April, 19–20, the international conference "Sustainable Development in Eastern Partnership Countries: Taking Stock of Progress and Setting Goals on the Road to Rio+20” took place in Kyiv.

The event was organized by UNENGO “MAMA-86” with the support of Friedrich Ebert Foundation in Ukraine and Belarus. Among the participants at the event were experts from all 6 Eastern Partnership countries (Azerbaijan, Armenia, Belarus, Georgia, Moldova, and Ukraine), as well as from the EU member-states, representatives of numerous Ukrainian NGOs, research institutions and governmental bodies.

The event aimed at promoting sustainable development and green economy in the Eastern Partnership (EaP) through encouraging an expert discussion of the progress, setbacks and best practices of sustainable development policies and formulation of proposals for bringing these issues higher on the EU-EaP agenda, as well as forming a unified position of regional CSOs with regard to Rio+20 conference.

The meeting was opened by Zoriana Mishchuk, Executive Director of UNENGO “MAMA-86”, who emphasized in her welcoming speech the importance of the current moment for assessing the regional state of progress towards sustainable development, in the light of the forthcoming UN Conference on Sustainable Development in Rio de Janeiro and opening opportunities for stronger societal cooperation within the Eastern Partnership framework.

The keynote speech on the main challenges of Rio+20 was made by Jan-Gustav Strandenaes, a Senior Policy Adviser at the Stakeholder Forum, UK, who serves as the global UN CSD NGO Co-Organizing Partner coordinating global NGO input into the UN CSD process and into preparatory process for the Rio+20 Conference. In his presentation, the expert touched upon the main weaknesses of the “Zero Draft” of Rio+20 Outcome Document, in particular, not always understandable language, lack of ambitions, imbalance in favor of environmental pillar, and lack of action-oriented approach. Mr. Strandenaes emphasized the importance of paying more attention to global sustainable development policy formulation, as well as strengthening institutional capacity of international environmental governance — UNEP, Sustainable Development Council, National Sustainable Development Councils etc.

Ivan Ivanets, the Head of the Environmental Integration Division of the Department of Environmental Policy and International Cooperation of the Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources of Ukraine, spoke about Ukraine’s activities in sustainable development field and, in particular, the preparatory process for Rio+20.

During the first session “Where Does Sustainable Development in EaP Stand? Achievements, Setbacks, Current Trends and Future Perspectives” EaP experts gave a short overview of sustainable development policies in their countries, including their assessments of the main achievements, challenges and future prospects of sustainable development. Karine Danielyan (Secretary of the National Sustainable Development Council under the Prime Minister of Armenia) had underlined the main problem of “the crisis of implementation”. Ms. Danielyan also emphasized the need to pay more attention to developing cooperation with businesses and gusing indexes of sustainable development in the region. Aleksei Andreev (Chairman of the Board of the “Biotica” Environmental Society, Moldova) presented progress of meeting the MDGs in Moldova (21 of 27 goals have been already gained), as well as main barriers and obstacles for promotion of sustainable development. As Ukraine, Armenia and Moldova reform environmental policy in the framework of the countries’ European integration, unlike Belarus where this factor is not working. Iryna Sukhiy (NGO “Ecodom”, Belarus) in her presentation spoke about a difficult situation with dialogue on sustainable development with the government. She mentioned the problem of nature exploitation for economic activities, and governmental unwillingness to include sustainable development in national programs. Nino Chkhobadze, former Minister of Environment of Georgia, presented the current challenging state with environment governance in Georgia. For instance, the main authority controlling pollution and giving licenses for energy production is the Ministry of Energy, which does not include environmental risks in consideration. Perspectives of sustainable development implementation in the framework of the current economic growth of Azerbaijan were presented by Fikret Jafarov, the Chairman of the Board of “Sustainable Development Society” NGO. Speaking about institutions, he mentioned a Commission for Sustainable Development in Azerbaijan, which, however, has never gathered.

During the second session “Greening Economy and Society through Sustainable Consumption and Production” experts presented practices of sustainable consumption and production (SCP) both in the region and in the EU. Leida Rijnhout, Executive Director of ANPED, Belgium, spoke about the process of introducing green economy the world and also about the place of the concept in Rio+20 processes and the Zero Draft. She mentioned three pillars of Green Economy Initiative, which are pro-growth, pro-jobs, and pro-poor. Janis Brizga, Head of “Green Liberty” NGO, Latvia, supplemented the picture speaking about SCP policies in the EU. According to him, the main question in SCP policies is the choice between voluntary and strong financial instruments.

Practices of SCP implementation in EaP countries were discussed by experts in respective country snap-shot reviews. Zoriana Mishchuk noticed several positive developments, such as the provision on the development of the 10-year SCP framework program, as well as a SCP Strategy and Action plan already in 2012, introduced due to strong civil society lobbying into the National Environmental Strategy and Action Plan; and stimulating role of the green tariff and accession to the European Energy Community on promotion of sustainable energy. Among the obstacles to SCP are the lack of coordination mechanisms foe environmental policy integration, the negative effect of the current administrative reform and weak information policy. Olga Kazantseva (International Association “Eco-Tiras”, Moldova) discussed the need to address the problem of differences in technological development between post-Soviet countries and EU. Manana Tsulaia, Biological Farming Association “Elcana”, spoke about the use of European Neighborhood Instruments in Georgia and the Strategy of Agriculture Sector Development, including organic farming as sustainable production practice. Perspectives of renewable energy development in Azerbaijan were shown using a video by Fikret Jafarov. Maryna Dubina (Environmental Society “Green Alliance”, Belarus) spoke about national programs and strategies of Belarus which do not have environmental priorities and do not provide for a governmental support of any organic or environmentally friendly activity. Arman Vermishyan (Head of the International Environmental NGO “Burg”) indicated key environmental priorities of Armenia in the agriculture sector, which are imposed by the Law on Organic Agriculture.

The third session “Institutional Framework for Sustainable Development in EaP and the World: Looking for Better Practices” was dedicated to presenting examples of sustainable development governance. Dorothee Braun, the Scientific Advisor at the Secretariat of the German Council for Sustainable Development, presented some good institutional practices from Germany.

Speaking about the institutional aspect of sustainable development in EaP, experts agreed that almost all countries of the region experience problems with adhering to international and national legal acts relating to sustainable development or environmental governance, in particular, relating to provision of information. Examples of failures to meet international environmental agreements (in particular, the Aarhus convention) and national legislation on governance in Ukraine were provided by Olena Kravchenko (NGO “Environment. People. Law”, Ukraine). Karine Danielyan also spoke about the reluctance of her country to comply with the Aarhus Convention, difficulties with leaving behind the Soviet principles of policy-making and predominance of oligarchic structures in state governance. Nino Chkhobadze, speaking about the biggest problems of environmental governance in Georgia, named the minor place of the Ministry of Environment among other ministries and agencies, and fatal laws on forests and land use. Iryna Sukhiy made a short overview of environmental governance in Belarus, which can be hardly called good, but still found some examples of positive practices of sustainable development at the local level. Aleksei Andreev focused on the challenges of coordination of authorities’ actions in Moldova regarding resource management, especially in agriculture and forestry. Fikret Jafarov presented development of sectoral strategies, which would include environmental management elements.

Summing up the first day, experts discussed proposals regarding essential steps for the transition of the region towards sustainable development, including stronger attention to peaceful resolution of conflicts, engaging business to implementation of sustainable development measures, “hardening” of respective international agreements, stronger action on defending environmental rights and strategic practices of bringing sustainable development ideas to community.

On April, 20, a workshop “EaP Region within the Global Civil Society Action on Sustainable Development” took place, with key presentations of Jan-Gustav Strandenaes, Senior Expert of Stakeholder Forum, UK, and Leida Rijnhout, Executive Director of ANPED, Belgium, both of whom are actively involved in consulting and capacity-building for NGOs in the preparation for Rio+20. The presenters discussed the role and possibilities open for civil society in the Rio+20 process, described positions of major groups (stakeholders) and gave advice on how to better lobby for societal interests during the conference and in the follow-up. Dorothee Braun, Scientific Advisor at the Secretariat of German Council for Sustainable Development, supplemented the picture with the information about actions of German civil society and state in the run-up to Rio+20 and about the main initiatives promoted by the German Council for Sustainable Development.

The workshop was followed by the discussion “Greening EaP: how to Mainstream Sustainable Development into European Integration Agenda”. Hans Rhein, Head of the Energy, Transport and Environment Section of the EU Delegation to Ukraine, spoke about the EU position in the context of Rio+20 and also about the cooperation between EaP countries, including Ukraine, with the EU on environmental and sustainable development issues. Igor Kohut, the National Coordinator of EaP Civil Society Forum in Ukraine, presented the opportunities provided by the CSF for civil society cooperation in the region, as well as mentioned some steps which could be taken to strengthen the environmental block of the CSF activities. Experts from other countries of the region shared their perception of current cooperation between EaP and EU in the sustainable development sphere, as well as expressed ideas on how to activate the “European factor” in the transition to sustainable development.

The conference ended up with drawing of the main conclusions and, in particular, defining the directions for further cooperation between experts as a follow-up to the event, namely: coordination of efforts in providing information about Rio+20 (before and during the UN Conference and in the follow-up) and related cooperation with media; preparation of a report on the regional progress towards sustainable development, including SCP policies and practices, on the basis of conference materials; holding a side-event in Rio to provide the international community with information on regional developments; establishing cooperation and sharing of experience on the functioning of national sustainable development councils in the region and creating them where they are non-existent or non-functional, etc. Based on the observations and ideas presented during the conference, a Joint positional document is to be prepared and communicated to target audiences (governments of EaP countries, relevant EU institutions, international organizations, regional expert community, etc.).