Search the Internet          Tips  Sites: Finance, Investment

US pushes 'partnerships' at Earth Summit

Jodie Ginsbergin Johannesburg

The United States showcased public-private partnerships on Thursday at the Earth Summit, promoting a range of projects meant to combat poverty but which critics say often do more for big business than the poor.

Delegates at the 10-day meeting in Johannesburg, meanwhile, were deadlocked on tough issues including poor nations' calls for rich countries to phase out farm subsidies even though 95 per cent of a 77-page draft plan of action had been agreed.

US President George Bush, who has chosen not to join about 100 other world leaders for the summit finale early next week, is a leading proponent of partnerships, also favoured by other rich nations from the European Union to Japan.

Environmentalists say partnerships, meant to involve local communities, companies and other groups, may let business cash in on providing essential services like water or electricity, while letting governments shirk their responsibilities.

Among key demands from developing countries which shows little sign of being heeded is a stronger commitment to an end to the subsidies paid to Western farmers and manufacturers that help keep out otherwise cheaper imports from the Third World.

UN organisers said they had received notice of 218 proposed partnerships, in areas ranging from healthcare to renewable energy projects to help meet summit goals of halving poverty by 2015 without poisoning the planet in the process.

"We are very excited about partnerships. We see this as a commitment on the part of all," said Paula Dobriansky, US Undersecretary of State for Global Affairs. "This is a call for action. This is a call for initiative."

CONGO, ENERGY

Among US projects there will be the one to expand efforts to protect Congo basin forests in central Africa with an additional $53 million over four years. Another multi-nation project will get $43 million to provide energy for poor communities.

Activists say rich nations are trumpeting partnerships at the World Summit on Sustainable Development to cover up a lack of new government funds or clear timetables for an assault on everything from AIDS to a lack of clean water supplies.

"(Governments) are supposed to be working up an action plan with targets and timetables and the means of implementation," said Greenpeace climate policy director Steve Sawyer. "We can talk about partnerships after they've done that."

California Congressman George Miller, whose Democrats are seeking to wrest control from Bush's Republicans in November elections, blasted US partnerships as "a recycled idea and recycled money".

Friends of the Earth said privatisations of water supplies in nations from Bolivia to the Philippines had meant higher prices for poor people. Nearly one in five people or 1.1 billion of the population have no access to clean drinking water.

Meanwhile, South Africa sought to defuse a looming clash with activists by approving all 17 protest marches planned on Saturday to the summit venue in a gleaming conference centre close to some of Johannesburg's worst slums.

Safety and Security Minister Charles Nqakula said the government had hammered out a compromise in talks on Wednesday and expected about 20,000 people to march for causes ranging from jobs to land.

STUN GRENADES

Police used stun grenades to disperse a small crowd of demonstrators on Saturday in downtown Johannesburg and have pledged to crack down hard after protests and violence disrupted other international gatherings from Seattle to Genoa.

With talks, meanwhile, stalled on issues like phasing out farm subsides, the 95 per cent of the text of a plan of implementation covered the least controversial elements.

US demands that good governance and democracy should be a counterpart for aid handouts, calls for multinational companies to be held accountable for their actions around the world and debate on the benefits of "globalisation" were also unresolved.

British Environment Minister Michael Meacher said ministers might have to get involved in breaking the deadlock among senior officials but predicted the summit would end with a deal.

"I don't believe that there are any fundamental, absolute sticking points," he told Reuters.

"I think it will be resolved but probably only through the shaping of the final packages. There are still differences over targets, governance, human rights and the social dimension."

Many delegates said the United States was leading a resistance to any new targets going beyond a world trade deal struck in Doha last year to phase out export subsidies and to make "substantial reductions in trade-distorting domestic support".

Farm subsidies in rich nations total about $300 billion a year, or nearly six times the West's aid payments to poor states. The poor states say that the subsidies shut out their exports ranging from textiles to bananas.

By one World Bank official's estimate, state subsidies paid for a cow in a rich nation are about three times the average earnings of the poorest people on the planet.

ALSO READ:
India asks West to give pledged aid to poor
Developing nations rally for new farm technologies
India asks developed countries to lift farm subsidies
Earth summit bogs down in bitter trade debate
Energy expert sees 1.4 billion without power in 2032
More Money Headlines