If Agenda 21 is not implemented at the local, national, and regional levels, what happens internationally will be of limited consequence. The CSD has to find ways in which not only national level policy makers, but also local level NGOs and regional organizations are able to participate in the follow up to Rio and the implementation of Agenda 21.
"There are many paths towards sustainability and I think we should dispel whatever pre-conceived notions we may have in demanding perfection in every step of this process, and incorporate different speeds in trying to achieve a better situation for our world. Explicit national strategies will help achieve this goal." Henrique Cavalcanti
National reporting was the way the CSD chose to monitor progress at the national levels on implementation of Agenda 21. While many people, in the beginning, were very pessimistic whether or not any country would volunteer to present to the Commission information about its own successes and failures, the first substantive CSD session showed a great interest from governments to present their reports.
Reporting requirements, however, were still too vague to facilitate a comprehensive reporting process that not only would be of use to the CSD, but also to the people involved in making the report. According to Lars Hyttinen, who is responsible for processing the information from the national reports at the Secretariat of the CSD, "what has happened in the last five years is a simplification of the reporting process." Through this simplification it has become easier, over the years, to fill out the questionnaire supplied by the Secretariat and to compare the results from different countries. But even though much hard work has been put into streamlining the national reporting process, many additional changes were proposed by the people we interviewed.
Indicators for sustainable development
The discussion on the development of indicators for sustainable development has been generally seen as crucial to the long-term goal of achieving sustainable development, much less to measuring national success and failures through reporting. Nothing is more central to improving national reporting. These indicators will provide a basis for more accurate assessments and comparisons. Government representatives, North and South, expressed concern that the danger that lies behind these indicators, however, is that a set of indicators could work like a scorecard on which individual countries are graded. With accurate grading and evaluation, they would feel like they have to pass an exam in front of the world. This, of course, is precisely what many NGOs believe is needed. As the Secretary General stated in his report for CSD-4, the CSD should be not only a "platform for exchange of national experience"'. Joke Waller-Hunter recommends that: "some method of peer review during the CSD oral presentation would make the [national reporting] exercise more valid and interesting".
Many experts expressed support for trying to find a way of combining the reporting duties for different commissions and conventions, so that one annual or biannual comprehensive report reflects what is happening on a wide range of subjects. Establishing reporting requirements for the next five years to allow governments much longer time to prepare was one valuable suggestion.
NGO involvement in national reporting
Mentioned even more often than indicators was the need to include national NGOs in the preparation of the reports. Lack of citizen participation was often noted as key deficit in existing practices of preparing reports. Government officials, UN staff and NGOs agreed with this requirement for ensuring that the national reports are produced through an open, national, and even local, process. NGOs can be involved in a series of tasks, like gathering data and doing evaluations. Not only can they assist governments where resources for such assessments are scarce, but they will also ensure that the reports are more participatory and gain more credibility.
"In the beginning of the next five year process we need to set up the national reporting requirements for those next five years. Governments will know what to do years beforehand, so they can set up national processes, with enough major group involvement." Felix Dodds
General comments on national reports
"It's a simple question but the answer is not so simple. We would like to see a reporting system that is more focused on general trends... Another point is the way in which the national reports are used. They tend to be focused on the answers of individual countries instead of the answers of specific issues. So you don't get an overview of trends, but a lot of scorecards, which makes it very difficult for countries to answer the questionnaire, because they feel that they are being tested. This problem can be made more serious by the introduction of indicators of sustainable development. It could make them feel like they have to pass an exam in front of the whole world.
"Our preference would be to have national reporting geared more towards the issues of Agenda 21, then to the performance of individual countries..... There are reporting requirements in the Conventions and there are reporting requirements in the CSD and my preference would be to finally end up with the requirement of one annual report to the CSD in which you could fit slots on biodiversity and climate and desertification and what have you. So on each issue a country would have to file one report which could be seen as part of a bigger report." Herman Verheij
"The people who are involved in coordinating the reports, should be present at the time of presentation, be part of the delegation." Chee Yoke Ling
"For the national reporting I think a lot of countries, mainly in the South should rely more on the NGOs. UNDP at the regional and local level could have a leading role in this. Local authorities that have worked on starting local sustainable societies should be linked much more in this reporting process." Ibrahim Magdi
"I would encourage indicators. This is not necessary to stress since I am the chair for the working group on this subject." Bedrich Moldan
"A lot of changes. The national reporting, at least for us, was a disappointment...Without indicators that are compatible, nothing will come of this process. So what I am hoping is that we accept some universally accepted indicators, like UNDP's human development index." Jukka Uosukainen
"In Europe there is a quite good Pan-European movement, even though feedBack could be improved. However, the global and regional processes are not connected. There is a channel between national and global level, but it is my concern that in the last years we have really missed the link between the regional and global level. This must be straightened." Erszebet Schmuck
"Again, there needs to be a link Back to the national process. The showcasing should stop. There is no need to present just the goodies, that's a waste of time. Involve local groups, have a discussion about the things that worked, but also about the things that were difficult to implement. Maybe they could have someone else do it, someone who had an actual education in this field. Also, maybe we could have a conference just about this part of the CSD." Tineke van der Schoor
"What has happened over the last five years is a simplification of the reporting process. If you go Back to Rio, you have general guidelines for reporting to the Earth Summit. These were very general and we recieved 169 different reports, more than 20.000 pages of information.... Some were better, some were poorer. After Rio the reporting has become more structured. Just agreeing on Agenda 21 already gAve us a structure... Also for 1997 we will be making country profiles. These profiles will try to summarize on one sheet of paper per chapter what has happened in all the countries.... The decision of CSD IV has asked us to further streamline and simplify the process. And I agree, because, having dealt with this information, I know that we are drowning in information. We need to figure out what is essential." Lars Hyttinen
"The national reporting process cannot be 'owned' by the ministry of foreign affairs, and even the environmental ministry can't do all the writing. It has gotta be an all stakeholders approach, an assessment of what they have learned and what they need to do next." Peter Padbury
"The role of NGOs is absolutely essential. Major groups have got to be participating. In Canada we are actually at the point where the government is happy to give us the national report to write. Because we don't see it making any ... difference if people are no longer interested." Peter Padbury
"We have to regionalize it, by bringing in the regional development Banks, the World Bank, the economic commissions and really work at setting up national strategies. I think the CSD should look after this sort of action." Henrique Cavalcanti
"The national reporting process needs to directly involve NGOs in the preparation of their reports. For instance, from the US perspective, NGOs are only brought in to comment, and they don't really contribute." Michael McCoy
"The national reporting process is a waste of time. Few reports are done. Some are not honest. So [we should] ask what to replace this with." Carol Saint-Laurent
"Are in-depth reports by a few governments more useful than superficial reports by all governments?" Arthur Dahl
A key way the CSD could guarantee greater awareness and debate about the reports, is to adopt some kind of "peer review" or process of hearings, in which government, UN, and NGO experts can comment on country and regional reports.
INTGLIM Recommendations
See INTGLIM report proposal for establishing a sub-commission or hearings mechanism for "peer review" of national (and regional, IO, TNC) reports.
Many countries have established national commissions for sustainable development, and over 2000 local Agenda 21s have come into existence since 1992. This is an impressive result.
Local and national initiatives
Our question (VIb) on this subject existed of two parts "Should, in the next stage of the CSD, there be a major effort to promote local and national Agenda 21 processes?" if so, "what should be the role of the CSD in this?"
The first part of this question got an affirming, but often qualified, answer. Everyone felt that local Agenda 21s should be supported in every way possible, but some stated that it should not be linked too closely to the diplomatic process.
"Local and national Agenda 21s are vital in this process, but I would like to express some concern about tying these processes too closely to the 'official' Agenda 21. There is a lot of action going on, even though many of these things are not formally recognized as local Agenda 21s just because they are not called that way." Inji Islam
"Local agenda 21s are crucial. If nothing happens on the local level, the whole UNCED process achieves nothing. The CSD could set up some guidelines, basics, for countries to follow. A lot of countries don't know how to involve NGOs, where it would be appropriate. If the CSD tells the people on the national level how to let NGOs participate, that would certainly help." Margaret Owin
"We agreed that people have their local agenda's. The problem is that we deal with that in a sort of theoretical manner. The most important issue in the South is that there are traditional values that we have to take into account. People already have their Agenda 21, only it is not called that. They have to be recognized and valorized." Ibrahim Magdi
"Yes, definitely. Local communities, municipalities and cities need encouragement. We need to see here the good and successful examples of local Agenda 21s, and bring them back to our countries. Maybe we should insert time and space in the Special Session for this subject." Jukka Uosukainen
"A continuation of the involvement of major groups in the local Agenda 21 process is crucial and the whole development of local Agenda 21s is one of the major successes. They should even be more involved in making presentations and moving forward. Governments should be held accountable towards their peer groups, either other governments or ourselves. The national reporting process will mature considerably, and the next couple of years will be very important in deciding on what we can move forward on." Felix Dodds
The CSD Secretariat has put some effort into involving local decision-makers and the people involved in implementing the decisions. This is a difficult process, as the format for such an integration has to satisfy both parties, not disregarding the local authorities' original culture and practices, but on the same token allowing them to feed useful input into the CSD. Last year, the CSD Secretariat organized a Day of the Local Authorities which was a very successful event. Initiatives like these have to be continued in order to provide a platform for this enthusiasm.
The role of the CSD in promoting local and national Agenda 21s, then, is not to come up with a rigid set of requirements, but to provide a forum where information between local initiatives can be exchanged, not only at the UN, but also on a regional, national and local level. In this, UNDP could play a facilitating role.
National commissions for sustainable development
"Not all countries actually have national commissions for sustainable development. The UN and other governments of countries that do have them should encourage countries like mine to develop such commissions. Also, these commissions should get the same responsibilities and they should become part of decision-making." Bedrich Moldan
While there was general support for the idea of national commissions or councils for sustainable development, there was broad scepticism about how many of the ones that were formed since 1991 simply existed on paper or were mostly public relations exercises, composed exclusively of elites. National commissions for sustainable development should be looked at differently than national Agenda 21s. A national Agenda 21 should be an actual long-term plan or strategy, one in which national commissions have various roles, along with the executive branches of governments, parliaments, local Agenda 21's, etc. Experts generally supported the goal that every country should have a national commission for sustainable development. But, a key requirement for these commissions should be that they help facilitate the participation of NGOs and other representatives of civil society, on both a national and an international level (for instance, by making sure that NGOs are represented on the national delegation to the annual CSD sessions). Also, the national commissions can help coordinate the national reporting process, avoiding duplication and ensuring overall participation.
The involvement of the CSD in national and local Agenda 21 initiatives
In conclusion we can say that the CSD should be supportive of national and local Agenda 21 initiatives, but the CSD should not have an organizing or formal role with these processes. It is, however, important that the CSD attempt to stimulate as many initiatives as possible. It is crucial that national councils for sustainable development be established in every country. These councils should work on national reports, should be open to any initiative that arises in the country and should offer support regardless the institutional, political or religious background of the initiator.
Selected proposal from interviews
INTGLIM Report Recommendations