Mister Chair, Distinguished Delegates,
We all share the ambition to make CSD an effective and credible body that does not only adopt large number of decisions, but also supports their implementation. Indeed, if agreeing on the 278 decisions of CSD17 was a challenge, implementing them is an even greater challenge. This is one of one of the sustainable development challenges that no country or group of countries can face alone: all stakeholders have a role to play: Governments, UN Agencies, Funds and Programmes, regional groups and institutions, international financial institutions and major groups.
This is why the EU is very happy with the work undertaken by the CSD18 Chair, Excellency Luis Alberto Ferrate Felice to make CSD18 work more interactive and to fully involve all stakeholders as well as to allow for as meaningful interaction with the UN system. Discussions during these two weeks are a testimony to that.
The EU and its 27 Member States are committed to the implementation process on the above and to continue cooperation with all partners and stakeholders in implementing CSD decisions.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Chemicals, waste, mining, transport and Sustainable Consumption and Production (SCP) have to be addressed in the context of the broader international environmental agenda. Applying principles such as linkages between chemicals and waste management policies, the need for looking at further synergies of the various international processes related to chemicals, the importance of the life-cycle approach and resource efficiency will require a concerted effort by all. It will require the full buy in by all stake holders and a full integration of the principles agreed at CSD into the activities of the UN system.
In the EU we have been implementing initiatives in line with the spirit and work of CSD work that focus on SCP. One of the concrete examples is a a 10-year economic strategy - called Europe 2020 adopted by the European Commission recently, which has also been endorsed by the MS. Sustainability is written through this strategy, and in particular resource efficiency is one of the seven flagship initiatives proposed to promote smart, sustainable and inclusive growth in Europe.
The "Resource-efficient Europe" initiative is an important part of this strategy, which aims to ?decouple economic growth from the use of resources, support the shift towards a low carbon economy, increase the use of renewable energy sources, modernize our transport sector and promote energy efficiency.?
The rationale behind this idea is that we can have continued economic growth whilst managing sustainably our resources.
We strongly believe that mainstreaming sustainable development into all policies, a shift to greener, more sustainable future is only possible through a strategic approach, with a clear vision for the work on implementing the principles of SCP over the next 10 years. We have been launching a number of initiatives in that direction, but we are very interested in listening to the experiences of others and any suggestions for concrete action that may emerge, both from stakeholders and the UN system
We had interesting discussions during the last one and a half weeks on possible implementation challenges. We welcome that an ambitious 10 Year Framework of Programmes on SCP seems to be supported by many but we also understand concerns related to the future implementation of such an international framework. Thus, we feel it is crucial to continue discussions on this topic,
with the possible assistance of the future Chair already before the Inter-Preparatory Meeting of CSD19.
Thank you for your attention.
