AALCO
PERMANENT OBSERVER MISSION
Of The ASIAN ? AFRICAN LEGAL
CONSULTATIVE ORGANIZATION
to the UNITED NATIONS
404 East 66th Street, Apt. 12-C
New York, New York 10021
Tel: +1-212-734-7608
Fax: +1-212-734-7608
E-mail: bhagwat@un.int
Commission on
Sustainable Development
Intergovernmental Preparatory Meeting
Statement by
Ms. Sujata Patel
Thursday, 01 March 2007
World Headquarters
E-66, Vasant Marg,
Vasant Vihar,
New Delhi - 110057
India
Tel.: +91 11 261 52251
Fax: +91 11 261 52041
E-mail: mail@aalco.org
Web: http://aalco.org
Mr. Chairman:
Distinguished delegates:
International environmental law is originally associated with the principle that
states must not permit the use of their territory in such a way as to injure the territory of
other states. However, global industrial development has strained the world?s
atmosphere, forests, lands, and oceans forcing the world to rely on the actions of the
UN as an intermediary able to bring about urgent and immediate change.
Across the world, most laws still assume that nature is static, not dynamic.
International law principles of national sovereignty and international intergovernmental
regimes are premised on the paradigm of a static Earth on which national states can be
defined. All nations continue to treat pollution as a local phenomenon. Law schools
teach this static model in their courses on property law and international law. We rush
disaster relief to victims of hurricanes and floods and then facilitate the rebuilding of
areas of high hazard, as if the events were random accidents unlikely to recur. All
jurisdictions tend to regard the natural system within its territory largely as a fixed,
unchanging natural resource base. Thanks to the studies and reports of the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, leaders in many nations have come to
understand that each nation?s climate and weather are linked in a global pattern.
Despite well-considered recommendations that the Earth Summit set forth in its
thoughtful action plan, ?Agenda 21,? the Rio Conference has stimulated rather modest
reforms, inadequate to stem the accelerating deterioration in global environmental
problems across the world. In response to alarm about signs of further environmental
degradation and chronic poverty experienced by billions of people, the U.N. World
Summit on Sustainable Development convened in 2002 and endorsed the
?Johannesburg Plan of Implementation? to spur nations on to action. Since then, there
remains scant evidence of enhanced work to abate worldwide environmental
degradation. Large intergovernmental conferences may be necessary, but are not by
themselves sufficient to force implementation of environmental reforms.
Moreover, AALCO calls on parties to move forward on both adaptation and
mitigation; the undeniable importance of both in addressing climate change is critical to
enhance efforts to mainstream adaptation to climate change into the broader
sustainable development agenda to achieve the Millennium Development Goals, as well
as to benefit from synergy with other Rio Conventions and the Kyoto protocol. On this
front, AALCO?s current member states have taken steps toward such mainstreaming
with ninety-two percent of AALCO?s member states ratifying, accepting, or approving
the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC) and thirty-six
of it?s members approving the Kyoto protocol.
AALCO expresses its concern that all nations, including both developed and
developing states, together face increased risk of negative impacts of Climate Change,
land degradation, access to water, access to food, and human health related issues
from such atmospheric change. To this end, both developed, as well as developing
countries are urged to act in concert to take economic development to greater heights to
benefit the environment. States must maintain their independent efforts at creating
environmental change, at the same time must interplay with each other through a rich
system of communications, while avoiding politicization of energy issues.
We call attention to a possible interest to sequester carbon through iron
fertilization of the open ocean. AALCO considers that before any such large-scale
fertilization takes place, environmental impact assessments should be conducted to
examine the likely outcomes and effects of such activities, including whether iron
fertilization would actually sequester carbon dioxide on a long-term basis ? that is, in
geological time ? and whether such fertilization would have any harmful effects on
regional ocean chemistry, including on pH levels, water clarity or marine biodiversity.
We note with concern that the oceans are becoming less alkaline, which may cause
harm to corals, mollusks and other living resources that depend on calcium available on
ocean waters.
In this regard, entrepreneurial ideas which foster the fight against atmosphere
pollution should also be forthrightly considered by private sector investment and marketoriented
approaches. In addition to encouraging developing countries to streamline
investment frameworks, essentially reducing transaction costs and attracting greater
foreign direct investment (FDI); states should promote sustainable development criteria
within such FDI agreements, such as providing certification schemes for environmental
goods and services. All stakeholders should take steps to integrate the planning and
decision-making process, thereby increasing economic efficiency, particularly in the
energy trading sectors. However, such efforts to combat climate change should be
careful not to discourage industrial development, rather should strive for decoupling
economic growth from emission growth.
An increase in States, particularly developing States?, access to funds and
benefits from the Kyoto Protocol are needed and can be made possible through a
reduction in the transaction costs of such fiscal mobilization and through efforts to
streamline the approval process. An overall increase in funding should also be sought
through other multilateral agencies, non-traditional resources, and innovative sources
for states individual efforts notwithstanding the Special Climate Change Fund, the LDC
Fund, and the Adaptation Fund. In addition to an increased access to funding, as well
as an increase in the ways and means of promoting know-how and technology transfer
through partnership should continue to take root, among states and corporate
enterprises. Accountability and transparency among interested parties should be a
priority within such financial investments.
AALCO recognizes that in evaluating environmental law programs, it becomes
clear that greater study and teaching of comparative environmental law is essential.
Environmental lawmaking is a powerful way to realize sustainability values and leverage
implementation of recommended solutions to abate pollution reverse desertification,
supply potable water, or conserve biodiversity. Recognition of the numerous local
environmental lawmaking actions, many of them reflecting global thinking, has been
masked because the UN, the media, and even the academic world devote their
attention to the failures of nations to agree internationally on new treaties,
implementation of Agenda 21, or establishment of new international environmental
intergovernmental organizations. These debates about building new institutions tend to
divert attention from the accomplishments of existing institutions, in particular the local
environmental law innovations. Rather than pursue this formalistic insistence on
building a new international intergovernmental body, much more study should be
devoted to seeking and studying the locally effective, creative innovations.
Member States with established enforcement mechanisms should continue to
render assistance to the countries beginning to develop such schemes. To learn from
the many national or local environmental success stories and replicate this sort of action
more rapidly, legal practitioners, government officials, and scholars alike must devote
attention to the subject of comparative legal studies.
It is true that we cannot escape from the past, but we can invent the future by
creating new environments of ecologically sound and economically rewarding
environments that are favourable to the continued growth of civilization.
AALCO calls on the General Assembly to underline the global magnitude of the
issue of sustainable environmental management and climate change and to take
immediate action.
Of The ASIAN ? AFRICAN LEGAL
CONSULTATIVE ORGANIZATION
to the UNITED NATIONS
404 East 66th Street, Apt. 12-C
New York, New York 10021
Tel: +1-212-734-7608
Fax: +1-212-734-7608
E-mail: bhagwat@un.int
Commission on
Sustainable Development
Intergovernmental Preparatory Meeting
Statement by
Ms. Sujata Patel
Thursday, 01 March 2007
World Headquarters
E-66, Vasant Marg,
Vasant Vihar,
New Delhi - 110057
India
Tel.: +91 11 261 52251
Fax: +91 11 261 52041
E-mail: mail@aalco.org
Web: http://aalco.org
Mr. Chairman:
Distinguished delegates:
International environmental law is originally associated with the principle that
states must not permit the use of their territory in such a way as to injure the territory of
other states. However, global industrial development has strained the world?s
atmosphere, forests, lands, and oceans forcing the world to rely on the actions of the
UN as an intermediary able to bring about urgent and immediate change.
Across the world, most laws still assume that nature is static, not dynamic.
International law principles of national sovereignty and international intergovernmental
regimes are premised on the paradigm of a static Earth on which national states can be
defined. All nations continue to treat pollution as a local phenomenon. Law schools
teach this static model in their courses on property law and international law. We rush
disaster relief to victims of hurricanes and floods and then facilitate the rebuilding of
areas of high hazard, as if the events were random accidents unlikely to recur. All
jurisdictions tend to regard the natural system within its territory largely as a fixed,
unchanging natural resource base. Thanks to the studies and reports of the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, leaders in many nations have come to
understand that each nation?s climate and weather are linked in a global pattern.
Despite well-considered recommendations that the Earth Summit set forth in its
thoughtful action plan, ?Agenda 21,? the Rio Conference has stimulated rather modest
reforms, inadequate to stem the accelerating deterioration in global environmental
problems across the world. In response to alarm about signs of further environmental
degradation and chronic poverty experienced by billions of people, the U.N. World
Summit on Sustainable Development convened in 2002 and endorsed the
?Johannesburg Plan of Implementation? to spur nations on to action. Since then, there
remains scant evidence of enhanced work to abate worldwide environmental
degradation. Large intergovernmental conferences may be necessary, but are not by
themselves sufficient to force implementation of environmental reforms.
Moreover, AALCO calls on parties to move forward on both adaptation and
mitigation; the undeniable importance of both in addressing climate change is critical to
enhance efforts to mainstream adaptation to climate change into the broader
sustainable development agenda to achieve the Millennium Development Goals, as well
as to benefit from synergy with other Rio Conventions and the Kyoto protocol. On this
front, AALCO?s current member states have taken steps toward such mainstreaming
with ninety-two percent of AALCO?s member states ratifying, accepting, or approving
the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC) and thirty-six
of it?s members approving the Kyoto protocol.
AALCO expresses its concern that all nations, including both developed and
developing states, together face increased risk of negative impacts of Climate Change,
land degradation, access to water, access to food, and human health related issues
from such atmospheric change. To this end, both developed, as well as developing
countries are urged to act in concert to take economic development to greater heights to
benefit the environment. States must maintain their independent efforts at creating
environmental change, at the same time must interplay with each other through a rich
system of communications, while avoiding politicization of energy issues.
We call attention to a possible interest to sequester carbon through iron
fertilization of the open ocean. AALCO considers that before any such large-scale
fertilization takes place, environmental impact assessments should be conducted to
examine the likely outcomes and effects of such activities, including whether iron
fertilization would actually sequester carbon dioxide on a long-term basis ? that is, in
geological time ? and whether such fertilization would have any harmful effects on
regional ocean chemistry, including on pH levels, water clarity or marine biodiversity.
We note with concern that the oceans are becoming less alkaline, which may cause
harm to corals, mollusks and other living resources that depend on calcium available on
ocean waters.
In this regard, entrepreneurial ideas which foster the fight against atmosphere
pollution should also be forthrightly considered by private sector investment and marketoriented
approaches. In addition to encouraging developing countries to streamline
investment frameworks, essentially reducing transaction costs and attracting greater
foreign direct investment (FDI); states should promote sustainable development criteria
within such FDI agreements, such as providing certification schemes for environmental
goods and services. All stakeholders should take steps to integrate the planning and
decision-making process, thereby increasing economic efficiency, particularly in the
energy trading sectors. However, such efforts to combat climate change should be
careful not to discourage industrial development, rather should strive for decoupling
economic growth from emission growth.
An increase in States, particularly developing States?, access to funds and
benefits from the Kyoto Protocol are needed and can be made possible through a
reduction in the transaction costs of such fiscal mobilization and through efforts to
streamline the approval process. An overall increase in funding should also be sought
through other multilateral agencies, non-traditional resources, and innovative sources
for states individual efforts notwithstanding the Special Climate Change Fund, the LDC
Fund, and the Adaptation Fund. In addition to an increased access to funding, as well
as an increase in the ways and means of promoting know-how and technology transfer
through partnership should continue to take root, among states and corporate
enterprises. Accountability and transparency among interested parties should be a
priority within such financial investments.
AALCO recognizes that in evaluating environmental law programs, it becomes
clear that greater study and teaching of comparative environmental law is essential.
Environmental lawmaking is a powerful way to realize sustainability values and leverage
implementation of recommended solutions to abate pollution reverse desertification,
supply potable water, or conserve biodiversity. Recognition of the numerous local
environmental lawmaking actions, many of them reflecting global thinking, has been
masked because the UN, the media, and even the academic world devote their
attention to the failures of nations to agree internationally on new treaties,
implementation of Agenda 21, or establishment of new international environmental
intergovernmental organizations. These debates about building new institutions tend to
divert attention from the accomplishments of existing institutions, in particular the local
environmental law innovations. Rather than pursue this formalistic insistence on
building a new international intergovernmental body, much more study should be
devoted to seeking and studying the locally effective, creative innovations.
Member States with established enforcement mechanisms should continue to
render assistance to the countries beginning to develop such schemes. To learn from
the many national or local environmental success stories and replicate this sort of action
more rapidly, legal practitioners, government officials, and scholars alike must devote
attention to the subject of comparative legal studies.
It is true that we cannot escape from the past, but we can invent the future by
creating new environments of ecologically sound and economically rewarding
environments that are favourable to the continued growth of civilization.
AALCO calls on the General Assembly to underline the global magnitude of the
issue of sustainable environmental management and climate change and to take
immediate action.