Informal Consultations on the African Preparatory Process for the Fourteenth Session of the Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD-14)

Minutes  

United Nations Conference Centre (UNCC),
Addis Ababa,
Ethiopia,

9-10 February 2005.

1. Introductory remarks

The informal consultations were convened by Mr. K.Y. Amoako, the Executive Secretary of the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) to discuss the African preparatory process for the 14^th Session of the Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD-14). They were held at the United Nations Conference Centre (UNCC) in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia on 9-10 February 2005.

Representatives of the following institutions participated in the consultations:

1. United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UNDESA),

2. United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP),

3. United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO),

4. United Nations Development Programme (UNDP),

5. Millennium Project, the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD) Secretariat,

6. African Development Bank (ADB) and

7. ECA Sustainable Development Division (ECA/SDD).

The list of participants is attached as Annex to this report.

In his introductory remarks, Mr. Ousmane Laye, Team Leader for Sustainable Development Monitoring and Officer-in-Charge of the ECA Sustainable Development Division (SDD) summarized the main objectives of the informal consultations as follows:

(i) To discuss the best approach to carry out a comprehensive review of the state of achievements of the goals of JPOI and Agenda 21;

(ii) To agree on a strategy to undertake the review and to prepare Africa's regional review reports on the thematic clusters of issues to be addressed; and

(iii) To define necessary actions, key actors and a timeline to attain these objectives.

He then presented the agenda of the consultations as follows:

(i) Review of the scoping papers on the four thematic issues for consideration by CSD-14; which are, energy, industrial development, climate change, atmosphere/air pollution;

(ii) Define the roles and responsibilities of participating agencies in the preparation of the different thematic reports;

(iii) Agree on the format of the thematic reports; and

(iv) Draft a timetable for the preparation of the reports.

2. Review of the scooping papers

Under this Agenda item, the agencies present:

(i) Agreed on the format of the reports for the four thematic issues relevant to CSD-14;

(ii) Reviewed the thematic scoping papers proposed by UNDESA in working groups; and

(iii) Discussed the outcomes of the working group session in plenary.

With regards to the format/structure, it was agreed that all thematic reports comprise of five chapters as follows:

(i) Overview of the current situation of the thematic issue

(ii) Review of progress made in the implementation of JPOI and Agenda 21

(iii) Challenges and constraints to meet goals and targets

(iv) Lessons learned

(v) The way forward.

With regard to the review of the thematic scoping papers prepared by UNDESA, it was decided to constitute three working groups which will deal with:

(i) Energy;

(ii) Industrial development, and

(iii) Climate change and Atmosphere/Air pollution.

The working group on `Energy" reviewed the scoping paper and actions to be undertaken according to the relevance of issues and defined priority in the African context.

The working group on "Industrial development" reviewed the scoping paper in order to determine what has not been captured and recommend sources of information. In this regard, the group proposed that, in Chapter One, emphasis be put on industrial development with particular reference to sustainable development by including the missing components on social performance of industrial development It also proposed to add in Chapter 2, information on non-tariff (technical) barriers, as well as examples in the form of case studies of countries that have been affected by the non-tariff barriers.

The group found out that Chapters 3, 4 and 6 were linked and therefore proposed to merge them into one Chapter to be entitled "Steering industrial development on a sustainable path". The new Chapter 3 would be comprised of three sub-chapters, which are: (i) "Enhancing the contribution of industry to economic development", (ii) "The role of industry in social advancement and poverty reduction"; and (iii) "Improving environmental performance".

The group recommended that Chapter 5 on "Responding to the challenges facing late industrializing developing countries" should be structured in such a way that it presents a "way forward", focused on small- and medium-scale enterprises (SMEs) and the role that large-scale enterprises can play in facilitating technology transfer, market access and capacity building of SMEs.

The working group on "Climate change, and Atmosphere/Air Pollution" reviewed separately the two scoping papers by identifying items in order of priority as `very important", "important"; and "not relevant". In reviewing the scoping paper on "Climate change", the group considered the relevance of the different items from the regional perspective and from the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) perspective.

In reviewing the scoping paper on "Atmosphere/Air Pollution", the group found out that the most critical issue was "Lead Pollution" as it severely affects the health of African people, particularly children. Therefore, the group proposed that emphasis would be put on the socio-economic impact of phasing out leaded gasoline, and indoor air pollution associated with energy use.

From the general discussions on the outcomes of the working group session, it was decided that issues presented in all thematic scoping papers should be ranked and prioritized according to their relevance to the African continent.

3. Defining the roles and responsibilities in the preparation of thematic reports

Under this agenda item, it was agreed that:

(i) ECA will be responsible for the preparation of the report on "Energy";

(ii) UNEP will be responsible for the preparation of the thematic report on "Climate change, Atmosphere/Air pollution; and

(iii) UNIDO will be responsible for the preparation of the thematic report on "Industrial development".

The representatives of NEPAD Secretariat and the Millennium Project agreed to provide inputs to the above three lead agencies in the preparation of their respective thematic reports.

4. Options for and format of the African CSD-14 Regional Review Forum

In introducing discussions on this Agenda item, Mr. Laye pointed out that the proposed African Regional Review Forum for CSD-14 should be held back-to-back with the forthcoming session of the African CSD (CSD-4), which is a statutory meeting to be organized by ECA within its work programme. He added that, following a decision taken at CSD-3 in 2003, the African CSD should be considered as a regional component of the global CSD. Therefore, theme of the African CSD-4 should be aligned to that of (the global) CSD-14.

However, it should be noted that we are in a transitional period during which the ECA work programme for the period 2004-2005 was decided before the mandate of ECA (African) CSD was revised to take into account the thematic programming of the global CSD. Therefore, the African CSD-4 will deal with the issues to be considered according to ECA work programme and be held back-to-back with the African Regional Review Forum for the global CSD-14. It was suggested that, in organizing the two meetings, there would be need to ensure some synergy and coordination between the two events so that the outcome of the review meeting is reflected in the CSD-4 report.

It was decided that:

(i) Duration of the two meetings should be of five days: three days for CSD-4 and two days for the review meeting for CSD-14;

(ii) The outcome of the review meeting for CSD-14 will be presented at the session on "Follow-up and implementation of the outcomes of WSSD" of CSD-4;

(iii) Attendance to the review meeting should be of high level stakeholders, including representatives of governments, intergovernmental organizations (IGOs), and civil society organizations (CSOs);

(iv) UNDESA's meeting on energy, ECA's expert group meeting on the Sustainable Development Report on Africa (SDRA) and NEPAD's meeting on infrastructure will take place back-to-back with CSD-4 and the review meeting for CSD-14, in order to leverage the quality of participants, while minimizing the costs; and

(v) Effort should also be made to organize other technical meetings/workshops/seminars back-to-back with the CSD-4 and the review meeting for CSD-14.

5. Timetable for the preparation of the thematic reports

Activities to be undertaken for the preparation of the thematic reports would include:

(i) Gathering of data and information;

(ii) Drafting the thematic reports;

(iii) Peer review by the Joint Secretariat;

(iv) Finalization of the draft reports before presentation to the Review Forum

(v) Presentation to the Review Forum; and

(vi) Finalization of the thematic reports and submission to UNDESA.

In order to make sure that the thematic reports are ready for consideration at the proposed dates for CSD-4 and African Regional Review Forum for CSD-14, i.e., from 24 to 28 October 2005, the following timetable was agreed:

01 March 2005: Starting date:

15 July 2005: Draft of the reports sent to the Joint Secretariat and other institutions for comments

31 July 2005 Comments/feedback to be sent to the Joint Secretariat and other institutions

August-September 2005: Finalization, translation and editing of the drafts reports

End September 2005: Invitation sent to member States and other stakeholders

24-20 October 2005: Review Forum

End November 2005: Thematic reports finalized and sent to UNDESA

6. Concluding remarks

In his concluding remarks, Mr. Ousmane Laye thanked the participants for their contribution to the informal consultations. He expressed the wish that the participants, and through them, their institutions, would sustain the momentum created during the consultations.

Annex

List of Participants