Hello again everyone!

Well, Matthew pulled an all-nighter last night, and nailed down the report from his university research project just in time to email it back to Leeds for his friend to print for him... crazy! As you've probably realised we're a little behind on the reporting still, so we're just going to mention some of the interesting things that have happened throughout the day - lobbying, following the negotiations, and other things have been ongoing, as ever.

A number of people (who didn't have research reports to finish) had a very late night last night working on putting together a list of points we want changed in the text, going through it with a fine-tooth comb. Hopefully that will be ready for circulation to governments tomorrow morning, just as the negotiations start coming to a head.

6 May, 11am

One of our points for inclusion in the final decisions of this summit has been the millennium development goals. Apparently the G77 don't want to mention these because they're irrelevant to CSD system, not being about implementation and mechanisms? Also they are, as ever, opposed to human rights being included. On the other hand we've heard that the G77 will propose something on education today - wait and see...

Later on we're having a meeting with the UN Focal Point of Youth (it used to be called the UN Youth Unit, but it's all changed for reasons that escape me.)

On lobbying, Michael is following the discussions about the text closely, and coordinating the lobbying effort to make sure we stay on top of the (rapidly changing) text! Some snippets of information that have been mentioned:

The Canadian delegation has given us a heads-up to follow negotiations on paragraph 17 closely - it's about the inclusion of the major groups. The main issue is trying to find some balance between US proposal - to include a much broader range of civil society in the process, and the existing major group structure, which is clearly formulated to meet the needs of the sustainable development discussions. (Some people think the US is trying to make the major group input weaker by opening it up as widely as they can and listening the voice of the current, reasonably well coordinated major groups.)

Yesterday the Mexican delegation were supporting the deletion of paragraph 21 (about monitoring of partnerships) but JUSCANZ were opposing this.

The US want to delete paragraphs 14,15,16 - about getting different people within the UN system and international institutions to work together effectively in various ways - on the grounds that it was all in the JPOI. Why that means we shouldn't mention it here escapes me. They're willing to keep those paragraphs, but want them weakened.

Someone from the Swedish delegation will be coming to the youth caucus meeting tomorrow to talk to us about how to lobby effectively. Also tomorrow we're having a workshop with Jan Gustav, who has been to every CSD before it was even called CSD - about 30 years. He is both fascinating and inspiring, and now runs his own NGO with a budget of $15 million!

This evening there will be a meeting between the youth caucus and representatives of the US delegation.

A government representative from S.Korea came to talk to us about an international event for young people they are hosting about sustainable production consumption, in collaboration with UNEP and consumer international(?) this August. I asked her to email me more details and I'll pass them on if and when she does.

Back to the lobbying discussions, our main four points are:

• education - the need for education to be a cross-cutting issue throughout the 10-year cycle
• participation - increased involvement of Major Groups
• human rights - yet again it's not mentioned
• reporting and indicators - currently the EU is supporting the text on reporting and indicators, but the US is saying that reporting "shouldn't be mandatory" as this will stifle partnerships with too much regulation. hmm.
  

UN Focal Point for Youth

6 May

We met with a representative from what used to be the UN Youth Unit:

http://www.unac.org/youth

A question and answer session about what they do, and how they're involved in the CSD process (they're not) was quite informative, but what was most interesting was when discussions focussed on the youth caucus, and our lack of ability to pass the knowledge gained at each step along the way on to those who will follow.

They were very supportive of our perspective, but don't have resources to help us set up a permanent youth caucus base. They do have, or can access, smallish grants for specific things - for example, in collaboration with the Canadian wing of one of the UN agencies (I believe, sorry, don't have it in front of me) they produced a young person's guide to surviving international conferences, packed with useful information about how the process works, hints, tips on effective lobbying etc.

There was a brief mention of CONGO - CONference of NGO's - if I understood it correctly, a network that enables groups without ECOSOC to get access since CONGO is accredited. CONGO has a Youth Advisory Committee (YAC) and it would be interesting to look in to the work they do and how we can get involved:

In terms of how the Youth major group can work with the focal point for youth in the future, the meeting wasn't really that productive. They don't really seem interested in being involved with CSD, and haven't got the resources to help up set up a long term office or something for the youth caucus, but they might be able to help with small projects such as that guide to surviving international conferences. Contact: tonysin@un.org

The big problem we face in the youth caucus from year to year is that (being young people) there is no institutional memory - other caucuses have permanent coordinator housed in an existing NGO, but youth lack that. In order to really reach out and try to make the youth caucus at CSD more representative and engaging, we really need some more permanent structure of some sort - that's one of the issues we're going to be discussing towards the end of the week as CSD draws to a close.

Vic and Matthew

Don't forget:

If you have questions or comments to make to Matt and Vic, you can email them - they'd love to hear from you!!

• All the UN documents and news from the conference is available here, on the CSD web-site
• Draft text of "Future Programme, Organisation And
  Methods Of Work Of The Commission"
• Excellent website with reports, photos, and audio of speeches

Youth caucus documents

• Lobbying notes on Education and Youth Employment
• Youth Caucus Proposal on Means of Implementation
• Youth Caucus Proposal on Poverty Eradication

Glossary of
CSD-speak

Confused by all the strange terminology and acronyms... We hope the glossary below will help:

CSD 11 - the 11th session of the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development. These have taken place every year since the first earth summit in Rio. Johannesburg was number 10.

JPOI - the Johannesburg Plan of Implementation

WSSD - World Summit on Sustainable Development - which took place in Johannesburg last summer.

Rio +10 - WSSD but it refers to the fact that this summit is ten years on from the original summit in Rio.

Agenda 21 - the environmental agenda for the Twenty First century. This was created at the Rio summit and the idea was that all aspects of society should be looked at from the perspective of Agenda 21.

Stakeholder - anybody who has an interest in the issue that is being discussed. In the case of WSSD it is probably everyone on the planet.

Multi-Stakeholder Dialogue (MSHD)- this is no more no less than a meeting of all people who have an interest/stake in the issue. With reference to WSSD, this has been split into nine Major Groups such as women, youth etc. and bodies have been created to represent the needs and opinions of these particular groups.

Major Groups - the nine stakeholder groups who can make an input into the summit: Women, Youth, Farmers, Indigenous Peoples, Local Authorities, Scientists, Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs), Trade Unions, and Business and Industry.

Type I outcomes - agreements made at the Summit in Johannesburg which are legally binding on an international level

Type II outcomes - promises made by governments, regions, businesses, and other organisations, maybe in partnership with others, to do things to achieve sustainable development - not enforcable though.

Caucus - a group of people with a common interest (eg women, youth) who meet together to organise themselves and work to further that interest.

Youth Caucus - the 'youth' Major Group - a group of youth organisations and youth representatives who we are working with in Bali and will be part of in Johannesburg.

Civil Society - all organisations, groups and individuals who are not part of governments - not politicians or civil servants.