Major Group: Children & Youth and NGOs
Thank you chair……..
Distinguished ladies and gentlemen,
Today’s moderated dialog poses a number of important questions about development trends and challenges. Many of these questions and issues have already been thoroughly researched and reported out in a variety of global studies, and also have been alluded to by previous speakers. In summary; today’s international development practices, and our current patterns of resource consumption are clearly not sustainable, and this over-use condition is becoming more severe with every passing year. Despite humanity’s collective progress in efficiency improvements and relative resource decoupling, the absolute decoupling of our economic activity - from natural system degradation - continues to elude us.
There is a growing international realization that humanity’s demand for resources has exceeded planetary boundaries, and these concerns have generated a healthy and long overdue debate about the “safe operating space” required for human development. We would recommend that the HLPF promote and fully engage in this debate.
The HLPF was created to provide political leadership in support of a sustainable post-2015 development agenda. It is relatively easy for political voices to introduce and support programs that focus on individual aspects of the human condition and are designed to improve the well-being of people throughout the world. But it is more challenging for the political mandate to advance programs and goals that assess the over-all bio-physical sustainability of nation states, and promote more appropriate balancing between aggregate human activity and natural resources. Yet, as we proceed with development in the 21st century, natural resources, and the proper balancing between aggregate human activity and the sustainable use of resources such as water, arable land, topsoil, and forests will become an increasingly and potentially critical aspect of sustainable development.
Therefore we ask that the High Level Political Forum pay special and focused attention to the relationship between our national and global development aspirations and the natural resources that are needed in support of these aspirations. Quite possibly the greatest challenge that the High Level Political Forum faces is to ensure that material resource accountability is fully included in the post-2015 development agenda!
In this brief intervention we are highlighting the issue of resource sufficiency, not just resource efficiency, and, as proposed by some delegations in the OWG, we call for all countries to undertake natural resource sufficiency evaluation to arrive at a resource ‘balance sheet’ that should guide and underpin their development plans and investments. We must not only be efficient in how we use resources, if there are not sufficient resources, we also need to address resource scarcity.
We will never know if we have enough resources to maintain human development unless we actually evaluate our resource demands and compare them to what is available. No one would think of flying a plane or driving a car without a fuel gauge. By the same token, we cannot plan for our future without knowing if we have enough sufficient natural resources to meet our projected needs.
Natural resource accountability provides an appropriate analytical framework and policy response to the growing global imperative to better manage the balance between human activity and the natural resources required for long-term human well-being. This planning and policy mechanism provides national leaders with a workable methodology that will allow them to understand and address the bio-physical sustainability of their countries.
So once again, in closing, we ask that the HLPF pay special attention to ensuring that material resource accountability is fully included in the post-2015 development agenda!
Thank you, and let me add that civil society stands ready to support you in your fine efforts to design and implement a truly sustainable post-2015 human development agenda.
Distinguished ladies and gentlemen,
Today’s moderated dialog poses a number of important questions about development trends and challenges. Many of these questions and issues have already been thoroughly researched and reported out in a variety of global studies, and also have been alluded to by previous speakers. In summary; today’s international development practices, and our current patterns of resource consumption are clearly not sustainable, and this over-use condition is becoming more severe with every passing year. Despite humanity’s collective progress in efficiency improvements and relative resource decoupling, the absolute decoupling of our economic activity - from natural system degradation - continues to elude us.
There is a growing international realization that humanity’s demand for resources has exceeded planetary boundaries, and these concerns have generated a healthy and long overdue debate about the “safe operating space” required for human development. We would recommend that the HLPF promote and fully engage in this debate.
The HLPF was created to provide political leadership in support of a sustainable post-2015 development agenda. It is relatively easy for political voices to introduce and support programs that focus on individual aspects of the human condition and are designed to improve the well-being of people throughout the world. But it is more challenging for the political mandate to advance programs and goals that assess the over-all bio-physical sustainability of nation states, and promote more appropriate balancing between aggregate human activity and natural resources. Yet, as we proceed with development in the 21st century, natural resources, and the proper balancing between aggregate human activity and the sustainable use of resources such as water, arable land, topsoil, and forests will become an increasingly and potentially critical aspect of sustainable development.
Therefore we ask that the High Level Political Forum pay special and focused attention to the relationship between our national and global development aspirations and the natural resources that are needed in support of these aspirations. Quite possibly the greatest challenge that the High Level Political Forum faces is to ensure that material resource accountability is fully included in the post-2015 development agenda!
In this brief intervention we are highlighting the issue of resource sufficiency, not just resource efficiency, and, as proposed by some delegations in the OWG, we call for all countries to undertake natural resource sufficiency evaluation to arrive at a resource ‘balance sheet’ that should guide and underpin their development plans and investments. We must not only be efficient in how we use resources, if there are not sufficient resources, we also need to address resource scarcity.
We will never know if we have enough resources to maintain human development unless we actually evaluate our resource demands and compare them to what is available. No one would think of flying a plane or driving a car without a fuel gauge. By the same token, we cannot plan for our future without knowing if we have enough sufficient natural resources to meet our projected needs.
Natural resource accountability provides an appropriate analytical framework and policy response to the growing global imperative to better manage the balance between human activity and the natural resources required for long-term human well-being. This planning and policy mechanism provides national leaders with a workable methodology that will allow them to understand and address the bio-physical sustainability of their countries.
So once again, in closing, we ask that the HLPF pay special attention to ensuring that material resource accountability is fully included in the post-2015 development agenda!
Thank you, and let me add that civil society stands ready to support you in your fine efforts to design and implement a truly sustainable post-2015 human development agenda.