A3-0001/94

Resolution on monitoring by the European Community of the implementation of Agenda 21 of the UN Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED)

The European Parliament,

-having regard to the motion for a resolution by Mr Collins and others on the environmental implementation of Agenda 21 of the 1992 UNCED Conference (B3-0474/93),

-having regard to the statements made by the European Council in Dublin on 25 and 26 June 1990 on environmental imperatives,

-having regard to its resolution of 13 February 1992 on EEC participation in the UN Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED),

-having regard to the eight-point plan of the European Council held in Lisbon on 26 and 27 June 1992,

-having regard to the Council meeting of 26 May 1992 held in preparation for the UN Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) in Rio de Janeiro,

-having regard to the conclusions of that conference and the agreements signed, and especially to Agenda 21,

-having regard to Resolution A/47/191 of the General Assembly of the United Nations on the institutional follow-up to the United Nations Conference on the Environment and Development (UNCED),

-having regard to Resolutions E/1993/14 and E/1993/215 of the United Nations Economic and Social Council on, respectively, the creation of a Commission on Sustainable Development and the rules of procedure of the said commission,

-having regard to the report of the first working session of the UN Commission on Sustainable Development, document E/1993/25/Add.1 dated 30 June 1993,

-having regard to its resolution of 17 November 1992 on the Fifth Community programme of policy and action in relation to the environment and sustainable development,

-having regard to the EC Treaty, and Article 130u(3) in particular,

-having regard to Rule 45 of its Rules of Procedure,

-having regard to the report of the Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Consumer Protection and the opinion of the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs and Industrial Policy (A3-0001/94),

A.whereas there is an urgent need for more concrete and intensive international cooperation in the area of environmental protection with a view to achieving global solutions and whereas the European Union and its Member States have an ethical and moral obligation to create suitable monitoring mechanisms to ensure implementation of the objectives of Agenda 21,

B.believing that, since anti-poverty action is defined as a key objective in Agenda 21, the European Union and its Member States must implement the UN requirement of dedicating 0.7% of GDP to official development aid by the year 2000, and welcoming the decision to reaffirm this undertaking at the first session of the UN Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD) held on 14 to 25 June 1993 in New York,

C.whereas it is essential to draw up an international code of conduct for technology transfers, to be based on the right of the LDCs to sustainable development and conservation of their natural resources, as having priority over patent rights, in the interests of North-South dialogue,

D.whereas the concept of sustainable development must entail raising the consciousness of the public, economic agents and the Member States with regard to the need to modify production and consumption habits so as to avert the continual and permanent deterioration of natural resources and the disproportionate pressure exerted by the Northern countries on the world's environmental resources, thus fulfilling another of the objectives of Agenda 21; and whereas the European Union should contribute to the development and strengthening of the Declaration of Principles adopted at the UNCED meeting in Rio de Janeiro,

E.whereas members of the public and citizens' organizations should contribute to the planning and execution of policies and projects directly affecting their quality of life and their surroundings; whereas the ordinary person's right to participation in a context of democratic responsibility is thus crucial; welcoming the agreements adopted at the above-mentioned meeting of the UN Commission on Sustainable Development and expecting the said right to be taken up by the national committees in the Member States,

F.whereas the United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development is the appropriate body at international level to supervise the implementation of Agenda 21,

1.Calls on the Commission, the Council, and the Member States to press ahead with meeting the financial commitments entered into at Rio;

2.Deplores the fact that no additional budgetary resources have been earmarked for implementation of Agenda 21 in the budget for the European Union for 1994;

3.Calls on the Commission and the Member States to provide, in addition to the ECU 3 000 000 already agreed on in Rio de Janeiro, new and supplementary funds for the implementation of Agenda 21;

4.Urges the Commission and the Member States to provide consistent support for effective and swift implementation of chapter 33 of Agenda 21;

5.Urges them also to provide technical and financial assistance to other countries, particularly developing countries and the countries of Central and Eastern Europe, for the preparation of national reports to the UN Commission on Sustainable Development;

6.Calls on the Commission to introduce a chapter on the protection of natural resources into all international trade agreements to which it is a party, especially the GATT agreements, and to complete as a matter of urgency the drafting of a Green Paper on Trade and the Environment agreed by the Council;

7.Urges all the Member States to establish in 1994, pursuant to Resolution 47/191 and on the basis of cooperation and coordination with other partners in the European Union and the active participation of civil society, national plans for sustainable development with suitable mechanisms for establishing sustainable development indicators which will make it possible to prepare monitoring reports on the implementation of Agenda 21 for the UN Commission on Sustainable Development, whose deliberations should be made public; believes that to this end there is an urgent need for national committees to be established in all the Member States of the European Union to implement and monitor the agreements adopted at the Rio summit;

8.Calls on the Commission and the Member States to participate actively in the proceedings of the UN Commission on Sustainable Development, facilitating the widest possible participation of civil society through the NGOs and other institutions in order to encourage implementation of the agreements adopted at the Earth Summit;

9.Calls on the Commission and the Member States to submit the reports on the implementation of Agenda 21 at European Community level and Member State level to the UN Commission on Sustainable Development in good time, and no later than six months prior to the beginning of the latter's session;

10.Calls on the Commission and the Member States, in drafting the reports, to take account of the agenda of the UN Commission on Sustainable Development and of the guidelines of the CSD Secretariat as specified in paragraph 26 of the report of the CSD, document E/1993/25/Add.1; calls on the Commission and the Member States to appoint a contact person to simplify and streamline the production of these reports to the CSD; calls on the Commission and the Member States to participate actively in interim meetings of the working parties of the Commission on Sustainable Development in preparation for its annual sessions;

11.Calls on the Commission and the Member States to encourage research, training and advice schemes with a view to developing, promoting, facilitating and financing access to and the transfer of environmental technologies, in accordance with the conclusions of the UN Commission on Sustainable Development, and to reinforce their own scientific and technological capacities geared to creating policies for sustainable development;

12.Calls on the Commission and the Member States to redefine their development cooperation policy with the aim of facilitating the acquisition of licences and patents for cleaner and more efficient technologies with a view to offering them to the LDCs on favourable terms;

13.Calls in particular for special training and teaching programmes to be devised at all levels on the development, use and maintenance of clean technologies in Eastern European countries and in the South;

14.Calls on the Commission to define mechanisms which will guarantee access to appropriate information and effective participation by all political agents as well as the most important social groups, including NGOs, consumers' associations and the general public, and to this end to contribute positively to the establishment of the Consultative Forum provided for in the Fifth Community Action Programme;

15.Urges the governments of the Member States to speed up the implementation of chapter XXXVI in order to encourage education and human resource development in all fields related to environmental protection and development, as priority areas if Agenda 21 is to be implemented;

16.Calls on the Commission and the Council to ensure that the concept of sustainable development which is contained in the new legislation governing the Structural and Cohesion Funds is regarded as an explicit and primary objective in the use thereof;

17.Calls on the Council, the Commission and the Member States to promote sustainable development as a right of both citizens and peoples; calls, accordingly, for the immediate establishment of the national committees on sustainable development; and requests the Member States to ratify the agreements signed by them at UNCED as speedily as possible, particularly the Climatic Change and Biodiversity Conventions;

18.Instructs its President to forward this resolution to the Commission, the Council, the governments of the Member States, their national committees and the UN Commission on Sustainable Development.