World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD)

Update on Asia-Pacific Region Preparations for the World Summit on Sustainable DevelopmentBangkok,

August 24, 2001 - The dates and venues for the remaining sub-regional preparatory meetings for the World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) have been set by an inter-agency taskforce.

The Asian Development Bank, United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) confirmed the following schedule of meetings at a Taskforce meeting earlier this week:

• South Pacific, Apia, Samoa, September 5-7, hosted by the South Pacific Regional Environment Programme (SPREP)
• Central Asia, Almaty, Kazakhstan, September 19-21, co-hosted by Intergovernmental Sustainable Development Commission (ISDC) and UNDP, Kazakhstan
  
• South Asia, Colombo, Sri Lanka, September 27-29, co-hosted by Government of Sri Lanka, the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) and the South Asia Cooperative Environment Programme (SACEP)
  
• South East Asia, Manila, The Philippines, October 17-19, hosted by ADB
  
• The North East Asia meetings were held in Beijing, China from July 26-28 and hosted by ESCAP.

In each location, two concurrent meetings are being held: the first involving representatives of the main civil society groups (Agenda 21 defines these as women, children and youth, indigenous people, NGOs, local authorities, workers and trade unions, business and industry, science and technological community, and farmers), and the second with government representatives.

Discussions are focussing on commissioned reports that assess the implementation of Agenda 21 since the 1992 Ministerial Conference on Environment and Development in Rio de Janeiro and the challenges which remain in achieving the objective of sustainable development.

An outline of the opportunities for involvement in the meetings and the reports from them are being made available at www.rrcap.unep.org/wssd, along with information about, and links to, other preparatory activities for the WSSD.The UNDP joined the three other agencies in the Taskforce at its recent meeting. UNDP is assisting with country assessments through its Capacity 21 programme and other initiatives, as well as supporting regional WSSD preparations.

The Taskforce is also coordinating preparation of a regional synthesis report, identifying a platform of issues in Asia and the Pacific identified through the sub-regional meetings and other forums. This will considered at regional multi-stakeholder and ministerial-level government meetings in Phnom Penh, Cambodia from November 27-29.

Early next year, two Global Preparatory Committee meetings will be held in New York, followed by the final global preparatory meeting in Indonesia, from May 27 to June 7, 2002.

The World Summit on Sustainable Development will be held in Johannesburg, South Africa from September 2-11, 2002, and like the Rio Earth Summit 10 years earlier, is expected to have a major bearing on social, economic and environmental policy from local to global levels.

Please note:

The Taskforce will be arranging media briefings following each of the sub-regional preparatory meetings.
These will involve the chairs of the stakeholder and governmental meetings and aim to highlight the key issues emerging through the preparatory process.Arrangements for these press briefing are being coordinated by Tim Higham, Regional Information Officer, UNEP, Ph 662 288-2127, email higham.unescap@un.org.

For more information:
Please visit www.rrcap.unep.org/wssd or contact the Secretariat for the Interagency Taskforce for Regional Preparations for the World Summit on Sustainable Development:
Surendra Shresta, Director UNEP Regional Resource Centre for Asia-Pacific, tel (662) 516 2124, surendra@ait.ac.th or Subrato Sinha, Programme Specialist, tel (662) 524-6496, subrato@ait.ac.th.