UNEP Executive Directors warn about Global Warming. Reported by NTV Kenya.
From 28 June – 2 July 2009, UNITAR teamed up with the Global Environmental Governance Project, a joint initiative of the Yale Center for Environmental Law and Policy and the College of William and Mary, the United Nations Environment Programme, and the Horn of Africa Regional Environment Center to organize the Global Environmental Governance Forum: Reflecting on the Past, Moving into the Future, Montreux, Switzerland. The event immediately followed the first meeting of the UNEP consultative group of ministers on international environmental governance, Belgrade, 27-28 June 2009.
The Forum brought together past, present, and future architects of the environmental governance system to devise options for a blueprint for reform of the contemporary international environmental institutions, in light of the original vision for the system’s form and function. It provided a unique opportunity to learn directly from the individuals whose ideas and aspirations formed the international institutions dealing with the environment. Former and present Executive Directors of UNEP who participated in the event included Maurice Strong, Mustafa Tolba, Elisabeth Dowdeswell, Klaus Toepfer, and Achim Steiner.
Carlos Lopes, Executive Director of UNITAR pointed out in his welcome remarks that the Forum has a great potential to revisit past visions and generate new knowledge relevant for developing a more effective and coherent international environmental governance architecture. He also noted that as a UN agency primarily interested in generating knowledge and enhancing skills of individuals, UNITAR is becoming concerned that the growing proliferation and complexity of international environmental policy processes creates sheer unmanageable human resource challenges in particular for least developing countries. "How can, under these conditions, international environmental negotiation processes be fair, effective, and results oriented" noted Mr. Lopes. He announced that UNITAR will be pleased to help address the challenge by offering seminars for the diplomatic community on the subject in Geneva and New York in the fall of 2009.
Given lack of progress during the 63rd General Assembly in 2008 to strengthen the institutional framework for the United Nations’ environment work, the development of new and visionary options to strengthen global environmental institutions has become more pertinent and timely than ever. The outputs generated through the Forum are thus expected to make a constructive input to future international policy discussions to develop a more effective and coherent international environmental governance architecture. Equally important, the Forum sought to catalyze a leadership network on international environmental governance for emerging leaders.
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