World Summit on Sustainable Development: Daily Highlights

Johannesburg, South Africa (26 August-4 September 2002)

Tuesday 27 August

Negotiations on the major outcome document for the World Summit on Sustainable Development continued to make progress. There has been agreement on more than 40 paragraphs so far in Johannesburg and the spirit of the talks has been characterized as constructive.
Plenary sessions have been held on agriculture and biodiversity. So far, the UN has received submissions from 17 partnerships, with $100 million in resources, to implement various biodiversity projects across the world. Peter Schei, a high level advisor to the United Nations Environment Programme, said that despite 15 to 30 years of agreements on biodiversity on paper, "there has not been a lot of implementation. He added that the resources spent on financing Biodiversity were "ridiculous" compared to the $350 billion that countries spend on subsidies every year.
190 countries are attending the Summit, one of the largest turnouts for any UN conference.
The number of people attending the Summit continues to grow. So far, 15,852 people have been accredited, including 7,118 delegates, 5,802 NGOs, and 2,932 media representatives.