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.