Page 5 sur 7
The World Summit on Sustainable Development:
Analysis of Results from Water Resources Point of View
Key Outcomes, Commitments, Targets and Initiatives
UN/DESA summarised the "results" of WSSD in a brief publication on the Summit website immediately after the Summit was over.
As far as "water" is concerned, as key outcome, the explicit acknowledgement is given that sanitation issues become critical and crucial elements of the negotiations and are reflected upon in the final declarations, in more depth than ever before.
Water can be seen as a "winner" of the WSSD. As far as water and sanitation are concerned, the Summit confirmed the water supply-related goal set by the UN Millennium Development Goals i.e. to halve by the year 2015 the proportion of people without access to safe drinking water. WSSD – in the spirit of the above cited outcome – added the quantifiable objective to halve by the year 2015 the proportion of people who do not have access to basic sanitation.
The achievement of these objectives implies that up to the target year 2015, annually, about 50 million people should be added to those having access to safe drinking water and approximately 100 million to be added each year to those having adequate sanitation. Even if the Summit does not come up with the inherent financial commitments, the political aim is well quantified, especially in comparison with the overwhelmingly verbal expression of aspirations for other aspects of sustainability.
Besides this clearly human-centred water and sanitation commitment, water also surfaces as part of the subheading on "Management of the Natural Resource Base". The commitment "to develop integrated water resources management and water efficiency plans by 2005" is, however, very vague. No specification is given as to whether these plans should be national or basin-oriented. Compared with the transitional provisions and implementation phases foreseen in the recent European Union Framework Directive on Water, it is highly unrealistic that the 2005 deadline can be achieved at global level. The more so that the IWRM still cannot be defined as a universally accepted, standardised methodology to be implemented routinely under whatever institutional framework. The lack of reliable databases is an additional factor making the 2005 target date illusory. While common sense can imagine and "invent" the content of a "Water Efficiency Plan", this terminology is entirely new. Again, no spatial (or temporal) reference is given to guide the scope and extent of these plans.
Among the key initiatives announced during the Summit, mention should be made of the "Water for Life" initiative of the European Union with its focus areas in Africa and in Central Asia. This initiative clearly reflects the emerging partnership "spirit" which is likely to be the strongest legacy of Johannesburg. Annex 1. shows the Johannesburg Declaration "Battle for the Planet" of Green Cross International to illustrate through this NGO statement the broad front of dedication to address the sustainability issues.
The Johannesburg Declaration on Sustainable Development
This is the political statement of the Summit. Among the 37 paragraphs only one, paragraph 18, refers to the afore-mentioned water and sanitation focus, besides a short reference to water pollution in paragraph 13. This relatively modest place in the political statement is "compensated" however by the fact that clean water heads the list of basic human requirements.
Annex 2 compares "waterwise" the final Declaration with its draft published one day before the end of the Summit in a Johannesburg daily newspaper "Star". A certain "downgrading" of water during the last minute negotiations can be sensed. This comparison, besides its historical value showing the evolution of a segment of the text through the last night of negotiations, also demonstrates that behind the negotiated text there are frequently well articulated, concrete aspirations capturing the spirit and momentum of a conference. This "untold" message is also a very important, invisible output of a forum, congress or summit.
The WSSD Plan of Implementation – WSSD/PI
While looking for the term "water" in a document to assess its importance with regard to other areas of concern may seem a mechanical approach, it is still a very legitimate and astonishingly accurate measure, if applied in the case of negotiated, political texts.
Out of the 170 paragraphs of the (unedited) 4th September version of WSSD/PI, "water" explicitly appears at least once in 24 paragraphs: 3 paragraphs in Chapter II – Poverty Eradication; 11 paragraphs in Chapter IV – Protecting and Managing the Natural Resource Base of Economic and Social Development; 1 paragraph in Chapter VI – Health and Sustainable Development; 2 paragraphs in Chapter VII – Sustainable Development of Small Island Developing States; 2 paragraphs in Chapter VIII – Sustainable Development for Africa; and 5 paragraphs in Chapter VIII bis – Other Regional Initiatives (2 for Latin America and the Caribbean, 2 for the West Asia Region and 1 for Europe). This confirms the importance of water in many facets of sustainability and in particular, its crucial role in developing regions.
The following Table 3 provides a quick reference to locate the water-relevant statements, goals and recommendations in the text of the Plan of Implementation.
Table 3. How to trace "water" in the Plan of Implementation of the WSSD
(list of paragraphs where water is mentioned)
II. Poverty Eradication / 6a,c,l,m; 7g; 9e
IV. Protecting and managing the natural resource base of economic and social development / 23; 24a-e; 25a-f; 26; 27; 28; 31c; 34; 35d; 36; 38b,d,I,k; 39d; 40b; 43
VI. Health and sustainable development / 47l
VII. Sustainable development of small island developing states / 52d; 54c
Sustainable development for Africa / 57; 60a,d
VIII.bis Other regional initiativesLatin America and the Caribbean / 67; 70
Sustainable development in the West Asia region / 71; 72
Sustainable development in the Economic Commission for Europe Region / 74
Without doubt the most comprehensive focus on freshwater-related issues are in paragraphs 23-28. Therefore, the entire text of these paragraphs is reproduced as Annex 3.
Paragraph 23 calls, in particular, for the integrated management of land, water and living resources.
Paragraph 24 calls for an action programme (financial and technical) to achieve the quantitative objectives in providing safe drinking water and basic sanitation. While this paragraph appeals to "mobilise international and domestic financial resources at all levels" it falls short of recalling the estimated increased investment need (World Water Vision 2000) of approximately US dollars 100 billion for each year or the respective estimates in the "Recommendations for Action of the Bonn Conference".This paragraph is more elaborate on management options and practices: Public information and participation; Focus on poor and gender sensitivity; Capacity-building and popularisation programmes; Setting water as priority in national and international development agendas; Intensifying water pollution prevention; Mitigating groundwater contamination; Exploring innovative technologies. No doubt, this list is quite exhaustive but does not reveal any new aspect which would not have been mentioned either in the 2nd WWF or in the International Conference on Freshwater (Bonn, 2001).
Paragraph 25 elaborates further the necessary/possible water management options: Development and implementation of national/regional strategies, plans and programmes in an integrated context; Improved efficiency and loss reduction within the water infrastructure and recycling; Full employment of policy instruments: regulation monitoring, voluntary actions, market mechanisms, land use management, cost recovery and integrated wide approach; Prioritisation of water uses to cover basic human needs and water allocation among competing uses; Programmes to mitigate the effects of extreme water-related events; Technology transfer and capacity-building including non-conventional methods, sea water desalinisation; Public, private partnerships, respect of local conditions, accountability, etc. This reads more like an (unedited) table of contents of a textbook on water resources management rather than a focussed political statement. It mentions all the components but gives little guidance or reports commitment on implementation.
Paragraph 26 calls for cooperation on behalf of developing and transitional countries to assess their water resources, create monitoring networks, databases and national indicators. Again, this paragraph addresses an important problem. However, monitoring and data collection is on the decline even in the so-called developed countries. Calling for national indicators in resource assessment seems to contradict the basin-wide integrated approaches advocated in most parts of the WSSD/PI.
Paragraph 27 is a welcome exception in a political text. It calls for science to improve the understanding of how the hydrological cycle functions. It calls for knowledge sharing, for capacity-building and for the application of modern earth observation technologies to create the science-based assessment of resource availability and variability.
Paragraph 28 calls for close cooperation of international and intergovernmental bodies in addressing water-related issues. It refers also to the International Year of Freshwater 2003.
In particular, paragraphs 26-28 are important as they provide the political endorsement and mandate for the World Water Assessment Programme of the UN System and for international science programmes, like the International Hydrological Programme of UNESCO.
The other references to water in Chapter IV. Protecting and managing the natural resource base of economic and social development addresses the role of water to carry pollutants from land-based sources to the seas, it refers to water as a source of risk (floods, droughts) and its vulnerability being affected by climate change.
Paragraph 38 refers to water in agriculture. Given that 70-80% of the water consumed worldwide is related to irrigation and other agricultural uses, the WSSD/PI is astonishingly short and general on this issue. The professional wisdom that water shortage can and must be dealt with first of all in an agricultural context does not seem to be adequately reflected and worded in the document. Calling for market-based incentives may be a sensible approach but it is also a very sensitive issue/subject. By avoiding to address this key issue adequately, the political document failed in this respect to be policy-relevant.
The role of water to combat desertification and secure mountain ecosystems, including their relationship with erosion, deforestation, land degradation and biodiversity, is, however, well documented.
The following chapters focus on the reciprocity between access to safe water and sanitation and health, as well as highlighting certain water issues in a regional context.
How Does the WSSD Influence the "Water World"?
As already stated, a consolidated assessment of the impact of WSSD on the "Water World" and consequently, on water (resources management) policies will be first possible after the 3rd WWF. Nevertheless, tendencies can be summarised in the following bullet points:
- WSSD did not produce any substantial paradigm shift as far as water is concerned. It confirmed IWRM as the endorsed approach reflecting holistic concerns.
- WSSD, while remaining "holistic" at the level of describing components of sustainability, placed availability of safe water and sanitation, equitable use and integrated management of this resource, as the key factors for combating poverty and securing sustainable development. This role is convincingly visualised in the WEHAB document. Thus, calling "water" the winner of Johannesburg is justified.
- WSSD reconfirmed the Millennium Development Goals, hence further strengthening the political commitment of providing safe drinking water and adequate sanitation for hundreds of millions of people deprived of these basic human needs.
- By adding sanitation to the MDG on safe drinking water, a crucial step was made towards seeking comprehensive, remedial action for improving the quality of human life.
- With these human-centred core objectives, WSSD clearly set priorities. It is up to the UN system and governments, as well as a task of NGOs and the private sector, to act along these ethical lines.
- The Plan of Implementation of WSSD calls for integrated water resources management and water efficiency plans by 2005 and for the development of integrated land management and water use plans. However, it does not elaborate in detail on the key linkage between (frequently unsustainable) water use in irrigation and the inherent conflicts it creates, especially between food and environmental security.
- Water resources assessment and cooperative efforts among sovereign states are mentioned, yet the WSSD fell short of explicitly declaring hydrological and meteorological data-sharing as an imperative.
