Opening Remarks during the High-Level Segment: Turning Commitments to ActionPaula Dobriansky,
Under Secretary for Democracy and Global Affairs
Remarks to at the 15th Session of the UN Commission on Sustainable Development
New York City
May 9, 2007Mr. Chairman, please allow me to express our appreciation for your leadership and hard work in ensuring a productive and action-oriented Policy Year of the UN Commission on Sustainable Development's 2005-2007 Energy Cycle. Under your Chairmanship, the CSD has delivered a number of important achievements, and the United States commends you and your team for your efforts.
I am pleased that the Secretary-General joined us today. For the past five years, this body has been a leading example of UN reform efforts and we encourage the Secretary-General and his team to take note of the innovative work of the CSD and replicate its best practices throughout the UN system.
And, it is a pleasure to see Dr. Brundtland here. Dr. Brundtland, your efforts twenty years ago continue to have a profound impact on the international community. Thanks to your World Commission on Environment and Development, the international community has developed an impressive policy blueprint for pursuing economic development, social development, and environmental stewardship – the three pillars of sustainable development.
The theme of today's session – “Turning Commitments to Action” – underscores the unique challenge and opportunity before this Commission. As we have said throughout this two-year cycle, the measure of success for the UN Commission on Sustainable Development is whether we translate the blueprint that Dr. Brundtland inspired into concrete action that delivers on-the-ground results that improve lives.
By that measure, this two-year cycle represents one of the Commission's most successful efforts to date.
First, during this cycle, the partnerships launched at the 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development have helped us make significant progress toward increasing access to modern, clean, healthy, and efficient energy services. Moreover, these partnerships are now pursuing ambitious future actions. Here are a few examples:
- The Partnership for Clean Fuels and Vehicles assisted Sub-Saharan African countries in phasing out leaded gasoline by the end of 2005. This partnership has now set its sights on a global leaded gasoline phase-out by 2008.
- Organizations involved in the Partnership for Clean Indoor Air have helped 1.3 million households adopt cleaner cooking and heating practices since 2003. Currently, these partners are aiming to assist 6.6 million households by 2010.
- Through U.S. Government support for the Global Village Energy Partnership and other programs from 2002 to 2005, over 19 million people received increased access to modern energy services. By 2012, the Global Village Energy Partnership is seeking to assist 7,000 small and medium energy enterprises, benefiting 4.5 million people.
Second, a number of new partnerships have been launched during this cycle. These include:
- The International Biofuels Forum;
- The Global Bioenergy Partnership;
- and the UNEP Global Partnership for Reduction of Mercury Emissions from Coal-Fired Utilities.
Third, governments have launched a number of initiatives at the national level that aim to deliver concrete results. For example, in January this year, President Bush set a goal of reducing U.S. gasoline consumption by 20 percent in the next 10 years, and issued an Executive Order committing U.S. Government agencies to reduce their energy intensity 30% by 2015. And, as Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice announced last week, the United States looks forward to hosting the Washington International Renewable Energy Conference in March 2008.
Fourth, CSD participants have submitted more than 200 case studies into the CSD Matrix; a practical knowledge-sharing tool with lessons learned and best practices from all corners of the globe. As with the Matrix created during the CSD Water Cycle, the United States hopes that the CSD Secretariat can work with partners to continue to develop this web-based tool.
Fifth, the CSD Learning Center has yet again showcased an innovative way of doing business at the United Nations, providing capacity-building training to hundreds of CSD delegates.
These successes notwithstanding, we still have much more work to do in the coming months and years to increase access to modern, clean, healthy, and efficient energy services. The United States looks forward to continuing to work with our partners across the globe to replicate and scale up the best practices identified during this cycle.
And, moments after we close the door on this CSD cycle, we will open the next two-year cycle. The sectoral themes of the 2007-2009 cycle—agriculture, rural development, drought, desertification, and land—are critical components of the sustainable development equation and strongly interlinked with the topics from our last two cycles. The coming cycle also provides a special opportunity to focus on the urgent needs of the African continent, where more than 300 million people lack access to safe drinking water, more than 500 million people lack access to electricity, and nearly 200 million are undernourished.
Looking back at the past 104 weeks, we can point to a number of factors that contributed to our shared success, not least the goodwill and active participation from governments, international organizations, and major groups. Our shared focus on identifying best practices and lessons learned provided a solid substantive basis for our deliberations, and we encourage the Bureau and the Secretariat to start early in the next cycle on a Web-based information-sharing tool similar to the CSD Matrix. Our discussions of partnerships have also been quite useful, and we encourage the regional commissions to consider incorporating partnerships into the upcoming Regional Implementation Forums. Finally, it is essential that all of us continue to focus on tangible, on-the-ground results as the measure of success for our partnerships, projects, and initiatives.
Mr. Chairman, we thank you for all you have done to make the successes of this two-year cycle possible. And, Dr. Brundtland, we hope that you take pride in the legacy you have created and its ongoing implementation.
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