JOHANNESBURG - South Africa has said it is confident that the United States would not torpedo a global action plan for environmentally sustainable development to be adopted at a U.N. summit in Johannesburg.
Environmental groups have voiced concern that the United States and oil exporting nations will try to scale down the World Summit on Sustainable Development's action plan because of fears about the impact it could have on business and profits. But South African Environment and Tourism Minister Valli Moosa in an interview with Reuters late this week dismissed such concerns as premature and said he and his ministry were working closely with the Americans to ensure the summit is a success.
"At this stage I have no reason to believe that any such thing will happen," Moosa told Reuters when asked if he thought the U.S. might hijack the agenda by attempting to water it down.
"We are reasonably confident that the United States will grasp the opportunity that the summit offers the world," Moosa said in an interview.
John Turner, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Oceans and International Environmental and Scientific Affairs, is meeting South African officials yesterday to discuss the summit and some of the issues that will be raised.
Potentially divisive issues include climate change, with the United States in the spotlight because of its rejection of the 1997 Kyoto Treaty.
This commits developed countries to cut their greenhouse gas emissions linked to global warming, particularly carbon dioxide from fossil fuel burning, by an average of five percent of 1990 levels by 2012.
"I don't think that climate change will come up in a way that derails the conference," Moosa said.
"Kyoto is being ratified by many countries and it is not the only international agreement that the United States is not a party to," he said.
Moosa said the conference, which South Africa is co-hosting under the auspices of his ministry and is a follow-up to the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, would focus on measurable targets and concrete programmes for reducing poverty while minimising the impact of development on the environment.
"Following on the United Nations Millennium Declaration, we will try to find concrete proposals to meet its goal of reducing by half the proportion of people whose income is less than one dollar a day by 2015," Moosa said.
"The summit will send out a message of hope to developing countries and the marginalised people of the world," he said.
The summit, to be held from August 26 to September 4 in Johannesburg, is expected to be attended by more than 60,000 delegates, environmental activists and business leaders and over 100 heads of state.:
