Govt, NGOs differ on partnership offers
Govt, NGOs differ on partnership offers
Fabiola Desy Unidjaja, The Jakarta Post, Nusa Dua, Bali
The Indonesian government is moving cautiously in its partnership talks at the United Nations' Bali meeting. It has proposed over 100 partnership projects, but expects to finalize arrangements for less than five projects during the current meeting in Nusa Dua.
Partnership talks have been clouded by the reluctance on the part of non-governmental organizations and other civil society groups to support the government in the talks as they consider partnerships a means for developed countries to avoid making any time-bound commitments in the negotiated document, called the Chairman Text, to be endorsed by world leaders in the upcoming World Summit on Sustainable Development.
"We only expect to get at least four or five partnerships because we are still trying to ask the NGOs to join the partnerships," Executive Director of the National Committee on Sustainable Development Erna Witoelar said on Thursday.
She said that the partnerships that would most likely be sealed during the Bali meeting included those on water management, coastal and marine conservation and the energy sector, with several countries such as the United States, Japan, the United Kingdom and Norway as the funding parties.
On water management, Erna said the U.S. and Japan had expressed their commitment to support the water management partnership projects. Their support would include in the campaign to build awareness among the people on effective water usage as well as projects to provide clean water for the urban poor.
Norway, meanwhile, is willing to support coastal and marine management projects, including sea resources conservation and support for small-scale fishermen.
The financing of partnerships could be provided through a debt swap arrangement or in the forms of grants, said Erna, who is former minister of resettlement and regional infrastructure.
Although the partnership proposals seem to have been well received by donors, the government cannot move forward in terms of completing the deals because it is waiting for support from civil society groups.
Without the involvement of civil society groups, such partnerships would be doomed to fail.
"The problem is that the NGOs have refused to use the money from those countries for partnerships," Erna remarked.
NGOs have warned developing countries not to accept partnership proposals from the United States and its allies during the negotiations before those developed countries make a time-bound commitment on sustainable development in the Chairman's Text.
Their calls have been well received by developing countries in the Group of 77. They wanted the inclusion of a time target in the Chairman's Text as a means to ensure the implementation of Agenda 21, concluded in the World Summit in Rio de Janeiro in 1992.
Developed countries like the U.S., Japan and Canada, however, have rejected the inclusion of time-bound measures in the Chairman's Text. They contend that the most important thing is how to meet their commitments, and not time schedules.
Taufan Suranto from the Indonesian Forum for the Environment (Walhi) said that NGOs had rejected talks on partnerships because it was important to set the basic commitment first then decide on projects.
"It will be difficult to talk about projects if there is no basic commitment from them. That is why we are reluctant to join the partnership," he said.