Check against delivery

Ladies and Gentlemen,

“Eradicating poverty is the greatest global challenge facing the world today and an indispensable requirement for sustainable development, particularly for developing countries.”

This quote is drawn from the Plan of Implementation from the Johannesburg World Summit on sustainable development. Johannesburg represents a welcomed consensus on sustainable development. Sustainable development must be understood as a concept based on human needs, human rights, and human responsibility towards the environment and solidarity. Solidarity between generations and solidarity between communities.

Unless we keep this in mind, I believe too many people will continue to stick to the idea that we can deal with poverty and growth first – then take a look at the environment. Sustainable development has three dimensions: economic, social and environmental.

When Wangari Maathai was awarded the Nobel Peace prize last year, it was a timely reminder to us all that we need to take a holistic approach to the concepts of environment management, human rights, poverty reduction and peace. It sounds simple and straightforward. In reality, our thinking and our actions have a tendency to be compartmentalised and focused on one or the other.

Five years ago the world community adopted the Millennium Development Goals. The Millennium Development Goals are our primary roadmap on the way forward to achieve a sustainable reduction of extreme poverty in its many dimensions. Although most of the goals focus on the issue of poverty, income poverty, hunger, disease, shelter and exclusion - To Ensure environmental sustainability is given as goal 7. The Johannesburg Summit two years later confirmed sustainable development as the overarching agenda for out common work, and placed the MDGs squarely within this agenda.

From Johannesburg, some of you might recall the successful efforts to fend off wording which could be interpreted as giving the WTO-rules precedence over environmental agreements and conventions, and that the “precautionary principle” was confirmed.

We were less successful in Johannesburg making decisions on targets, timetables and partnerships to speedily increase access to such basic requirements as clean water, sanitation, adequate shelter, energy, health care, food security and the protection of biodiversity. But overall, Johannesburg was more of a success than some of us had thought possible. Johannesburg completed the Millennium Development Goals within the umbrella of sustainable development.

A good strategy for such summits is to push the language as far as possible, and thereafter to try to make those with a feeble memory deliver on the promises given. Sometimes it works. Sometimes summits become nice memories, sometimes they contribute to bringing us all forward.

It is my firm conviction that the Millennium Development Goals and the decisions from Johannesburg, in a singularly efficient way have contributed to focussing the international agenda on the challenges of sustainable development. Before it was far more difficult to get the focus of world leaders or politicians with their minds on serious security issues to focus on the challenge of poverty. Not so anymore. Just take a look at the agenda for the upcoming G-8 meeting in Gleneagles – Africa and the climate are the two priorities

In September 2005, the General Assembly of the United Nations will carry out a comprehensive review of the implementation of the Millennium Declaration The review takes as its point of departure the report of the Secretary - General “ In larger freedom: towards development, security and human rights for all”. We will ask - How far have we come in relation to the Millennium Development Goals (MDG)? What challenges remain? How can we develop an effective partnership between all actors? What do we need in order to bring balance between the various elements of sustainable development?

14 days ago (9 June) the UN report on the status of the implementation of the MDGs stated that unprecedented gains against poverty has been achieved since 1990. The number of people living in extreme poverty has fallen off by 130 million people. This progress has taken place against the backdrop of an overall population growth of more than 800 million in the developing regions.

But still more than 1 billion people are living on less than a dollar a day, half of the developing world lack access to sanitation, every week in the developing world, 200 000 children under five die of disease and 10 000 women die giving birth. In addition, we need to adapt ourselves to a new geography of poverty: Some regions score high on most of the goals, whereas particularly Africa south of the Sahara lags behind on most of the goals. For the first time in history, in a few years there will be more people living in extreme poverty – in absolute numbers – in Africa than in Asia.

In Several goals related to women and children development is also far too slow. The UN Millennium Task force also states quite clearly that for the loss of environmental resources, most of the world is off track. The conclusion I draw from this is that we need to focus more on Africa, we need to focus more on environment. We need to focus more on children, and clearly on women’s rights. This is important – of course for the sake of the female half of world population – but also because women play an active role in poverty reduction as well as in activities related to water resources management, hygiene, sanitation and sustainable use of local resources.

When investment in human resources is being made, we must remember that to invest in women is very often the very best investment for sustainable development . “The year 2005 is crucial in our work to achieve the Goals”, UN Secretary Kofi Annan says in his foreword to the MDG report. “Instead of setting targets, this time leaders must decide how to achieve them.”

Today, I would like to give you a brief outline of how I see the way forward. Then I will take a brief look at a couple of issues of particular relevance for sustainable development. I will end my address to you by giving you an outline of how we conduct our preparatory work up to the September summit.

If we are to reach the MDGs, we need to understand our global reform agenda along four fronts:

1. The first front is the need for reform of International framework conditions for development

No country develops in isolation. Development calls for international co-operation, trade, and access to markets. If we in the developed world do not allow easier access to markets and reduce the debt burden of the poorest countries, we will fail in our quest to reach the MDGs. Last year, Ugandan president Museveni stated in the Wall Street Journal that if we keep the developed world dependent on handouts, we have a recipe for permanent poverty. The only way out of this vicious cycle is through trade and market access.

The British development organisation OXFAM make this case clearly: if Africa were to increase its share of world exports by one percentage point, the resulting gains in income would be equivalent to about five times what the continent receives in development co-operation and debt relief today.

So our first area of reform has to be international framework conditions - debt cancellation, inclusion into world trade on conditions which are conducive to development. Good development policy must not be undermined by bad trade policy.

2. More and better aid

The second arena for reform is the business of aid. We need more and better aid.

In order to reach the Millennium Goals, we need another 50 billion dollars in aid per year. For 2003, world’s total military spending was 956 billion dollars (SIPRI). Total development co-operation assistance was 68,5 (OECD/DAC).

It makes you think.

The trend on development aid is on the upwards – for 2004 official development aid rose to 78 billion, more countries adopt concrete plans for scaling up – but we are too slow. OECD predict 88 billion for 2006 – clearly too little.

The development reform agenda has another important aspect - We need to change the way we work. Many poor countries are forced to spend scarce resources on preparing thousands of reports for numerous donors and to manage a dizzying number of accounts and projects. This “donor circus” must stop. We have to lower our flags; we have to be less concerned about our own “glory” and more concerned about results on the ground. Poor countries should spend what little capacity they have on running the country rather than on satisfying donors.

Without donor reforms, without ownership and leadership, we will not reach the Millennium Goals. An important milestone was reached with the Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness in March this year.Concrete targets were set for our work on harmonisation of donor procedures and alignment with recipient countries’ own cycles and procedures. We are moving forwards – but again slowly and quite uneven. Let me add, in this forum, quite a bit of Norway’s attention on the OECD consists of trying to figure out how to speed up this process. I could need some more help on this.

3. National governments must do better

One important stride forwards towards a consensus on the broad lines in development policy, was when we ceased to have two camps on governance. We used to split into those who blamed most ills on the international framework regimes, and those who blamed everything on governance. Now – we talk openly about both aspects. This schism ended finally with the MDGs and the so-called Monterrey consensus. Developing countries have committed themselves to improving their governance as part of the global partnership, the global bargain. Poor countries need to put their own house in order, to improve their policies and their governance. Anti-corruption efforts, democracy building and respect for human rights must be the foundation for sustainable development everywhere. We agree on this, but there is some way from this insight to the development of sound policies and institutions. Sometimes the governance issue is presented to simple, as if it were solely a question of democracy. Of equal importance are the issues of rule of law and the capacity of institutions – it takes time to get there.

4. Private sector and civil society

Even if the poor countries deliver on their part of the bargain, and if we as rich countries do all the other things right, it will still not be enough to reach the Millennium Goals.

We need only look at total global resource flows, and the incredible gap between the rich and the poor regions of the world. The most significant part of these resource flows are private, they are foreign direct investment. The public sector alone can never lift the poor people of this world out of poverty, or bridge the gap between us. There is simply not enough money and resources there. We need to mobilise a number of other actors, in the private sector and in civil society.

To sum up – we need urgent reforms on all four of the global fronts – international framework conditions, donor-work, governance and private sector and non-governmental organisations. And along all of these fronts - we need to anchor our efforts in sound and sustainable policies. That is why MDG 7 and the Johannesburg agenda are so important.

This year is almost overfilled with reports and deadlines. In March, one of the more memorable UN report was released – the UN Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MA) “Living beyond our Means”. In my opinion, the report is to be taken seriously in its insistence that our planets natural assets must be seen as part of the fight against poverty. This report clearly states that - and I quote: “development policies aimed at reducing poverty that ignore the impact of our current behaviour on the natural environment may well be doomed to failure.”

The objective of the MA was to assess the consequences of ecosystem change for human well being and it focuses in particular on the notion of “ecosystem services” - that is to say the benefits people are obtaining from ecosystems. The conclusions of the assessment is a stark warning – human activity is putting such strain on the natural functions of Earth that the ability of the planets ecosystems to sustain future generations can no longer be taken for granted.

Virtually all of Earth’s ecosystems have been contributing to substantial net gains in human well being and economic development. However - these gains have been achieved at growing costs, especially during the last 50 years, in the form of the degradation of many ecosystem services and the exacerbation of poverty for groups of people in developing countries. Further nature destruction will still increase some people's wealth, but it will at the same time increase the problems of the very poorest.

Energy-consumption is but one case in point - where the distribution challenges clash with the need for restraint. A family in one of the poorest countries of the world consumes perhaps 250 kWh – whereas a family in Norway typically will use 25.000 kWh. The richer 20 pst of us claim the use of 60 pst of the global energy expenditure. We know this – and we know that global energy consumption must rise as a consequence of poverty reduction - we need to divert energy-consumption away from fossil fuel and over to renewable energy.

We know we that poverty reduction will go hand in hand with increase in food production – we need to invest more in technologies which will allow us to produce more without increasing the use of agrochemicals and water. The potential is there: there are enormous differences in the productivity of farmers across regions; with approximately the same input, African farmers produce only 1/3 of the production of Asian farmers, and 1/5 of the amount produced by farmers in the west.

Already, many of the regions facing the greatest challenges in achieving the MDGs coincide with those facing significant problems of ecosystem degradation. A few examples illustrate this point. The World Bank estimates that half of those dying prematurely in poor regions of the world, die from side effects of pollution, lack of clean water and other environmental hazards.

Rural poor people tend to be most directly reliant on ecosystem services and most vulnerable to changes in those services. More generally, any progress achieved in addressing the MDGs of poverty and hunger eradication, improved health, and environmental sustainability is unlikely to be sustained if most of the ecosystem services on which humanity relies continue to be degraded. In contrast, the sound management of ecosystem services provides cost-effective opportunities for addressing multiple development goals.

The most important achievement of the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, in my opinion, is the way that it opens up cross-sectoral communication by focusing on socio-economic aspects of ecosystem loss. To communicate well with the economists among us, the continued existence of natural ecosystems in all its diversity can best be compared to the spreading of risks. Surely, we do not want the vulnerability of fewer choices, a narrowing of future possibilities. Nor do we want to be bogged down in costly efforts to restore ecosystem services that can be preserved today at a fraction of the cost.

An important recommendation in the MA is to take the value of the nature into account and correct the historic bias against natural resources when it comes to weighing the costs and benefits of particular economic choices. By placing a more correct price on the ecosystem services, the price for alternative solutions becomes relatively cheaper and more likely to appear desirable to public or private investors. More cities and local communities should do as New York City - factor in the real value of their wetland to supply their water – as drinking water and for other purposes.

Another recommendation of equal importance is to realise that local communities are far more likely to protect and use in a sustainable way the natural resources, if they have real influence in the decision making processes – and - if they end up with a fair share of the benefits arising from their use.

Cost sharing and benefit-sharing emerges as issues we can not continue to be blind to. Several environment conventions have taken issue here. In my opinion, this must be moved into a more central place in the thinking of western politicians. When New Guinea and Costa Rica tabled the idea of paying forest-rich developing countries to maintain the rainforest – we should listen. Why should resources be provided through international mechanisms only for planting – not for protection and maintenance? We are approaching the post-Kyoto negotiations, but I see no reason why such ideas could not be aired in other venues as well.

But I want to issue a warning: too often bright ideas to buy into the goodwill of developing countries that possess a good – political or other – which we in the west desire – end up by diverting resources from really poor off countries to countries which are slightly better off. In short – when we get bright ideas on spending – we need to look for additionality.

Many changes in ecosystem management have involved the privatisation of what were formerly common pool resources. Individuals who depended on those resources such as indigenous peoples, forest dependent communities and marginalised poor people have often lost rights to the resources. It is of vital importance that their informal rights to land and harvesting of resources is recognised and as donors we should support legal capacity building concerning the formalisation of the inherited rights of local people.

Formalisation of economic assets into secure legal rights with a focus on the poor and marginalised will have direct ecological and economic effects. It could promote equity by providing the poor with effective legal protection and recognising their economic assets and transactions.

With Norway in the lead, the Nordic countries, UK, Canada, Tanzania, Guatemala, Egypt and South Africa during the New York summit will launch “The High Level Commission on Legal Empowerment of the Poor”. The Commission will be charged with developing an action oriented agenda, including key principles and a tool kit with policy and strategy options, that governments and organisations can utilise to move forward.

The fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from the use of genetic resources is of special importance. This is the third and important part of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) in addition to conservation and sustainable use. Developing countries are home to most of the world’s biodiversity. We in the developed countries ask those countries that are rich in genetic resources to protect their resources for our common interest. Benefit-sharing should be taken more seriously.

In my opinion we lack legitimacy in our request if we don’t share the benefits arising from the commercial use of the resources. We ask e.g. Madagascar to protect their biodiversity and they have provided us with the important Periwinkle. This medicinal plant can cure 90 % of children with leukaemia and gives the pharmaceuticals an acceptable benefit. What have the people in Madagascar received for protecting the plant and having the knowledge on its medicinal properties? Developing countries want to be ensured that if they protect and grant access to their native species – for example to multinational pharmaceutical companies – they will be fairly compensated.

The CBD has agreed to start negotiations on an international regime on access and benefit-sharing as related to genetic resources. The aim of such a regime should be to agree on benefit-sharing arrangements in order for the providing countries of genetic resources to be compensated through monetary and non-monetary benefits. Such benefits would certainly also strengthen the incentives for developing countries to preserve their biodiversity. Some of you may be aware of the need to include the aspect of benefit sharing into patent legislation – Norway has included a provision in the patent law that obliges patent seekers to state the origin of genetic material which form basis for biotechnology inventions. I believe that an international obligation to include information on the origin of the genetic material in patent applications would support the object of benefit sharing as well as providing a better understanding of what should be covered by the patent. The introduction of such a requirement is presently being discussed in both the World Intellectual Property Organisation and the WTO.

It will also be necessary to build capacities in developing countries to enforce national laws on access and benefit sharing. Norway, as both a provider and a user of genetic resources, will actively contribute to a successful outcome of the negotiations. In September this year we will have a workshop together with South Africa as one contribution to bring the process forward.

Ladies and gentlemen,

In September this year politicians will meet to assess the progress made in cutting the world poverty by half as we committed ourselves to at the Millennium Summit. How far have we come in relation to the MDGs? What challenges remain? How can we develop an effective partnership between all actors? For the one billion people living on less than a dollar a day, the MDGs are a life and death issue. The September Summit will first of all be a unique opportunity to reaffirm the global partnership for achieving the MDGs - industrialised countries must deliver on aid, trade and policy coherence. But each country must take primary responsibility for its own economic and social development.

The Norwegian government intends to play an active part in the preparations towards the UN summit in September. We want to support the ambition to reform UN in order to strengthen our collective capacity to confront security, development and environment challenges. The UN summit in September will be an event of critical importance. It provides us with a unique opportunity to take decisive steps towards the implementation of the Johannesburg agenda and the MDGs.

In March this year, the Nordic ministers for Foreign Affairs and for Development Co-operation stated their positions and ambitions for the summit in a joint letter to secretary general Kofi Annan. Though in general supportive, the letter also underlines the need for more decisive reforms of the UN development system, more emphasis on donor reform as well as more stress on important crosscutting issues such as gender equality and environment.

Before the September Summit of the UN we ask that the so-called Monterrey consensus on development be upheld – this represents a balance of responsibilities between rich and poor countries on aid and governance. We urge action on Official Development Aid-level – rich countries must deliver on the 0,7 percent target set some 30 years ago. We urge speedy action on donor reform. We urge that industrialised countries’ trade and other policies be more coherent with development objectives of poor countries. We urge action on debt relief, with additional resources. We want more emphasis on gender issues and sexual and reproductive health. We want more focus on environmental sustainability – confirm the Johannesburg principles and make them reality. It is our opinion that sustainable development is not significantly clearly and explicitly addressed in the UN Secretary Generals report “ In Larger Freedom”, nor in the Draft declaration presented to us ahead of the Financing for Development Conference, which will start next week.

Likeminded countries have to utilise the momentum to encourage developing countries further in strengthening governance, combating corruption and include environment and sustainable development into their national development strategies. But we will only do this with some credibility if we deliver on our side. This is the crux of the consensus on sustainable development – we must remember this.

Agreement on the MDGs and Johannesburg principles were outstanding achievements on the part of the UN. But it will be a true victory only when the goals are reached. When deadlines are kept, when targets are met, when the poor see progress in their own lives which are not at the expense of sustainable utilisation of resources - that is when we - all of us - have succeeded.

I will, however, conclude my address by quoting once again secretary general Kofi Annan: “All our efforts will be in vain if their results are reversed by continued degradation of the environment and depletion of our natural resources.”

We agree, and we believe we must do more to have this reflected in the United Nations consensus that is to take form from now on and until September.

Thank you for your kind attention.