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new york / amsterdam, november 13th,
2002
friends of the earth international
challenges un governments
"don´t let big business rule the world"
summit wasted - the time for action is
now
As the United Nations (UN) meets for the
first time today to pick up the pieces after
the World Summit on Sustainable Development
(WSSD), Friends of the Earth International
accused governments of betraying people and
the planet in Johannesburg (1). The UN
General Assembly will today adopt the
Johannesburg "Plan of Action" (2). Friends of
the Earth International called on governments
to abandon the neoliberal trade agenda which
dominated negotiations in Johannesburg and
instead to develop and implement global rules
for big business as promised (3). Friends of
the Earth International is calling for a
commitment to deliver on this promise.
Friends of the Earth International (FoEI)
accused governments of misleading the public
as they portray the results of the World
Summit as a positive step forward. In
practice, Johannesburg was a massive missed
opportunity. Industrialised nations failed to
acknowledge their massive ecological debt to
the developing world. The Summit failed to
set the necessary social and ecological
limits to economic globalisation. The energy
agreement was a scandalous betrayal of all
those affected by climate change, which sets
no target for the expansion of renewable
energy, but instead endorses the further
development of fossil fuels, dangerous
nuclear power and socially disastrous big
hydro dam projects.
Instead of using the World Summit to
respond to global concerns over deregulation
and liberalisation, governments sought to
rebrand the WTO´s free trade agenda as
sustainable development. FoEI will continue
to show that corporate-led globalisation is a
major cause of unsustainability, rather than
the solution (4).
FoEI´s campaign "Don´t let big business
rule the world" will continue until and
beyond the World Trade Organisation (WTO)
meeting in Mexico in September 2003 (5). It
demands a review of the impacts of the
current global trade regime to deliver trade
justice and the development of a global
mechanism to deliver rights to communities
and rules for big business.
Daniel Mittler, Earth Summit Coordinator
for Friends of the Earth International said:
"The Plan adopted today is a scandalous Plan
of Inaction. Bush and his cronies turned the
Earth Summit into a Trade Fair. But they did
have to concede on one point. The
Johannesburg declaration provides an
opportunity to deliver rights for communities
to hold big business to account. Governments
must act now to halt bad business
practices."
For more information contact: Daniel
Mittler, FoEI Earth Summit Coordinator, +49
30 2758 6468 (Germany)
Niccolo Sarno, FoEI Media Coordinator, +31
20 622 1369 (The Netherlands)
Notes
1) The World Summit on Sustainable
Development took place in Johannesburg, South
Africa, from August 26th to September 4th
2002. Further information at
www.johannesburgsummit.org
2) The UN General Assembly is set to approve
the Johannesburg results in New York on Nov.
13th
3) Paragraph 45 of the Plan of Action
contains one of the very few new commitments
made at Johannesburg - the development of
rules and processes to enhance corporate
accountability. An assessment of the
Johannesburg outcomes in this area, "Big
Business Rules?" is available at
www.foei.org
4) For some examples of corporate abuses see
"Clashes with corporate giants" at
www.foei.org
5) FoEI´s "Don´t let big business rule the
world campaign" was launched in Bali on June
1st 2002. FoEI is calling on governments to
deliver binding corporate accountability
(including liability) through the UN by 2005.
FoEI collected thousands of messages for the
Earth Summit and delivered them through a
major art installation to the Summit. Further
details at
www.rio-plus-10.org
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