'Handle environmental issues properly'

by Joy HYVARINEN

Reform of the way the UN handles environm ental issues is badly needed, argues Joy Hyvarinen. However, she says, governments may be getting mired in a fruitless dispute that will leave the basic flaws untouched.

The EU and the US are at loggerheads again in the international environmental arena.

After years of disagreement about climate change, the issue now is whether the UN's environment programme should become a fully-fledged organisation, with more power, money and autonomy.

The international organisations that look after the global environment need reform, but arguing about the institutional format for the UN's main environmental body is not necessarily going to help resolve the problems.

The first thing to understand is that the UN's environment programme is not the only UN body that concerns itself with the environment - far from it.

Scores of UN organisations, agreements and programmes tackle environmental issues.

Looking at the state of the world environment, business as usual is not an option.

For example, a tropical forest country that wants to have a say in international decisions about forests should be attending meetings of the Rome-based UN Food and Agriculture Organization, the UN forest forum in New York, the Montreal-based global agreement to protect natural diversity, and the annual climate change meetings, to name a few.

A major problem with international environmental decision-making is that the various UN bodies are not joined up. Priorities are unclear and there is much overlap and duplication of work.

Another problem has been an explosion of new multilateral environmental agreements (MEAs), put in place to deal with the increasing problems that require international cooperation.

There are currently more than 500 of them.

International treaty meetings are very complex. For example, the main UN treaty to protect species and ecosystems can require specialist knowledge of issues ranging from shrimp farming and desertification to intellectual property rights and the legal regime for marine life on the deep sea bed, at a single meeting.

Compulsory cash

Government representatives spend an enormous amount of time at international conferences about issues such as climate change, biodiversity, desertification and wildlife.

A huge number of decisions and recommendations emerge from these meetings; but few will ever be read by those who are supposed to put them in practice on the ground.

Developing countries in particular are struggling with implementation, lack of financial assistance from the international community and the many reporting obligations under various MEAs.

Implementation raises an important question about international diplomatic decision-making and in-country realities.

"Nothing will change without greater political will and unless rich countries provide more funding to tackle international environmental issues."

The discussions about strengthening international environmental organisations and agreements are taking place at UN headquarters in New York.

It is hard to see how lessons from the ground on what actually works - and what doesn't - can find their way into these discussions. Now, a new debate threatens to distract attention from the real needs for reform.

The EU wants a UN Environmental Organisation ("UNEO"), which would mean turning the UN Environment Programme (Unep) into a freestanding agency, with its own budget.

The EU's proposal is backed by a group of about 50 countries called "Friends of a UN Environmental Organisation". The US opposes the proposal. Would a UNEO be more effective than Unep in stemming the rising tide of environmental destruction?

Maybe; but no institutional format will ensure good environmental decision-making, unless the political will is there.

The UNEO would not depend on voluntary funding, as Unep does, which could make a difference; but the EU has not yet presented detailed proposals, making it difficult to assess what the added value of an UNEO would be.

However, it is essential to tackle the problems in the international decision-making architecture for environment.

The system of organisations and agreements that we have now is not effective enough to deal with the world's escalating environmental problems.

Stale argument

There is a need to move beyond the stalemate about whether Unep should become a UNEO, with imaginative proposals that make the best of the existing structure and fill institutional gaps where needed.

Following the UN's 60th anniversary in 2005, the UN ambassadors from Mexico and Switzerland have been leading discussions with other government representatives in New York about how to strengthen international environmental organisations and agreements.

Last year the ambassadors presented a set of "building blocks" for further discussion. The building blocks are issues which governments agree need to be tackled to make international decision-making work better: strengthened scientific assessments, better monitoring and early warning capacity, closer co-ordination and co-operation among UN agencies, and financial assistance to developing countries.

Progress has been slow. One issue to be decided now is whether the discussions (referred to as "informal consultations") could move into negotiations, ie actually making decisions about what should be done to improve international organisations and institutions. Even if the discussions become negotiations, the Swiss and Mexican ambassadors have noted that the time is not right for decisions about major changes, because states have such different views. The task of the ambassadors is not one to be envied.

Ambitious needs

Looking at the state of the world's environment, business as usual is not an option. It is time for decisive action to improve international organisations and decision-making. The world needs UN organisations that are set up so that they can deal effectively with our current problems, monitor the state of the world environment and respond to new threats, and take the lead in ensuring that countries do their bit.

Last year the UN ambassadors identified "ambitious incrementalism" as a guiding principle for the discussions in New York.

This diplomatic-speak is intended to reflect lofty long-term aims, based on a step-by-step approach, while taking into account that governments do not agree on what the long-term aims should be.

This year, the ambassadors stated that "as for ambitious incrementalism, they now hope to move with speedy circumspection".

Nice turns of phrase, but they risk describing plain old business as usual. Perhaps what is needed now is something like "courageous reform".

The bottom line is that nothing will change without greater political will and unless rich countries provide more funding to tackle international environmental issues.

Without that, restructuring the international environmental decision-making architecture will simply be a diversion.

Joy Hyvarinen is director of Field, the Foundation for International Environmental Law and Development, an independent subsidiary of the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED).

The Green Room is a series of opinion articles on environmental topics running weekly on the BBC News website.

Source: BBC