Examination of Witnesses (Questions 150
- 159)
THURSDAY 18 APRIL 2002
THE RT
HON CLARE
SHORT MP, MR
RICHARD MANNING
AND MR
ADRIAN DAVIS
Chairman
150. Secretary of State, thank you very much
for coming. Colleagues have promised that they will ask brisk
questions so we can try and encapsulate this in about an hour,
if that is convenient to you. As you know, we have been undertaking
an inquiry into climate change and sustainable development. I
think we would be interested if you would like to tell us what,
from DFID's perspectives, are your priorities for the Johannesburg
Conference? I am not sure whether you are going, I am sure you
are, but what are DFID's objectives at that meeting?
(Clare Short) I just wanted to say I have had this
long letter about your visit to Ghana and Nigeria, for which I
am grateful. It was handed to me when—
Chairman: That was a report.
(Clare Short) A report on your visit.
Chairman: We are not expecting an instant
response.
(Clare Short) The thing is, I have not even read it
yet. They literally gave it to me. The point is there might well
be information in there that having sent the letter you think
I have but I have not actually read it yet. I just want you to
know that I do not have that information. The second thing I would
say on climate change is I do not consider myself at all an expert
on climate change, there are people in the Department who follow
that agenda carefully and think about the effect on developing
countries. The basic point about it is the world is being polluted
and the climate change is being generated by countries like ours
and the likely effect on developing countries is in the increasing
turbulence and instability. We are focused on that end of the
discussion although, of course, the Department has experts and
expertise helping developing countries look at the likely consequence
for them but we are not central players in that debate because
our countries, so to speak, are going to be recipients of the
turbulence although, of course, later on South Africa, Brazil,
China and India as they start to develop and affect the rest will
be players as well as recipients. The third thing on WSSD is I
think there is an enormous prize to be had out of this UN Conference.
We have been trying to work as a Department to not have these
one-off UN Conferences all over the place about whatever the latest
fashion is but to hone an ever growing consensus in the international
system. First the Millennium Development Goals, which as you know
we worked to get agreement right across the system at the Millennium
Summit, then Doha on trade, a commitment to looking at trade again
to grow developing countries, then Monterrey, and it is not just
money at Monterrey, it is how do you finance development, what
kind of reform grows an economy, creates more revenues, better
livelihoods and funding for public services and the proper and
better use of aid. The Millennium Conference, Doha and Monterrey
have gone well, and then Johannesburg. The prize, if we can get
it, is the Northern Greens who tend to often adopt an anti-development
perspective, because living in our privileged countries one thinks
"the planet is under strain, it cannot take any more pollution
or use of its natural resources, we should all stop being so materialistic,
not go for growth and diminish world trade". That perspective
comes out of a genuine good-hearted concern for the planet but
leaves out the needs of the poorest people and countries to have
economic growth and more material well-being. So you often get,
and it certainly happened at Seattle and it bubbles up in different
meetings that we go to, the Green agenda being anti-development
and being seen as hostile by developing countries, that we polluted
the planet and plundered it to get our development and now we
are pulling up the ladder behind us with a set of rules that will
make it very difficult for developing countries to grow. They
are very conscious of that and the threat at Seattle, for example,
to put environmental rules into world trade rules could lock them
out of the possibilities of growing their economies through trade.
The bad thing about that is, one, it is unfair to developing countries
to create such rules that prevent them developing but, two, the
world will divide in two. We cannot look after the planet sustainably
unless we are looking at it in a way where we all stand to gain
mutually and where there is something in it for everybody. Therefore,
to have a real environmental sustainability agenda we have got
to get the Greens to join up with the development people, to see
that what we have got to have is a guarantee to development for
the poor countries and poor people within a sustainable planet.
That is a shift in the mind set of the environmental movement
that I think we might achieve at Johannesburg. If so, then the
international consensus is stronger, what we have to do is clearer,
getting on with implementing the consensus is better. Of course,
for developing countries that means grow your economy, better
social provision and look at your own environmental resources.
That is what sustainability means. Personally I think that is
the prize for Johannesburg, this shift in the mind set, a guarantee
of development for the poor with a commitment from all of us to
work for a sustainable planet and to take it away from the conservation,
do no harm, have lots and lots of checks on any development proposal
because it might be harmful for the environment. Promoting development
is part of making the world safe and secure and the levels of
poverty we have are a threat to the future safety and sustainability
of the world. I think it is edging our way. I think it is a very
important prize because lots of the negatives and the NGOs and
people on the street, lots of well meaning people, come with this
almost anti-development mind set but think they are being kind
and it does get in the way of international agreement and just
driving forward development and implementing the agreements we
have got.
151. I am sure you are right but having read
a fairly excoriating article by George Monbiot in The Guardian,
for example, it seems to me if that is the case we are going to
need to spend some time between now and September improving the
vocabulary at home so there are not all those misunderstandings
about what people are actually saying. It seems to me that it
is just a misunderstanding of what certain words mean.
(Clare Short) I would just like to say sometimes people
have names that make you think of things, like Mr Fukuyama with
the end of history, and Mr Monbiot also makes me think of things.
He is an intransigent—I have seen an article by him, I do
not read him any more, saying that the free market used to be
okay when it was a baker's shop at the bottom of the road but
now it is multinational capital it is hopeless. These are people
indulging in all the privileges of living in a developed economy,
having clean water, sanitation, electricity, telecommunications,
access to the internet, walking up and down shopping streets buying
the products of multinational capital and then getting themselves
into a frenzy that it is destroying the earth and becoming absolutely
fixated on not letting any of this get to the developing world.
It is a series of errors, some of it genuinely held, some of it
just people who like spreading enmity and hostility and misinformation.
Some you can win, some you cannot.
Mr Battle
152. While sharing some of your reservations
about the proper integration of sustainability and poverty eradication,
that was not a common agenda in the past, it was almost the environmental
movement sometimes felt that the people were the problem and setting
the environment against the people. I think it has moved on. Some
of us visited Northern Nigeria and I was very shocked in Northern
Nigeria literally to see the—big word—desertification,
to see the desert blowing in where rivers were dry and people
were trying to scratch a living in practically pre-biblical conditions
without even Jacob's well there. I just wonder if you can get
in your vision of it that integration of environment and poverty
eradication as a common vocabulary at the Summit. Can the Summit
do more than just be a talking shop? What kind of outcomes would
you like to see from the Summit to take it further forward? What
I would not like to see is everyone has got together but nothing
happens as a result of it.
(Clare Short) Let me come back to desertification
in Northern Nigeria. It used to be the case, but it has improved
in recent years, that Summits and UN Conferences were places for
grand declarations of moral principle and concern about poverty
and the rest and then everyone went home and carried on as before
and there was fantastically little in concept that meant it had
to be implemented. You had one on children, one on deserts, one
on forests, the fashions change and everyone turns up and has
another jamboree. That was how the system used to be. The International
Development Targets drawn out of the series of Summits on children,
women, reproductive health care and so on and then driving them
through the IMF, the World Bank, the OECD into the Millennium
Development Goals and then Doha getting serious about trade and
Monterrey getting serious about how to manage the world economy
in a way that will give the poorest people in countries a real
chance of development within a sustainable framework is the bit
that needs to become entrenched in the international consensus
at Johannesburg. When you come to individual developing countries
there are two takes on the environmental agenda. The poor of the
world, the rural poor, are more dependent on environmental resources
than any of the rest of us and very directly that land, that wood
for their cooking, that fish that they can get, the products of
the forest, so as you get the forests chopped down, and there
is enormous corruption in forestry and people who own the forests.
They take the animals, they take the trees, and the people who
have lived for generation upon generation in the forest have more
and more difficulty. Of course, we have got growth in world population
and deforestation and so on, more grazing, more animals, more
desertification, people who live on the food they grow themselves
and as the land gets poor their children go hungry. This is spreading
around the world. A part of the answer is better environmental
management. What we have learned about forestry, for example,
is you have to give the people who live in and around the forest
and off the products of the forest—and that is never just
the trees, there are all sorts of other plants, where their animals
feed and so on—some control over the future of the forest
and then they will nurture it and care for it. There is that famous
thing, you plant trees for your grandchildren. The poor of the
world have tended not to have any control over the forests they
have lived in forever. You need that kind of environmental improvement
and the same with fisheries. We have got a big project in West
Africa for fisheries. The European fishing policy is in danger
of denuding Africa of its fisheries just like we have done to
our own North Sea. That needs dealing with and stopping because
there are lots of little people who fish and that is how they
get their protein. If the fisheries go, they go forever. Within
the country you need to look for your strategy for economic development
and the reduction of poverty but include sustainable management
of environmental resources in a way that is pro-poor and gives
the poor some say over their future and therefore some interest
in nurturing that but given the scale of world population we are
going to need more value added. Urbanisation is happening anyway,
half of humanity is now urbanised, it is going to be 65 per cent
in another 15 or 20 years. There has got to be more processing
of agricultural projects, more value added, more people getting
jobs, not just in the forest or by growing food because the world
cannot sustain it. Some of those people in Northern Nigeria might
urbanise and have better jobs processing some of their products
and then you need a change in trade rules because Africa exports
unprocessed products. Then, of course, all of these poor countries
are going to have more and more turbulence in their environment,
more and more disasters, floods, and climate change that means
the crops do not grow because of what we are doing to generate
global warming. That is even more of a burden on them to be able
to promote their development and improve their lives. We need
the international agreements that deal with some of that destructive
effect, we need much more promotion of development, and in a lot
of countries, because we cannot stop some of this turbulence that
is coming, we need to help countries to have in place the capacity
to deal with crises. There is the famous thing, you have floods
in the southern United States of America and a few people lose
their cars; you have them in Mozambique—it used to be Bangladesh
but Bangladesh has learned—thousands of people lose their
lives. Part of dealing with catastrophes is to be prepared and
organised to deal with them. That is my answer to your question.
This is fantastically urgent both in terms of human need and in
terms of the urbanised, very unjust world where now because of
the global communications we have the poor of the world see how
the rest of us live and they are not going to be dispersed across
rural areas, they are going to be collected together in cities
more and more. The anger and rage there is going to be if there
is not progress is going to make for a very bitter, nasty world.
It will make where we are now, which is pretty depressing, even
more depressing.
Mr Colman
153. I understand that the Danish Government
are promoting the concept of a global deal in Johannesburg. What
do you believe is the global deal and are you backing it?
(Clare Short) The Danes are talking about it and the
South Africans were talking about it. Are they talking about it
less?
(Mr Davis) They are talking about a programme of action.
(Clare Short) It sounds nice, a global deal. People
who came to this not having focused on the Millennium Development
Assembly, Doha and the rest came afresh as though we had not had
the preceding conferences and then said "oh, can we have
a big global deal for sustainability for the world?" I gather
the Danes are saying free trade, international environment agreements,
development of the 0.7 per cent ODA target strengthening freedom
and democracy. That is fine. I do not think there is going to
be a global deal. I think it is a programme of action that drives
forward what we have agreed at these other conferences that is
leading to implementation that brings sustainability and environmental
resources into the picture and gets the mind set of the world
right about how to care for them.
154. I understand some environment groups are
concerned about the agenda that Denmark are pushing in this global
deal, which is very much around a free trade agenda, environmental
and social concerns, and they are concerned that the vested trade
concerns will override environmental and social concerns.
(Clare Short) There you are, that is an example of
the backward anti-development environmental movement. I just said
about Africa. Seventy-plus per cent of its exports are unprocessed
commodities coming out at tiny prices, their cocoa, their coffee,
their cashews, their minerals. It is a resource rich country but—Then,
of course, of the packet of cashews we buy a tiny, tiny fraction
goes to the farmer who grew the cashews. They need the jobs to
package it, they need the jobs to package the coffee or whatever
it is and, as you know, commodity prices are falling. If there
is not a change in world trade rules giving the poorest countries
the chance to process, add value and export and, therefore, be
able to afford the imports that give them access to modern technology,
that gives them water, sanitation and so on, then those who argue
this, if they were to succeed, are marginalising the poorest countries
forever from the globalising world economy, from modern technology,
from the chances for investment and sentencing them to every growing
poverty, because it is not a stable thing. In poor countries the
population is growing. In Africa the population is growing faster
than the economy and on present trends Africa is going to get
poorer and poorer. Those who think that giving Africa more chance
to trade will somehow endanger the environment, if they were to
succeed the consequence for Africa would be disaster and they
are profoundly wrong.
Mr Khabra
155. Many people in the world consider that
the World Summit on Sustainable Development is the last chance
to push for ratification of the Kyoto Protocol. It is worth noting
that it would leave many of the concerns of developing countries
unresolved. In view of this may I ask you a question. How has
climate change featured in the discussions building up to the
Johannesburg Summit and what does DFID hope will be achieved on
climate change at the Summit? What prominence will climate change
issues have at Johannesburg?
(Clare Short) We do not agree, and the South Africans
do not agree and the international system does not agree. Kyoto,
as you know, is profoundly important but also divisive. We have
got the biggest economy in the world not co-operating and we have
got some other big OECD economies that have not decided whether
they will or not: Japan, Australia, Canada and so on. If there
is any attempt to bring Kyoto to Johannesburg it will divide the
Conference, the thing will be a disaster. We have got another
process for Kyoto, which is delicate and precious and needs protecting
and needs not to be taken to Johannesburg. It will damage Kyoto
and it will destroy the Johannesburg Conference and some of the
big players who have not decided what to do about Kyoto would
probably not come. I understand why people think this is a conference
about the environment and we have not resolved Kyoto, let us take
it there, but it is extremely unwise and we must not do it. It
would be a disaster. Your second question was what are DFID doing.
I tried to indicate earlier that the people who are causing climate
change are our kind of economies and it is us who have got to
clean ourselves up. The poorest economies are going to be the
recipients of even more barriers to their development out of the
turbulence, the disease spread, the effect on crops and agriculture,
the disasters, the flooding and so on. Part of our take is them
preparing, understanding, getting some knowledge of what is likely
to come to be better at handling the consequences. There is a
series of big countries that will as they develop, and China continues
to develop very successfully, I see despite the world economy
going down they had ten per cent economic growth again this year,
they will start as they go on—India, China, Brazil and South
Africa—to later become countries that will need to join
in the agreement to reduce emissions. China has done remarkably.
It got quite worried about its own environmental damage. Its economy
has been growing considerably, ten per cent a year for ten years
or more.
(Mr Davis) Twenty, since 1980.
(Clare Short) The most successful poverty reduction
that is going on in big numbers is in China. They also adopted
major reforms on energy and they have reduced their emissions
while they have been engaging in this kind of economic growth.
There is a series of very important lessons there. For the poorest
economies, on their potential contribution, even the most successful
possible development you can think of for them, they are not going
to be real contributors to global warming, they are going to be
recipients of the effect. I do not know, Adrian or Richard, if
you want to add anything on what DFID are doing. I hope I have
made clear how we come into this. It is not our core issue but
it has a deep consequence for the countries we are interested
in, so we do take an interest. The main players are us, the polluters,
the OECD countries, which we do not lean on.
(Mr Davis) Only to confirm that the main area in which
we will be working is adaptation to climate change. As we made
clear at the first session when we gave evidence, the more development
there is in an economy, the more resilient they become to climate
change, so we will be concentrating on adaptation. I suspect there
may be questions subsequently specifically on adaptation.
156. I am going to ask you about some controversial
issues. I consider that developing countries, the poor countries,
have not got the same capacity to follow the Kyoto Protocol whereas
the highly industrialised rich countries have had years of opportunity
to develop and have been able to reduce poverty. Countries like
India and many other countries are not in the same category at
all. In trying to reach a global deal, can the Johannesburg Summit
bridge the different perceptions of climate change between the
North, where it is seen as a pollution and environmental protection
problem, and the South, where it is seen as an issue of livelihoods
and survival? I can give you the example of the Narmada Project
in India which will bring enormous benefit to the poor people
but the environmentalist lobby which have imported anti-developmentalist
environmentalist lobbyists are going mad to oppose it.
(Clare Short) Andhra Pradesh?
157. The Narmada Project. Can the distortion
in climate change negotiations caused by the dominant Northern
perception of climate change as an environmental problem be overcome
and a more equitable and inclusive way forward be found to help
countries like India, Pakistan and some of the other countries?
(Clare Short) Firstly, climate change is not and must
not go to Johannesburg. We must not go there as a first base.
Of course, the Kyoto Protocol does not require developing countries
to reduce their emissions. This is the thing that the United States
finds objectionable and thinks that it should, but we agree with
the Kyoto Protocol that we are the mega polluters, that we move
first and then, of course, this should be going on later and as
some of the big developing countries develop, like China, they
will join in later with some kind of agreement. I agree with your
fundamental point, it would be absolutely wrong at this stage
to impose requirements on reducing emissions on developing countries
that are producing very few emissions and have weakness of capacity.
As their economies grow they need to come in but be helped in
the meantime to grow their economies with sources of energy that
are not polluting. China is an example of making a lot of progress.
As they have grown their economy they have improved the cleanness
of the energy that they have been using. I do not know about that
particular project in India that you referred to but Richard Manning
does. Let me say about India that India has masses of capacity,
it has enormously strong educated people but it also has a third
of the poor of the world, and that capacity it has is not always
applied consistently right through society to bring the reforms
that would bring the benefits to everyone. That is the challenge
for India. This is another example of Northern concepts of the
Green agenda objecting to development. We have got this row on
at the moment about Andhra Pradesh. Andhra Pradesh has got 160
million people, very, very poor people, a very powerful reform
agenda trying to grow the economy, get all children educated.
It is progressing, it is breaking through caste boundaries. I
have been to a tribal village where there was not a single literate
woman but every single little girl is in school. Those are the
sorts of things being achieved in Andhra Pradesh that are deeply
moving, and the sorts of things we need to achieve across the
world. We, as a Department, have put 60 million in budgetary aid
to back all of this reform agenda in Andhra Pradesh. There is
a lot of landless poor. Thinking about the future of the economy,
there are projections by the government of Andhra Pradesh about
how less people will live on the land and how the land might be
more productive and more value added. I think they are open to
the use of GM. Suddenly we have got vicious campaigns against
my Department saying we are responsible for all of this and we
have got to stop Andhra Pradesh doing all of this, which is not
our right, it is for the people there and their own elected government
to make this decision. It is another example of a well meaning,
I am sure, but distorted version of the environmental agenda having
a naivety about what has to be achieved in order to promote development
in poor countries. Before the Industrial Revolution 98 per cent
of the population of Britain lived in poverty in rural areas and
that was at the time when you got hanged for stealing a sheep,
and people did because that is how hungry they were. That was
why they came into the cities and lived in squalor and then we
had the political struggle to use the benefits of industrialisation
to lift up everybody. There is a whole mind set there that seems
not to remember that history and thinks it is a great romance
for everyone to live in rural poverty. Sorry.
Chairman
158. We are going to move on from Johannesburg
to specific questions about climate change but, before we do,
this rather excellent report that our colleagues on the Environmental
Audit Committee did on sustainable development[1]
refers to some work that DFID has done with the World Bank, EU
and UN on linking poverty reduction and environmental management.
They referred to a consultation draft in January. I just wondered
whether that has come to a final document yet and, if so, whether
it would be possible to share it with us some time?
(Clare Short) Yes,
indeed. That project was about this very discussion, can we get
the environmental agenda really to be about sustainability and
be development friendly. We joined together with those organisations
to try and hone a forward looking agenda that takes account of
the needs and interests of developing countries. We did a consultation
phase, the consultation is now complete and it is—
(Mr Davis) Not yet. We sent you the first
draft. We sent 15 copies, it is the blue document . We sent that
to you as part of the papers that we promised to send you after
the first session.
Chairman: Yes, I remember.
(Mr Davis) There has been an electronic discussion
group. We are revising it and setting out an action plan summary
for the Bali Preparatory Committee and then the final report will
be available about a month before Johannesburg [2].
Incidentally, because that has been so successful we are doing
a joint paper on climate change and poverty now.
Chairman: I think we would be very interested
to see a copy of the final draft.[3]
(Mr Davis) Sure.
(Clare Short) We are trying to parallel
the preparatory process with a more intelligent discussion of
how you can bring sustainability, environment and development
for the poor together.
Chairman: I suspect we all concur with
that, it would be useful to see the work that has been done.
Hugh Bayley
159. What assessment has your Department made
of the impact of climate change on the achievability of the Millennium
Development Goals? For instance, we have received evidence saying
that climate change will lead to a greater geographical distribution
of malaria, and depletion of water resources. One goal is to stabilise
and reduce the incidence of malaria, and another is to ensure
that there is an increase in the number of people who have access
to safe water supplies, so climate change will make those Development
Goals harder to achieve. How much harder?
(Clare Short) Indeed so. I will bring Adrian in. A
piece of very serious work has been commissioned to answer that
question. Have they had that too?
(Mr Davis) No.
(Clare Short) I will leave that with you and we can
send you some more copies[4].
There is also some work we are doing now to help countries to
look at what the knowledge is that we have now. We have got to
remember that the projections of climate change from now assume
the world does nothing to deal with it. As you know, lots of Pacific
and Caribbean islands and countries would disappear, a third,
a half of Bangladesh's territory would disappear yet it is highly
crowded and it is going to double in population because although
population growth is declining it is a very young country. The
long-term projection is horrendous but what we have got to do
with that projection is learn that we must not go there. That
is why we need Kyoto and we need to change the behaviour of the
world and reduce the prospects of that very grave climate change
but some effect is inevitable already and that will bring damage,
increased turbulence, more floods, more disease and it will add
to the burdens and problems of meeting the Millennium Development
Goals. We have to face it and do better, and we can do better
if the world would just concentrate and apply everything we know
more effectively throughout the international system.
1 Environmental Audit Committee, Third Report of Session
2001-02, UK Preparations for The World Summit on Sustainable
Development. (HC 616). Back
2
This will be published in a final form in late July. A copy of
the summary has been placed in the Library. Back
3
Not printed. Copy place in the Library Back
4
See http://www.erm.com/climate&poverty. Back
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