The World Summit on Sustainable Development, as we said, wraps up today.
The final thirty-three speakers, including US Secretary of State Colin Powell, made their presentations this morning at the High Level Segment.
The main theme of the Summit was action. The Summit set many targets and timetables for combating poverty and protecting the environment, including a target to reduce the proportion of people who lack access to proper sanitation, an agreement to work to increase access to modern energy services, and a number of targets and timetables aimed at protecting or restoring ecosystems, such as the restoration of fisheries by 2015, or to reverse the loss of biodiversity by 2010.
In addition, the Summit has already generated announcements of additional resources and new partnership initiatives to accomplish tangible results. More than 300 partnership projects, including more than 60 announced at the Summit itself, were submitted to the UN with more than $235 million in additional resources.
Most countries expressed satisfaction at the result of the Summit, but some countries, such as the European Union and some Latin American countries, and a number of NGOs, expressed disappointment that no target had been set for increasing the use of renewable energy. The Summit did, however, call on all countries to increase the use of renewable energy “with urgency.”
The afternoon session, which was due to end a short while ago, adopted the Plan of Implementation and the Political Declaration.
More than 21,000 people attended the Summit, including 9,101 delegates, 8,227 NGOs, and 4,012 of you, the media.
We have a press release outlining the major commitments and initiatives of the Summit and a wrap up press release will be issued later today.
seen at 12:00, 4 September
in
Spokesman for the UN Secretary General.
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