johannesburg, south africa, 26th august
2002
richest nations try to trade away earth
summit
As negotiations get underway at the Earth
Summit in Johannesburg (1) on Monday 26th,
Friends of the Earth International(2) accused
the United States, Australia and Canada of
standing in the way of international
agreements for people and the planet and
called on other governments to ignore this
"axis of environmental evil". (3)
"Instead of using the Earth Summit to
respond to global concerns over deregulation
and liberalisation, governments are pushing
the World Trade Organisation's agenda and
rebranding it as 'sustainable development',"
said Friends of the Earth International's
Daniel Mittler in Johannesburg.
Friends of the Earth International called
on all governments to commit to countering
the negative social and environmental impacts
of economic globalisation. So far few
positive measures have been agreed and
governments could even reverse some
commitments made ten years ago at the Rio
Earth Summit.
Informal negotiations started on the 23rd
with the US and the EU jointly proposing a
new text on trade that utterly fails to
address the issues of environmental
protection, poverty relief and sustainable
development that the Earth Summit has been
convened to address. This joint text also
fails to address the need for binding rules
for global business, which are needed to
deliver sustainable development. Corporations
are present in Johannesburg in force
pretending that they are already delivering
sustainable development.
"Western multinationals are destroying
livelihoods of communities in the third
world. If these corporations were as
responsible as they pretend here in
Johannesburg, they should all be signed up to
a binding corporate accountability convention
which would make them legally liable for
irresponsible behaviour" said Salvadorean
Friends of the Earth International chair
Ricardo Navarro.(4)
Industrialised nations are also unlikely
to acknowledge their massive ecological debt
to the developing world (5). Friends of the
Earth International is preparing to bring the
"people´s voice" to Johannesburg. At local
actions in more than 15 countries, Friends of
the Earth International has already collected
thousands of demands to world leaders
including via Radio Earth Summit (6).
For every demand collected, Friends of the
Earth International will deliver a small
figurine designed by local South African
artists to the conference centre in
Johannesburg on September 1st. This major art
installation, which will also feature a
6-metre high "corporate giant", will have a
clear message to governments: "Don´t let big
business rule the world!".
Contact in Johannesburg:
Daniel Mittler, Earth Summit Campaign
Coordinator, +27 72 401 5394
Ricardo Navarro, Friends of the Earth
International chair: + 27 72 4015392
Tony Juniper, Friends of the Earth
International vice-chair: +27 72 4015393
Contact details to reach Friends of the
Earth International spokespeople and press
officers are available at
www.foei.org/media/2002/contacts_wssd.htm
Notes to editors
(1) Official information on the summit is
at www.johannesburgsummit.org
(2) Friends of the Earth is the largest
environmental grassroots organisation, with
more than 1 million members in 70 countries.
www.foei.org
(3) The USA, Australia, Canada but also
OPEC countries have continuously fought
against any new commitments to emerge from
the Earth Summit.
(4), (5) For FoEI corporate accountability
and ecological debt campaign details visit
www.rio-plus-10.org and www.foei.org
(6) www.radioearthsummit.org
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