for the
World Summit on Sustainable Development
(Preliminary Draft - 2002.02.04 - Monday 4 February 2002)
Preamble: In the ten years since the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, no indicator of development has come close to increasing so rapidly as the level of adoption of information and communication technologies and the use of the Internet. This phenomenon had led to the development of Information Ecology recommendations by NGOs in "Towards Earth Summit II: Recommendations for Actions and Commitments" /1.
The significance of this trend was underscored by the UN Economic and Social Council in its priority theme for ECOSOC's High Level Segment in 2000 and the associated Ministerial Declaration on "Development and international cooperation: the role of information and communications technologies in the transition to global knowledge-based economies"/2.
The rapid rate of adoption of information and communication technologies has profound significance for sustainability, and embodies no less than the transition to a entirely new form of economics - economics governed by the laws and properties of information, information systems and networks, rather than by the laws of the material world.
This transition has profoundly altered the nature and dynamics of many of the critical areas of activity and processes related to sustainability, and that were recognized in Agenda 21, including:
- Transformation of the nature and dynamics of the marketplace - the primary governing institution of economic transactions - in ways that can readily allow for the routine integration of environment and development in decision-making through the introduction of full-cost accounting for economic transactions, including the "external" social and environmental costs of economic goods and services - thus permitting a correction of a fundamental defect in existing markets that has persisted in undermining sustainable economic activities; (Agenda 21, Chapter 8)
- Transformation of the nature and dynamics of financial markets, and financial transactions - including greatly enabling the establishment of low-cost mechanisms for micro-finance; (Agenda 21, Chapter 33)
- Transformation of the very nature of property, including the emergence of the Internet domain as the seat of property in the information age;
- Transformation of the nature and dynamics of technology transfer - including in particular the transfer of information and communications technology, including open source software; (Agenda 21, Chapter 34)
- Transformation of the nature and dynamics of the participation of non-governmental organizations, major groups and the public in consultations and decision-making relating to sustainability - and in related access to and exchange of information; (Agenda 21, Chapters 23-32 and 40)
- Transformation of the ability to compile, organize, integrate and make accessible geographic information - through the use of geographic information system that can profoundly enhance the monitoring and observation of natural resources and of associated economic, social, health and demographic trends. (Agenda 21, Chapters 5-6 and 9-22)
We therefore call upon the Preparatory Committee for the World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) to establish an Ad-Hoc Open Ended Working Group - to include participation from Member States, the UN Secretariat, and relevant UN Agencies, Programmes, and Task Forces, non-governmental organizations, the private sector and other Major Groups - to explore the development of a set of recommendations for the WSSD on ways in which information and communication technologies can be utilized to enable a transition to sustainable development, including:
- The development of "ecological markets" -markets that incorporate full-cost accounting - including the adoption of full-cost accounting into e-commerce protocols through the integration of economic transactions with a comprehensive database of ecological properties of goods and services;
- A process for the establishment of common protocols for access to information, public participation in decision-making, and access to justice in matters relating to sustainable development, in particular giving consideration to the development of such protocols to strengthen the implementation of the Aarhus Convention on Access to Information, Public Participation in Decision-Making and Access to Justice;
- Promoting access to and awareness of open source software standards, with particular attention to support for the development of integrated open source software systems that can be used by small businesses, local, provincial and national governments, and community-based and non-governmental organizations;
- Support for enabling broad-based access to the registration of Internet domains, and for the establishment of simple, accessible country-level procedures for the registration and management of Internet domains within their Top Level Country Code domains - and for affirming a country's inalienable sovereign right to ownership and control of its Top Level Country Code domain, including the restoration of country code domains that have been transferred to private corporations - e.g. the .tv domain that was assigned to the Small Island State of Tuvalu, or to State or Local governments, e.g. the .la domain that had been assigned to Laos, and has been acquired by the City of Los Angeles;
- Support for initiatives to provide universal access to electronic information, with particular attention to the use of hand-held wireless devices, and ensure that the issues of sustainability are integrated into the agenda of the World Summit on the Information Society.
To comment on the Information Ecology Draft Recommendations for the WSSD, send an email to ecology2001@gmail.com or participate in the Information Ecology Caucus mailing list by sending a blank email message to information-ecology-subscribe@yahoogroups.com