Kirsty Schneeberger, Stakeholder Forum
The first meeting of 2012 on Rio +20 – the informal discussions on the initial Zero Draft text – has commenced. The ball is rolling and in no time at all we will find ourselves at 20th June reaching agreement on the finer details of the Outcome Document, which has the potential to be one of the most defining moments of this generation. Many articles in this edition of Outreach refer to the Brundtland Commission and the vision that was shown in its report that had (and remains to have) a powerful impact on the way in which we view sustainability.
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Georgios Kostakos, Secretariat of the Global Sustainability Panel
Seventeen months after its launch by the UN Secretary-General in August 2010, the High-level Panel on Global Sustainability (GSP) is ready to issue its report. It took six meetings of the panel members, and many more discussions between their sherpas and advisers to get to this point. A large number of organisations and individuals, beyond the Panel and the Secretariat that supported it, were consulted and offered inputs during this period, including civil society, directly or through UN-NGLS. Was it worth the effort?
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Owen Gaffney, Geosphere-Biosphere Programme
Could an Intergovernmental Panel on Global Sustainability provide the scientific leadership, coordination and infrastructure the UN needs?
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By Hudson McFann, SustainUS
Natural disasters, identified as one of seven critical issues in the Zero Draft, are receiving priority attention in the Rio+20 process. This move is both encouraging and consistent with the 2002 pledge in the Johannesburg Declaration on Sustainable Development at the World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) ‘to place particular focus on, and give priority attention to, the fight against the worldwide conditions that pose severe threats to the sustainable development of our people’ (paragraph 19).
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By Georg Kell, Executive Director of the UN Global Compact
Rio+20 will convene Governments to build consensus on a more sustainable course for our world, in the environmental, social and economic spheres. Business plays a crucial role in this endeavour through corporate sustainability, defined as the delivery of long-term value in financial, social, environmental and ethical terms. To spur private sector action in support of sustainability, a Rio+20 Corporate Sustainability Forum will be held on 15–18 June in Rio.
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Ben Vanpeperstraete and Olimar Maisonet-Guzman on behalf of the UN-CSD Major Group of Children and Youth
Although the first version of the Zero Draft tries to capture a diversity of views from Members States and civil society, it falls short in the proposal of solutions and a plan of action for the sustainability challenges that we face. The document diagnoses existing problems, rather than putting forward concrete solutions for overcoming them. For example, most of the language for the governance section proposes either to continue with the current governance structure, or select from a series of conservative reforms.
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Neva Frecheville, WWF UK
One of this generation’s greatest tragedies – and oncoming catastrophes – is the failure to stem the accelerating rate of biodiversity loss. Biodiversity underpins the ecosystem goods and services on which humanity depends, and its loss represents a betrayal for the world’s poor as progress towards development is undermined.
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 Nationality: Canadian
Country of residence:USA
Current Position: Sustainable Development Officer, UN DESA - Coordinator Major groups, focal points for sustainable agriculture and sustainable consumption and production.
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Louise Kantrow, Permanent Representative of the International Chamber of Commerce to the United Nations
Business Action for Sustainable Development (BASD2012), the official United Nations coordinator of the Business and Industry Major Group at the upcoming Conference on Sustainable Development (Rio+20) is a temporary coalition of business organisations that will ensure the voice of business is heard at the conference and during the preparatory process. This initiative is convened by the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC), the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) and the United Nations Global Compact (UNGC), and has been expanded with the addition of ten sectoral international business organisations as partners. This broad partnership and group of networks enables us to consult with thousands of businesses from the Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) to the Multi-National Enterprise (MNE) in every region of the world.
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Uchita de Zoysa, Peoples’ Sustainability Treaties for Rio+20
Many voices from the South have already condemned the Zero Draft outcome document as a misrepresentation of the aspiration of the global civil society and their representative public. The course of action towards Rio+20 has been characterised by a process in which stakeholder vision and participation has been low, engagement difficult and the challenge for civil society organisations (CSOs) to ensure a representative outcome at Rio+20 harder than ever.
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