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Dedication to Dr Mostafa Kamal Tolba
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Dedication to Dr Mostafa Kamal Tolba The editors of The Environmentalist, are proud to dedicate this, the first issue of 1982, to Dr Mostafa Tolba, Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), and through him to UNEP itself. This year marks the 10th anniversary of the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment (Stockholm, 1972) and therefore of the formation of UNEP. Mostafa Tolba became the Executive Director in 1975, having been deputy to Maurice Strong for three years. Dr Mostafa Tolba began his professional life as a scientist, and a most distinguished scientist at that. He graduated in botany from the University of Cairo, and later obtained a doctorate in plant pathology from Imperial College, the University of London. In ten years he was awarded the prize as Egypt's most distinguished botanist. During his relatively short academic life he was author of over 100 major scientific papers in international journals, covering plant pathology, mycology and virology. He became Professor of Microbiology at the National Research Centre, and at a later date, Professor with a Chair in Microbiology at the University of Cairo. For most people, more than a life's work. Not so for Mostafa Tolba, he had wide interests in policy and in the politics of science, and in the field of politics in general. He served as Secretary-General of the National Science Council of Egypt, and President of the Egyptian Academy of Science, Research and Technology. He also became UnderSecretary of State, Minister of Higher Education, Minister of Youth, as well as a top political aide of Anwar Sadat, when the late Egyptian leader was Vice-President. With such background and experience, it was no wonder that he was appointed Executive Director of UNEP, and to become the person in 1982 with the greatest responsibility for the global environment. A person so outstandingly qualified for such responsibility, and a person (as all who know him well recognize) with such dedication for the care of the environment, and for all people who live within that environment. Dr Tolba is not merely an administrator of a UN Agency, he is involved philosophically, politically and socially. He internationally personifies what needs to be done, and what has to be done. 0251-1088/82]0000-0000/$02.75
His feeling and care has been recognised by decorations from twelve countries. He has also been awarded the Honorary Degree of Doctor of Moscow University in recognition of services to the world in the field of Environment. One of Dr Tolba's great contributions has been in convincing the developing countries that there was no irreconcilable conflict between a concern for the environment and development. That was a great achievement; now he has an even greater task of persuading the industrial countries to provide the necessary financial backing to the work of UNEP. For a person who firmly believes that 'Environmental decisions are inseparable from political decisions', one has the feeling that he will be successful. However, the concern of governments is different today from that in 1976. In 1976, expressing a 'cautious optimism' about the future of the environment, Dr Tolba said that both the industrialized world and the developing countries are now "fully aware of the impact of their activities on the environment. They are keen on establishing strong
The Environmentalist, 2 (1982) 5 - 12
© Elsevier Sequoia/Printed in The Netherlands
environmental controls. Many have put environmental protection into their constitutions. New national legislation is being passed all over the world. International conventions and treaties are being signed. All this is proof that governments and people are increasingly determined to protect and to improve their environment." How very different that statement is to what Dr Tolba had to say in Brussels during the latter part of 1981 ..."However, in making my call today for a renewed commitment to the environment, I am conscious of the financial .constraints to action EEC nations now face. Western Europe on the eve of 1982 is in a different economic situation from that which pre-
10th Anniversary of Stockholm ConferenceThe 1982 Message Some progress which served only to show what could have been achieved. That in many ways sums up what I feel about the international community's performance in meeting the environmental challenges of the 1970s. Though we made some progress, for example, on tackling chemical pollution or on establishing international environment accords, in general the 1970s witnessed a serious global deterioration in the environment. Deserts continued to spread, soil continued to be eroded, tropical forests to be felled, marine resources to be used up, the carbon dioxide content in the atmosphere continued to rise, and many Third World cities expanded beyond their environmental limits. Above all, little headway was made in defeating p o v e r t y - - t h e cause of most of our environment problems. Ten years ago these problems worried me; they worry me even more now. In 1972 at the Stockholm UN Conference on the Human Environment 113 nations declared their intention to "safeguard and enhance the environment for present and future generations of man". Those nations agreed an Action Plan of 109 separate recommendations and set up U N E P - - t h e United Nations Environment P r o g r a m m e - - t o catalyze nations into putting the Plan into effect. So, although 6
vailed in 1972, the year of the Stockholm Conference. It was then assumed that Europeans' prosperity would increase with each passing year, but runaway inflation, market saturation, mounting unemployment and slowing rates of economic growth have undermined that assumption." In his message to this issue Dr Tolba states 'Ten years ago these problems worried me; they worry me even more now'. In dedicating this issue to Dr Tolba, we know that in the fight ahead, his dedication to the environment will not be in any doubt. The question is...what about ours? David Hughes-Evans
ten years ago we faced formidable problems we knew at least that governments had shown a willingness to tackle them as matter of top priority. In 1982 we find ourselves in very different circumstances. The problems we faced in 1972 have been compounded, and instead of stepping up efforts aimed at solving them we fred that the Stockholm commitment has begun to flag. In the face of the global economic recession the temptation has been for the international community to relegate the environment to a position of secondary importance. A dangerous, short-sighted development which has not gone unnoticed by the UN General Assembly. In 1980 and 1981, the Assembly called on UNEP to convene a global environment conference in Nairobi in May 1982 to coincide with the tenth anniversary of Stockholm. The Nairobi "Session of a Special Character of the UNEP Governing Council" will be a meeting of all UN member states intended to provide a platform for those states to reaffirm their commitment to the principles of Stockholm and to the further implementation of the Action Plan. Another reason for holding the Nalrobi conference is to take a closer look at the Stockholm Declaration and see how our understanding, our 'perceptions' of the environment have altered. These include such areas as interdependence between States, interconnexions between various parts of the environment, alternative lifestyles and patterns of development, environmental uncertainties and the interrelationships of people, resources, environment and development. The Environmentalist
This does not mean, however, that UNEP is advocating a rewrite of the Stockholm Plan of Action. Many of the problems and challenges it identified are as relevant today as they were a decade ago. It can be adapted to meet changing circumstances--but the underlying principles are themselves unchanging, and unchangeable. The Session of a Special Character will also have to decide a series of basic questions. Is the environment programme to be advanced or retarded ? Do we learn from the mistakes of the past, build on the progress we have made so far, and move forward better prepared and equipped? Or do we begin to run the programme down, and thereby begin to falter on the responsibilities handed down to us by the Stockholm conference ?
Ten years ago these problems worried me; they worry me even more n o w UNEP has made thorough preparations for the Session of a Special Character and for the Governing Council that follows immediately afterwards. To assist the process of decisionmaking by governments, UNEP is tabling only one short paper of about 70 pages. Entitled "The Environment in 1982: Retrospect and Prospect", the paper summarises the other more substantive documents which will be debated by the regular Governing Council Session. The paper summarises the major developments in the environment field and in the state of the environment over the previous ten years, a look forward to the major environmental trends we foresee for the next ten years and a series of suggested actions to meet the challenges of the 1980s. UNEP is not looking for states attending the Nairobi Conference to make a series of general statements about the importance of the environment, but will be asking governments instead to make practical commitments which will have the effect of putting the environment back at the top of the international agenda for action. This means, for example, that they should make environment a first consideration in their bilateral aid programmes; it means more emphasis should be given to national environment legislation; it means that more resources should be channelled into environmental research and monitoring which enable us to forecast future trends that in turn assist us to manage the environment properly. Vol. 2, No. 1 (1982)
The Session of a Special Character will decide the course not only of the environment movement, but of UNEP. In the main document we have reviewed the international performance, and our own, in implementing the Plan of Action. We have been candid about UNEP's successes and failures. This is not a new departure: at the nine annual Governing Council Sessions we have always told the truth. UNEP, firstly under Maurice Strong's leadership, and since 1976 under my own, has always been strongly of the opinion that if we fail to give an objective picture we lose credibility with governments. And by examining the reasons for the failures we'll know not to make the same mistakes again. UNEP was the very first UN agency to be headquartered in the developing world. Starting from scratch and lacking many of the technical back-up facilities which other UN agencies located together in major capital cities enjoy, we experienced many teething troubles. But by the mid-70s we were in full stride. The intervening years have seen UNEP--sometimes against considerable o d d s - - m a k e a series of achievements of which we are justifiably proud. Probably our most important overall success has been to raise the general level of environmental awareness in decision-making circles. The priority given to the environment in the New International Development Strategy and in the Brandt Report, the explosion in environmental legislation, the growing political strength of environment ministries, the growth in membership of the conservation conventions, the regional environment p a c t s - these can all be taken as evidence of an expansion in the priority decision-makers now give to the environment.
The studies have s h o w n that investment in protection measures can be shown to pay in hard cash terms UNEP has also logged a list of direct or specific achievements which I have only the space to touch on here. The International Register of Potentially Toxic Chemicals (IRPTC), the environmental emergency and anti-dumping accords, the INFOTERRA environmental sources service, the Regional Seas Programme and GEMS, our Global Environmental Monitoring Service, our Industry and Environment Programme--all rank as major UNEP success stories. 7
A recent UNEP success has been a programme of evaluation of environment protection measures carded out by certain governments. The programme has added a potent new argument in favour of environment protection because, to date, the studies have shown that investment in protection measures c a n be shown to p a y - - i n hard cash terms. For example, the results of a French study on 24 pollutants revealed that the cost of pollution in 1978 came to about four per cent of the GNP, whereas cost benefit analysis indicated that an investment in environmental protection of up to two per cent of the GNP could have saved those additional costs. Similar studies have produced parallel results in other countries. In Switzerland, Japan, USA and several more developed nations private industry is also beginning to discover that they can increase profits by retrieving pollutants. As a catalytic a g e n c y - - t h e role bequeathed to us by the Stockholm C o n f e r e n c e - - w e have also experienced considerable success in persuading UN agencies and other international institutions to make commitments to the environment. One of our main achievements was to promote the 1980 "Declaration on Environmental Policies and Procedures Relating to Economic Development" signed by the World Bank, the UNDP and seven more of the world's leading multilateral development financing agencies which between them spend more than US $14 billion on projects each year. The Declaration has since then been followed by the setting up of a committee of development institutions to review and monitor its implementation.
Reluctance of governments in recent years to provide UNEP with proper funding is our most serious problem Despite the advances which can be attributed to this catalytic function, it has appeared at times to us a thankless brief. Unlike, say, UNICEF or the World Health Organization we do not carry out field projects, so at the end of the day we cannot say we saved so many thousands of children from starvation or eradicated smallpox. UNEP can only persuade others to take action, and when the time comes for giving credit we are frequently overlooked. This failure to recognize UNEP's achievements matters only insofar as it may be one 8
reason for the reluctance of states to come forward with adequate funding. So at the Session of a Special Character we will be inviting governments to assess this catalytic role. Should it be modified or reinforced ? It will be up to them to decide. This reluctance of governments in recent years to provide UNEP with proper funding is our most serious problem. It is forcing us to cut back on all our activities. One of the problems weighing heaviest on my mind is meeting the expanding demands of the developing nations. We have invested a great deal of time and effort over the previous ten years in convincing the developing countries--where the problems posed by misuse of natural resources are most s e v e r e - - o f the importance of environmentaUy-sound development. In large measure we have succeeded so now they are making a series of reasonable demands on our environment programme only to find that we can meet only a fraction of those requirements. Going on recent trends, these nations at the Session of a Special Character will be demanding even more help. This is why at the Conference we will be looking to the industrialized and oil exporting nations to commit themselves to meet the desirable targets of the Environment Fund. Before making such a financial commitment governments will want to be sure UNEP i s - - i n straightforward terms--giving value for money. They will want to be apprised of the problems we foresee and, just as important, our solutions to those problems. They will want to know t o o - - a s I referred to earlier--the reasons for past failures, and they will want assurances that they will not happen again. The Retrospect and Prospect paper and the back-up documentation w i l l - - I am c e r t a i n - satisfy those reasonable demands. The documentation reveals that a number of the failures are attributable to governments themselves. Nations, for example, have not been ready to provide the data needed to set up a register of radioactive releases the feasibility of which was called for by the Stockholm Plan of Action. Similarly governments have been reluctant to conform to an important Stockholm principle which related to the use of shared natural resources. And, of course, not nearly enough progress has been made implementing the call for disarmament. The Action Plan also contained within it some seeds of failure. It is clear now from a distance of ten years that in the light of funds that were made available it was overly ambiThe Environmentalist
tius. Implementation might have gone ahead more quickly if the plan had conveyed a clearer sen.~e of priorities. Regrettably one of my biggest disappointments relates to an area of special interest to readers of The Environmentalist, namely public information. We can put forward a good argument for having convinced governments, international agencies of the importance of the environment, but not fully for the general public. Governments do not make decisions in a vacuum; they can obviously be influenced by the independent judgements of political constituencies--the mass of the people. At that level the environment movement needs new impetus, new expression and this can only come about through the educational system, NGOs and the media.
Two basic messages have failed to get through to the man in the street Since UNEP's inception our consistent plea has been "development without destruction". We have tried to justify this on the fact that a strategy of a sustained, rational use of living resources is economic commonsense. And equally consistently we have argued that just as the environment is the common property of all mankind, so are the problems. If nations want to have lasting solutions they must take concerted international action. Those two basic messages have failed to get through to the man in the street. In the industrialized countries, for instance, most people still continue to associate the term 'environment' with pollution and maybe nature conservation. One of the major tasks ahead in the next ten years for UNEP will be to redress this situation. I do not underestimate the difficulties. Most environmental NGOs are national-based and are concerned mostly with issues on their own doorstep. The media too often seem to give coverage to domestic issues at the expense of international coverage. I am confident that journalists and NGO representatives attending the Nairobi Conference will find the debates a rewarding experience and return home with a deeper conviction both of the relevance of sustainable development and the international dimension to their own countries. Until now media coverage of the environment has been limited. This relates closely to what constitutes a 'hard news story'. Most space and air time tends to be reserved for Vol. 2, No. 1 (1982)
'dramatic' happenings like doomsday predictions, oil spills or events which bring endangered wildlife species to extinction. But not all the signs are negative. The media coverage given to our annual state of the environment reports and to the launching in 1980 of the World Conservation Strategy has been very satisfactory. Similarly responsible stories emanating from UNEP-supported bodies like Earthscan and the Worldwatch Institute have regularly appeared in the press. Television and radio have also displayed a great deal of interest in the environment. A BBC documentary on our Mediterranean Action Plan, for example, has been seen around the world. However, the fact remains that the Western news agencies are not much interested in development stories. It is outside the editorial brief of this article to argue the case for or against the controversial New International Information Order, but certainly one of my major concerns is that more scope should be given to the kind of development stories the readership in Third World nations is interested in. A top priority not just for UNEP, but for the environment movement as a whole in the next ten years will be to focus more attention on environmental education. In schools and higher educational institutions inclusion of environmental studies as a separate activity or as part of the curricula is the exception rather than the rule. By the time of the second anniversary of Stockholm I would like that position to be reversed. There is no lack of priority afforded to environmental education in the Stockholm Action Plan. Recommendation 96 recognized education as being crucial to the vital task of improving the management of our environment. In UNEP's case it has been the familiar
A top priority in the next 10 years will be to focus more attention on environmental education story of trying to do too much with too few resources. Environmental education is such a broad field that there is a constant danger of spreading resources too thin. I have noted that other organizations have experienced difficulties in spreading the message. IUCN, for example, has made little secret of the fact that until very recently their Education Commission had made little impact. 9
But to return to my opening theme, there has been some progress. In 1977 the first Intergovernmental Conference on Environmental Education in Tbilisi in the USSR specified the nature, role, objectives and guiding principles for adoption at all levels. As a follow-up to that confererence the system wide International Environment Education Programme (IEEP) which led to Tbilisi was stepped up jointly by UNESCO and UNEP. IEEP's aim at its second phase is to catalyse national, regional and intemational activities towards implementation of the Tbilisi recommendations. Even optimists did not expect Environmental Education, a life-long process, to take root in less than a decade considering the nature of the educational system. New approaches and ideas take time to fathom. This is more so since environmental education is not just an extra subject to be tacked on to the existing curriculum, it calls for an interdisciplinary approach which entails cooperation between the traditional disciplines essential to understandhag the complex problems of the environment and devising solutions to them. The present phase of our Environment Education Programme has resulted in several publications, seminars, workshops and conferences. Curricula and educational materials have been prepared, the training of teacher trainers, planners and administrators has also been undertaken in addition to the promotion of research and experimentation. Most progress in environmental education has been made at post-secondary level in the OECD countries. In the USA, 27 universities offered a degree or a major in environmental engineering in 1979, compared to only four before 1970. Several institutions also made welcome initiatives. Tufts University in the USA, for example, ran a series of lectures on the World Conservation Strategy which proved a great success. In the developing world, by contrast, very little progress has been made. This is partly due to lack of available funds, and partly due to lack of employment opportunities for environment specialists. This is worrying because unless the developing nations build up their indigenous environment expertise our goal of sound environmental management will remain illusive. There is enormous scope here for the international and bilateral aid agencies to help the developing nations to build up their local capacities. 10
The ever present danger is that the developed nations will unwittingly export their own environmental concerns which centre around pollution, nature conservation and so on. Teachers will have to be trained in, and teaching materials focus on, the special needs of poor nations which are concerned with development. UNEP, within the limits of scarce resources, has produced a series of publications aimed at meeting the special needs of the Third World (a list of available publications can be obtained by writing to our Publications Department, UNEP, Box 30552, Nairobi).
Most progress in environmental education has been made at postsecondary level The World Health Organization with its primary health care programme is still struggling to overturn Western ideas about medicine which centre on expensive urban-based hospital treatment and liberal use of expensive drugs. WHO's concentration on prevention rather than cure finds a parallelin the environment, and UNEP accordingly faces similar problems which relate to my concern, already referred to, about meeting the demands of the developing nations on our environment programme. Much attention at the forthcoming Session of a Special Character will be focussed on what UNEP conceives to be the major trends for the next ten to fifteen years and our suggested courses of action. I have space here to give a very brief outline of our findings. Marine environment: UNEP has found that while there is no evidence of serious pollution of open oceans, coastal waters--which provide 90 per cent of the world's fish c a t c h - have been exposed to increasing threats from industrial contamination and unsound development. A major threat in the 1980s will be posed by offshore oil and mineral extraction. We are advocating formulation of guidelines for coastal development, more emphasis on multilateral fisheries management, development of mariculture and aquaculture and increased support for our expanding Regional Seas Programme. Atmosphere: The main concern here is the continuing build up of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere caused by the burning of increased quantities of fossil fuels, chiefly coal. This could result in a global warming which, if it The Environmentalist
occurs, will certainly affect food production. More research and monitoring is called for to shed light on climatic uncertainties. There is also the perceived threat to the ozone layer from chlorofluorocarbons; an ozone convention is currently being negotiated. Energy: The well-being of the atmosphere is inseparable from the kinds of energy policies nations pursue over the next decade. UNEP is promoting sound energy policies to meet increasing demand while minimizing the threat to the environment. Such policies should be based on using the most appropriate mixes of existing energy sources, applying sound renewable energies and a fourfold increase in tree planting. Terrestrial environment: If nations follow such an energy policy they will also help to preserve the tree cover which in turn protects soil and keeps back the advancing deserts. To preserve terrestrial bioproductive systems UNEP is urging nations, among other activities, to adopt and implement a plan of action for the protection and sustainable use of tropical forests; to implement the recommendations of the World Conservation Strategy; to formulate a soils action plan; and to step up efforts to implement the 1977 desertification strategy. Water." Freshwater constitutes roughly one thousandth of the Planet's water supplies. The heavy demands for irrigation, industrial and domestic uses on those limited supplies will continue. Already some West Asian countries are being forced to withdraw fossilised supplies. UNEP is vigorously promoting the development of intemational guidelines for water management. There is also a need for regular assessments of global water needs. Health. Contaminated water is the cause of a large proportion of the diseases in the developing world. UNEP is advocating strong support for the aims of WHO's Drinking Water Supply and Sanitation Decade. This should be complemented by continued support for WHO's immunisation programme against the six major infectious diseases. Human health is also endangered by the release of chemicals and other dangerous substances into the atmosphere. To combat this threat we are asking nations to develop controls on trade and dumping of hazardous substances. Settlements. In the developing world cities will continue to expand. Today there are 22 cities in the Third World with a population of 4 million or more, at the turn of the century there could be 60. Many of the problems of Vol. 2. No. 1 (1982)
human settlements--poverty, overcrowding, disease, c r i m e - - s t e m from their exceeding their environmental limits. UNEP is promoting the development of, and application of, environmentally sound new systems of settlement planning, building technology and service provision. Peace and security: Though numerous arms limitation agreements testify to a widespread desire to stop the arms race, the expenditure on weapons continues to increase. Modern warfare constitutes the greatest single threat to the human environment. At the Session of a Special Character we will renew the Stockholm call for nations to disarm. All the solutions to projected environment problems come under the blanket call for environmentally sound development. The developed nations can play a major role in promoting sustainable development by making sure their country-to-country aid programmes contain provisions for preparing an environmental impact assessment. UNEP is currently engaged in a project to turn environmental impact assessments into better management tools through defining a simplified cost effective format for impact statements. At the Nairobi conference we will be looking to the developed nations to make a commitment to the environment in their overseas assistance programmes.
Modern warfare constitute the greatest single threat to the human environment Looking to the future, I believe the present laxity over environmental problems will not continue inspite of the existing economic difficulties. There are clear signals that people in a large number of countries of our globe are becoming more and more concerned over the quality of the environment in which they live. This will in itself persuade governments to do more in the area of environmental protection. What I feel will be our major concern in UNEP in the next decade of its life is the spreading of the message to the grassroots--not only of concern over the quality of life now but of the impact of the present styles and patterns of irrational use of natural resources on the quality of life in the years to c o m e - - e v e n on human survival itself. Such understanding is basic if we are to ensure that our only one 11
earth is going to be handed over intact to the future generation. I am confident that people, governments, inter-governmental and nongovernmental organizations will intensify their
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most appreciated support to UNEP to achieve this goal. Mostafa K. Tolba Executive-Director, UNEP, Nairobi, Kenya
77~e Environmentalist
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Dedication to Dr Mostafa Kamal Tolba The editors of The Environmentalist, are proud to dedicate this, the first issue of 1982, to Dr Mostafa Tolba, Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), and through him to UNEP itself. This year marks the 10th anniversary of the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment (Stockholm, 1972) and therefore of the formation of UNEP. Mostafa Tolba became the Executive Director in 1975, having been deputy to Maurice Strong for three years. Dr Mostafa Tolba began his professional life as a scientist, and a most distinguished scientist at that. He graduated in botany from the University of Cairo, and later obtained a doctorate in plant pathology from Imperial College, the University of London. In ten years he was awarded the prize as Egypt's most distinguished botanist. During his relatively short academic life he was author of over 100 major scientific papers in international journals, covering plant pathology, mycology and virology. He became Professor of Microbiology at the National Research Centre, and at a later date, Professor with a Chair in Microbiology at the University of Cairo. For most people, more than a life's work. Not so for Mostafa Tolba, he had wide interests in policy and in the politics of science, and in the field of politics in general. He served as Secretary-General of the National Science Council of Egypt, and President of the Egyptian Academy of Science, Research and Technology. He also became UnderSecretary of State, Minister of Higher Education, Minister of Youth, as well as a top political aide of Anwar Sadat, when the late Egyptian leader was Vice-President. With such background and experience, it was no wonder that he was appointed Executive Director of UNEP, and to become the person in 1982 with the greatest responsibility for the global environment. A person so outstandingly qualified for such responsibility, and a person (as all who know him well recognize) with such dedication for the care of the environment, and for all people who live within that environment. Dr Tolba is not merely an administrator of a UN Agency, he is involved philosophically, politically and socially. He internationally personifies what needs to be done, and what has to be done. 0251-1088/82]0000-0000/$02.75
His feeling and care has been recognised by decorations from twelve countries. He has also been awarded the Honorary Degree of Doctor of Moscow University in recognition of services to the world in the field of Environment. One of Dr Tolba's great contributions has been in convincing the developing countries that there was no irreconcilable conflict between a concern for the environment and development. That was a great achievement; now he has an even greater task of persuading the industrial countries to provide the necessary financial backing to the work of UNEP. For a person who firmly believes that 'Environmental decisions are inseparable from political decisions', one has the feeling that he will be successful. However, the concern of governments is different today from that in 1976. In 1976, expressing a 'cautious optimism' about the future of the environment, Dr Tolba said that both the industrialized world and the developing countries are now "fully aware of the impact of their activities on the environment. They are keen on establishing strong
The Environmentalist, 2 (1982) 5 - 12
© Elsevier Sequoia/Printed in The Netherlands
environmental controls. Many have put environmental protection into their constitutions. New national legislation is being passed all over the world. International conventions and treaties are being signed. All this is proof that governments and people are increasingly determined to protect and to improve their environment." How very different that statement is to what Dr Tolba had to say in Brussels during the latter part of 1981 ..."However, in making my call today for a renewed commitment to the environment, I am conscious of the financial .constraints to action EEC nations now face. Western Europe on the eve of 1982 is in a different economic situation from that which pre-
10th Anniversary of Stockholm ConferenceThe 1982 Message Some progress which served only to show what could have been achieved. That in many ways sums up what I feel about the international community's performance in meeting the environmental challenges of the 1970s. Though we made some progress, for example, on tackling chemical pollution or on establishing international environment accords, in general the 1970s witnessed a serious global deterioration in the environment. Deserts continued to spread, soil continued to be eroded, tropical forests to be felled, marine resources to be used up, the carbon dioxide content in the atmosphere continued to rise, and many Third World cities expanded beyond their environmental limits. Above all, little headway was made in defeating p o v e r t y - - t h e cause of most of our environment problems. Ten years ago these problems worried me; they worry me even more now. In 1972 at the Stockholm UN Conference on the Human Environment 113 nations declared their intention to "safeguard and enhance the environment for present and future generations of man". Those nations agreed an Action Plan of 109 separate recommendations and set up U N E P - - t h e United Nations Environment P r o g r a m m e - - t o catalyze nations into putting the Plan into effect. So, although 6
vailed in 1972, the year of the Stockholm Conference. It was then assumed that Europeans' prosperity would increase with each passing year, but runaway inflation, market saturation, mounting unemployment and slowing rates of economic growth have undermined that assumption." In his message to this issue Dr Tolba states 'Ten years ago these problems worried me; they worry me even more now'. In dedicating this issue to Dr Tolba, we know that in the fight ahead, his dedication to the environment will not be in any doubt. The question is...what about ours? David Hughes-Evans
ten years ago we faced formidable problems we knew at least that governments had shown a willingness to tackle them as matter of top priority. In 1982 we find ourselves in very different circumstances. The problems we faced in 1972 have been compounded, and instead of stepping up efforts aimed at solving them we fred that the Stockholm commitment has begun to flag. In the face of the global economic recession the temptation has been for the international community to relegate the environment to a position of secondary importance. A dangerous, short-sighted development which has not gone unnoticed by the UN General Assembly. In 1980 and 1981, the Assembly called on UNEP to convene a global environment conference in Nairobi in May 1982 to coincide with the tenth anniversary of Stockholm. The Nairobi "Session of a Special Character of the UNEP Governing Council" will be a meeting of all UN member states intended to provide a platform for those states to reaffirm their commitment to the principles of Stockholm and to the further implementation of the Action Plan. Another reason for holding the Nalrobi conference is to take a closer look at the Stockholm Declaration and see how our understanding, our 'perceptions' of the environment have altered. These include such areas as interdependence between States, interconnexions between various parts of the environment, alternative lifestyles and patterns of development, environmental uncertainties and the interrelationships of people, resources, environment and development. The Environmentalist
This does not mean, however, that UNEP is advocating a rewrite of the Stockholm Plan of Action. Many of the problems and challenges it identified are as relevant today as they were a decade ago. It can be adapted to meet changing circumstances--but the underlying principles are themselves unchanging, and unchangeable. The Session of a Special Character will also have to decide a series of basic questions. Is the environment programme to be advanced or retarded ? Do we learn from the mistakes of the past, build on the progress we have made so far, and move forward better prepared and equipped? Or do we begin to run the programme down, and thereby begin to falter on the responsibilities handed down to us by the Stockholm conference ?
Ten years ago these problems worried me; they worry me even more n o w UNEP has made thorough preparations for the Session of a Special Character and for the Governing Council that follows immediately afterwards. To assist the process of decisionmaking by governments, UNEP is tabling only one short paper of about 70 pages. Entitled "The Environment in 1982: Retrospect and Prospect", the paper summarises the other more substantive documents which will be debated by the regular Governing Council Session. The paper summarises the major developments in the environment field and in the state of the environment over the previous ten years, a look forward to the major environmental trends we foresee for the next ten years and a series of suggested actions to meet the challenges of the 1980s. UNEP is not looking for states attending the Nairobi Conference to make a series of general statements about the importance of the environment, but will be asking governments instead to make practical commitments which will have the effect of putting the environment back at the top of the international agenda for action. This means, for example, that they should make environment a first consideration in their bilateral aid programmes; it means more emphasis should be given to national environment legislation; it means that more resources should be channelled into environmental research and monitoring which enable us to forecast future trends that in turn assist us to manage the environment properly. Vol. 2, No. 1 (1982)
The Session of a Special Character will decide the course not only of the environment movement, but of UNEP. In the main document we have reviewed the international performance, and our own, in implementing the Plan of Action. We have been candid about UNEP's successes and failures. This is not a new departure: at the nine annual Governing Council Sessions we have always told the truth. UNEP, firstly under Maurice Strong's leadership, and since 1976 under my own, has always been strongly of the opinion that if we fail to give an objective picture we lose credibility with governments. And by examining the reasons for the failures we'll know not to make the same mistakes again. UNEP was the very first UN agency to be headquartered in the developing world. Starting from scratch and lacking many of the technical back-up facilities which other UN agencies located together in major capital cities enjoy, we experienced many teething troubles. But by the mid-70s we were in full stride. The intervening years have seen UNEP--sometimes against considerable o d d s - - m a k e a series of achievements of which we are justifiably proud. Probably our most important overall success has been to raise the general level of environmental awareness in decision-making circles. The priority given to the environment in the New International Development Strategy and in the Brandt Report, the explosion in environmental legislation, the growing political strength of environment ministries, the growth in membership of the conservation conventions, the regional environment p a c t s - these can all be taken as evidence of an expansion in the priority decision-makers now give to the environment.
The studies have s h o w n that investment in protection measures can be shown to pay in hard cash terms UNEP has also logged a list of direct or specific achievements which I have only the space to touch on here. The International Register of Potentially Toxic Chemicals (IRPTC), the environmental emergency and anti-dumping accords, the INFOTERRA environmental sources service, the Regional Seas Programme and GEMS, our Global Environmental Monitoring Service, our Industry and Environment Programme--all rank as major UNEP success stories. 7
A recent UNEP success has been a programme of evaluation of environment protection measures carded out by certain governments. The programme has added a potent new argument in favour of environment protection because, to date, the studies have shown that investment in protection measures c a n be shown to p a y - - i n hard cash terms. For example, the results of a French study on 24 pollutants revealed that the cost of pollution in 1978 came to about four per cent of the GNP, whereas cost benefit analysis indicated that an investment in environmental protection of up to two per cent of the GNP could have saved those additional costs. Similar studies have produced parallel results in other countries. In Switzerland, Japan, USA and several more developed nations private industry is also beginning to discover that they can increase profits by retrieving pollutants. As a catalytic a g e n c y - - t h e role bequeathed to us by the Stockholm C o n f e r e n c e - - w e have also experienced considerable success in persuading UN agencies and other international institutions to make commitments to the environment. One of our main achievements was to promote the 1980 "Declaration on Environmental Policies and Procedures Relating to Economic Development" signed by the World Bank, the UNDP and seven more of the world's leading multilateral development financing agencies which between them spend more than US $14 billion on projects each year. The Declaration has since then been followed by the setting up of a committee of development institutions to review and monitor its implementation.
Reluctance of governments in recent years to provide UNEP with proper funding is our most serious problem Despite the advances which can be attributed to this catalytic function, it has appeared at times to us a thankless brief. Unlike, say, UNICEF or the World Health Organization we do not carry out field projects, so at the end of the day we cannot say we saved so many thousands of children from starvation or eradicated smallpox. UNEP can only persuade others to take action, and when the time comes for giving credit we are frequently overlooked. This failure to recognize UNEP's achievements matters only insofar as it may be one 8
reason for the reluctance of states to come forward with adequate funding. So at the Session of a Special Character we will be inviting governments to assess this catalytic role. Should it be modified or reinforced ? It will be up to them to decide. This reluctance of governments in recent years to provide UNEP with proper funding is our most serious problem. It is forcing us to cut back on all our activities. One of the problems weighing heaviest on my mind is meeting the expanding demands of the developing nations. We have invested a great deal of time and effort over the previous ten years in convincing the developing countries--where the problems posed by misuse of natural resources are most s e v e r e - - o f the importance of environmentaUy-sound development. In large measure we have succeeded so now they are making a series of reasonable demands on our environment programme only to find that we can meet only a fraction of those requirements. Going on recent trends, these nations at the Session of a Special Character will be demanding even more help. This is why at the Conference we will be looking to the industrialized and oil exporting nations to commit themselves to meet the desirable targets of the Environment Fund. Before making such a financial commitment governments will want to be sure UNEP i s - - i n straightforward terms--giving value for money. They will want to be apprised of the problems we foresee and, just as important, our solutions to those problems. They will want to know t o o - - a s I referred to earlier--the reasons for past failures, and they will want assurances that they will not happen again. The Retrospect and Prospect paper and the back-up documentation w i l l - - I am c e r t a i n - satisfy those reasonable demands. The documentation reveals that a number of the failures are attributable to governments themselves. Nations, for example, have not been ready to provide the data needed to set up a register of radioactive releases the feasibility of which was called for by the Stockholm Plan of Action. Similarly governments have been reluctant to conform to an important Stockholm principle which related to the use of shared natural resources. And, of course, not nearly enough progress has been made implementing the call for disarmament. The Action Plan also contained within it some seeds of failure. It is clear now from a distance of ten years that in the light of funds that were made available it was overly ambiThe Environmentalist
tius. Implementation might have gone ahead more quickly if the plan had conveyed a clearer sen.~e of priorities. Regrettably one of my biggest disappointments relates to an area of special interest to readers of The Environmentalist, namely public information. We can put forward a good argument for having convinced governments, international agencies of the importance of the environment, but not fully for the general public. Governments do not make decisions in a vacuum; they can obviously be influenced by the independent judgements of political constituencies--the mass of the people. At that level the environment movement needs new impetus, new expression and this can only come about through the educational system, NGOs and the media.
Two basic messages have failed to get through to the man in the street Since UNEP's inception our consistent plea has been "development without destruction". We have tried to justify this on the fact that a strategy of a sustained, rational use of living resources is economic commonsense. And equally consistently we have argued that just as the environment is the common property of all mankind, so are the problems. If nations want to have lasting solutions they must take concerted international action. Those two basic messages have failed to get through to the man in the street. In the industrialized countries, for instance, most people still continue to associate the term 'environment' with pollution and maybe nature conservation. One of the major tasks ahead in the next ten years for UNEP will be to redress this situation. I do not underestimate the difficulties. Most environmental NGOs are national-based and are concerned mostly with issues on their own doorstep. The media too often seem to give coverage to domestic issues at the expense of international coverage. I am confident that journalists and NGO representatives attending the Nairobi Conference will find the debates a rewarding experience and return home with a deeper conviction both of the relevance of sustainable development and the international dimension to their own countries. Until now media coverage of the environment has been limited. This relates closely to what constitutes a 'hard news story'. Most space and air time tends to be reserved for Vol. 2, No. 1 (1982)
'dramatic' happenings like doomsday predictions, oil spills or events which bring endangered wildlife species to extinction. But not all the signs are negative. The media coverage given to our annual state of the environment reports and to the launching in 1980 of the World Conservation Strategy has been very satisfactory. Similarly responsible stories emanating from UNEP-supported bodies like Earthscan and the Worldwatch Institute have regularly appeared in the press. Television and radio have also displayed a great deal of interest in the environment. A BBC documentary on our Mediterranean Action Plan, for example, has been seen around the world. However, the fact remains that the Western news agencies are not much interested in development stories. It is outside the editorial brief of this article to argue the case for or against the controversial New International Information Order, but certainly one of my major concerns is that more scope should be given to the kind of development stories the readership in Third World nations is interested in. A top priority not just for UNEP, but for the environment movement as a whole in the next ten years will be to focus more attention on environmental education. In schools and higher educational institutions inclusion of environmental studies as a separate activity or as part of the curricula is the exception rather than the rule. By the time of the second anniversary of Stockholm I would like that position to be reversed. There is no lack of priority afforded to environmental education in the Stockholm Action Plan. Recommendation 96 recognized education as being crucial to the vital task of improving the management of our environment. In UNEP's case it has been the familiar
A top priority in the next 10 years will be to focus more attention on environmental education story of trying to do too much with too few resources. Environmental education is such a broad field that there is a constant danger of spreading resources too thin. I have noted that other organizations have experienced difficulties in spreading the message. IUCN, for example, has made little secret of the fact that until very recently their Education Commission had made little impact. 9
But to return to my opening theme, there has been some progress. In 1977 the first Intergovernmental Conference on Environmental Education in Tbilisi in the USSR specified the nature, role, objectives and guiding principles for adoption at all levels. As a follow-up to that confererence the system wide International Environment Education Programme (IEEP) which led to Tbilisi was stepped up jointly by UNESCO and UNEP. IEEP's aim at its second phase is to catalyse national, regional and intemational activities towards implementation of the Tbilisi recommendations. Even optimists did not expect Environmental Education, a life-long process, to take root in less than a decade considering the nature of the educational system. New approaches and ideas take time to fathom. This is more so since environmental education is not just an extra subject to be tacked on to the existing curriculum, it calls for an interdisciplinary approach which entails cooperation between the traditional disciplines essential to understandhag the complex problems of the environment and devising solutions to them. The present phase of our Environment Education Programme has resulted in several publications, seminars, workshops and conferences. Curricula and educational materials have been prepared, the training of teacher trainers, planners and administrators has also been undertaken in addition to the promotion of research and experimentation. Most progress in environmental education has been made at post-secondary level in the OECD countries. In the USA, 27 universities offered a degree or a major in environmental engineering in 1979, compared to only four before 1970. Several institutions also made welcome initiatives. Tufts University in the USA, for example, ran a series of lectures on the World Conservation Strategy which proved a great success. In the developing world, by contrast, very little progress has been made. This is partly due to lack of available funds, and partly due to lack of employment opportunities for environment specialists. This is worrying because unless the developing nations build up their indigenous environment expertise our goal of sound environmental management will remain illusive. There is enormous scope here for the international and bilateral aid agencies to help the developing nations to build up their local capacities. 10
The ever present danger is that the developed nations will unwittingly export their own environmental concerns which centre around pollution, nature conservation and so on. Teachers will have to be trained in, and teaching materials focus on, the special needs of poor nations which are concerned with development. UNEP, within the limits of scarce resources, has produced a series of publications aimed at meeting the special needs of the Third World (a list of available publications can be obtained by writing to our Publications Department, UNEP, Box 30552, Nairobi).
Most progress in environmental education has been made at postsecondary level The World Health Organization with its primary health care programme is still struggling to overturn Western ideas about medicine which centre on expensive urban-based hospital treatment and liberal use of expensive drugs. WHO's concentration on prevention rather than cure finds a parallelin the environment, and UNEP accordingly faces similar problems which relate to my concern, already referred to, about meeting the demands of the developing nations on our environment programme. Much attention at the forthcoming Session of a Special Character will be focussed on what UNEP conceives to be the major trends for the next ten to fifteen years and our suggested courses of action. I have space here to give a very brief outline of our findings. Marine environment: UNEP has found that while there is no evidence of serious pollution of open oceans, coastal waters--which provide 90 per cent of the world's fish c a t c h - have been exposed to increasing threats from industrial contamination and unsound development. A major threat in the 1980s will be posed by offshore oil and mineral extraction. We are advocating formulation of guidelines for coastal development, more emphasis on multilateral fisheries management, development of mariculture and aquaculture and increased support for our expanding Regional Seas Programme. Atmosphere: The main concern here is the continuing build up of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere caused by the burning of increased quantities of fossil fuels, chiefly coal. This could result in a global warming which, if it The Environmentalist
occurs, will certainly affect food production. More research and monitoring is called for to shed light on climatic uncertainties. There is also the perceived threat to the ozone layer from chlorofluorocarbons; an ozone convention is currently being negotiated. Energy: The well-being of the atmosphere is inseparable from the kinds of energy policies nations pursue over the next decade. UNEP is promoting sound energy policies to meet increasing demand while minimizing the threat to the environment. Such policies should be based on using the most appropriate mixes of existing energy sources, applying sound renewable energies and a fourfold increase in tree planting. Terrestrial environment: If nations follow such an energy policy they will also help to preserve the tree cover which in turn protects soil and keeps back the advancing deserts. To preserve terrestrial bioproductive systems UNEP is urging nations, among other activities, to adopt and implement a plan of action for the protection and sustainable use of tropical forests; to implement the recommendations of the World Conservation Strategy; to formulate a soils action plan; and to step up efforts to implement the 1977 desertification strategy. Water." Freshwater constitutes roughly one thousandth of the Planet's water supplies. The heavy demands for irrigation, industrial and domestic uses on those limited supplies will continue. Already some West Asian countries are being forced to withdraw fossilised supplies. UNEP is vigorously promoting the development of intemational guidelines for water management. There is also a need for regular assessments of global water needs. Health. Contaminated water is the cause of a large proportion of the diseases in the developing world. UNEP is advocating strong support for the aims of WHO's Drinking Water Supply and Sanitation Decade. This should be complemented by continued support for WHO's immunisation programme against the six major infectious diseases. Human health is also endangered by the release of chemicals and other dangerous substances into the atmosphere. To combat this threat we are asking nations to develop controls on trade and dumping of hazardous substances. Settlements. In the developing world cities will continue to expand. Today there are 22 cities in the Third World with a population of 4 million or more, at the turn of the century there could be 60. Many of the problems of Vol. 2. No. 1 (1982)
human settlements--poverty, overcrowding, disease, c r i m e - - s t e m from their exceeding their environmental limits. UNEP is promoting the development of, and application of, environmentally sound new systems of settlement planning, building technology and service provision. Peace and security: Though numerous arms limitation agreements testify to a widespread desire to stop the arms race, the expenditure on weapons continues to increase. Modern warfare constitutes the greatest single threat to the human environment. At the Session of a Special Character we will renew the Stockholm call for nations to disarm. All the solutions to projected environment problems come under the blanket call for environmentally sound development. The developed nations can play a major role in promoting sustainable development by making sure their country-to-country aid programmes contain provisions for preparing an environmental impact assessment. UNEP is currently engaged in a project to turn environmental impact assessments into better management tools through defining a simplified cost effective format for impact statements. At the Nairobi conference we will be looking to the developed nations to make a commitment to the environment in their overseas assistance programmes.
Modern warfare constitute the greatest single threat to the human environment Looking to the future, I believe the present laxity over environmental problems will not continue inspite of the existing economic difficulties. There are clear signals that people in a large number of countries of our globe are becoming more and more concerned over the quality of the environment in which they live. This will in itself persuade governments to do more in the area of environmental protection. What I feel will be our major concern in UNEP in the next decade of its life is the spreading of the message to the grassroots--not only of concern over the quality of life now but of the impact of the present styles and patterns of irrational use of natural resources on the quality of life in the years to c o m e - - e v e n on human survival itself. Such understanding is basic if we are to ensure that our only one 11
earth is going to be handed over intact to the future generation. I am confident that people, governments, inter-governmental and nongovernmental organizations will intensify their
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most appreciated support to UNEP to achieve this goal. Mostafa K. Tolba Executive-Director, UNEP, Nairobi, Kenya
77~e Environmentalist