommend a harmonized approach to Climate Change that links us, whether we are focused on gender, age, health, agriculture, the indigenous, livestock, poverty, food security, peace, sustainable development or other issues.
+We recommend that this Declaration be given to the United Nations Secretary General at the end of the 60th DPI/NGO Conference in New York. We also agree to develop a joint report over the next twelve months of practical policy recommendations to define new approaches to key priority issues identified in the New York conference. This report will also be presented to the Secretary General at the DPI/NGO conference in Paris in 2008.
+The NGO Special Report on Climate Change will not cover all topics. That would be impossible. It is instead a tool to stimulate action beyond 2008 and a permanent conversation on improving how NGOs collaborate and influence policy makers on this important threat, regardless of individual mandates.
+=== Guiding Principles for the report ===
+# The report should articulate a practical, common strategy that engages the UN, governments and all civil society in order to include the best ideas.
+# The NGO/DPI Executive Committee should provide a website to list important NGO-led related programs and efforts to support the report such as workshops and virtual committees.
+# The report should be shared with the entire NGO community, all member States of the UN and especially organizations already working on disaster prevention and climate change (too many to be listed here).
+# We are particularly concerned about reluctance by some major contributors to greenhouse gas emissions to seriously address the issue and that insufficient resources have been made available to protect the poor and disadvantaged such as the elderly and disabled.
+# We reaffirm the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development and recommend an integrated UN mechanism to implement all environmental treaties and a culture of disaster prevention, reduction and resilience.
+# Climate change is a direct threat to social equality, environmentally sound development, poverty reduction, the prevention of disease and food security.
+# We concur with the fundamental principle enunciated throughout UN documents: that all future generations have a right to enjoy their ecological heritage and a safe environment
+# We acknowledge the importance of the 1992 UN Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED)[3], [4], and the Framework Convention on Climate Change which was signed and ratified by most Member States of the United Nations including many who have not ratified the Kyoto Protocol.
+# We recognize the precedence of productive contributions of UN partnered NGOs and call on all NGOs to continue that tradition, drawing on experiences and principles established through conventions, treaties, covenants, UN Conference action plans, and UN General Assembly Resolutions and Declarations.
+=== Contents of the Report ===
+: ''This paragraph will be written in the past tense in the final Declaration:''
+Conference participants are requested to recommend specific report chapters that will be the basis for virtual workshops which collaborate over the coming year. Any NGO associated with DPI or ECOSOC may make recommendations, whether they attend the 2007 conference or not; but all recommendations must be received by NOON, September 7, 2007. Each chapter will contain a specific recommendation and rationale. Brevity is important. We can not hope to include every specific concern, however, if the networking caused by this effort is successful, further reports are also possible and encouraged. Send recommendations to (an email address) or (use designated conference procedure).
+Topics already recommended for inclusion in the report are:
-----
+The General Threat and A Harmonized approach that cuts across parochial interests. This chapter is the most important one because it ties the threatened interests and recommendations together into one fabric.
+# Adaptation consequences of climate change
+# Age
+# Agriculture
+# Bio-Fuels
+# Coastal and small island societies
+# Compliance with international environmental law.
+# Convention on the Prohibition of Military or Any Other Hostile Use of Environmental Modification Techniques (ENMOD, October, 1978)
+# Gender
+# Geo-Engineering
+# Health
+# Hunger and Food security
+# Indigenous populations
+# Livestock and animal welfare
+# Nuclear Energy
+# Poverty, Labor and Livelihood Protection
+# Reducing greenhouse gases and conserving carbon sinks
+# Sustainable development
+# Water
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