Business Briefing for Johannesburg World Summit- What business can take away from the Summit

Article13, the leading corporate social responsibility experts, have released a series of reports on what business can take away from the World Summit on their website at www.article13.com A summary of the report follows.

Key facts:
The World Summit on Sustainable Development was held at Johannesburg between 24th August and 4th September 2002. There were two main types of outcome:
1) Type-I outcome: A political declaration and a programme of action (Plan of Implementation) for the further implementation of Agenda 21, both of which are fully negotiated and agreed to by all governments
2) Type-II outcome: Non-negotiated partnerships and initiatives (of which more than 220 were declared)

What did it achieve?
In general:
- Increased awareness of sustainable development, globally and in the UK.
- Built on a continuum of other intergovernmental agreements: Rio, Rio +5, Millennium Development Goals, Doha, Monterrey.

Partnerships:
- Increased role of business and civil society reflected in the number of partnerships agreed upon
- Signalled the end of intergovernmental conventions" and processes" such as Kyoto

Gaps?
Areas where it was felt more could have been achieved:
- Targets for natural resource depletion and reversing loss of biodiversity
- Stronger links between the type-I and type-II outcomes
- Precautionary principle
- Stronger commitments on subsidies
- Clearer view of the future, especially the role of the Commission for Sustainable Development

The big picture
Despite the wranglings between the different groups present at the World Summit on Sustainable Development, all agreed on the interconnectedness of the issues brought to the table during the World Summit. Although it has become a bit clichéd, it is true to say that the events of September 11th highlighted the fluidity, and cross-border nature of the challenges facing the modern world. The particular focus on poverty showed that achieving sustainable development is not a purely environmental affair. Social, environmental and economic development need to go hand in hand to achieve sustainable development.

Issues such as poverty, access, trade, globalisation, and environmental degradation etc. have a significant bearing on the stability and sustainability of the world order. So what role did business play in this event, and more importantly what can business take away from it?

Looking at the big picture, it is clear that the current state of affairs - inequality, poverty, political instability and fragmentation - is not great, for the developed world or developing world, for women or men, for adults or children, for society or the environment, for business or government.

That much is clear.

But surely it is the remit of governments (national and regional) or governance structures (EU and UN) to sort out these huge issues. Does business need to get involved?

What does it mean for business?
One thing that came across very strongly during this Summit as opposed to the Rio Summit ten years ago, is that business is as important an actor on the global, national, regional and local scale as government, civil society and NGOs.    

Business took on an action-oriented role at this summit. Through the partnerships and the reports on progress in the last ten years, business hoped to demonstrate how it has translated the aspirational and conceptual discussion on sustainable development into practical action on the ground. Most significant was a historic joint statement by Greenpeace and the World Business Council on Sustainable Development, both groups moved away from their entrenched positions on climate change to come together to stress the importance of joint action.

However, business has also been the target of much criticism. NGOs have protested against what it calls corporate takeover" of the summit.

We have taken the key themes, agreements, aspects of the Implementation Plan1 and highlighted for each area, why and how it might affect business. It is true that in terms of mandatory regulation, there was very little for anyone to take away. But there were plenty of signals pointing to up and coming issues. As anyone involved in business planning knows, it is the ability to read the early warning signals" coming through from the market and planning and innovating for them, that is the key to business success.

What we hope to do in this paper is to highlight some of these weak signals, which will have an impact, large or small, in the years to come.

Ends

Article 13 work to deliver the new way of doing business. As well as bespoke risk identification, planning and consultancy, Article 13 work in a number of ongoing business processes that range from visioning, responsible sourcing and supply chain, business-to-business ethics, ethics in the workplace through to making your approach tangible creatively.

Article 13s co-directors, Neela Bettridge and Jane Fiona Cumming, have extensive experience in a number of critical fields: commerce and communications, social and environmental arenas, legal and business strategy. Article 13 also draws on the wisdom of distinguished advisors: Dr Paul Toyne, Professor Chris Baines, Chris Hoare, Professor Colin Gilligan, Susan Clayton, Neill Irwin, Professor Dave Owen and Andrew Acland. This panel, in turn, is complemented by a network of specialists drawn from the social, environmental, economic, ethical and business worlds.