Building a Global Network of National Councils for Sustainable Development

Date: April 28, 2012
Time: 10-16:00
Location: The Church Centre, 777 United Nations Plaza, New York, NY 10017

The Ministry of the Environment of Finland and Stakeholder Forum, along with partners, are working together to establish a network through which NSDCs can share best practice and promote sustainable development domestically and internationally. The aims of this work are to:

  • Identify and map existing national sustainable development councils;
  • Classify each council given its purpose and modality;
  • Create a library of material from each council;
  • Build a global network of national councils to engender engagement;
  • Build capacity through sharing best practice and lessons learnt;
  • Identify the implementation potential on the themes for Rio+20; the Green Economy and IFSD.

Please join us at a workshop in New York to discuss this work to date:

National Sustainable Development Councils (NSDCs) and National Strategies for Sustainable Development (NSSD) were products of Agenda 21. Both were given new life and support at World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) in 2002 as integral elements of work on sustainable development, and countries agreed to have councils and strategies in place by 2005. 

NSDCs directly link to the themes and objectives of Rio+20. The position of the national councils allows them to be actively engaged in the implementation of the Green Economy and bring global recommendations on this theme to the national and local level. As the councils are multi-stakeholder in nature, they may represent the best of bottom-up approaches and may function as important vehicles for developing and contributing to good governance at all levels and thus strengthen Institutional Framework for Sustainable Development (IFSD)efforts at national and local level. 

The workshop will entail a presentation of research and analysis done to date in mapping out the know NSDCs, as well as perspective on NSDCs from council officials, national governments, the UN and and civil society. There will also be opportunities to actively engage in the debate. Speaker include:

  • Ms Annika Lindblom – Senior Adviser, Ministry of the Environment; Deputy Secretary General, Finland’sNational Commission on Sustainable Development
  • Elizabeth Thompson – Executive Coordinator, Rio+20
  • Dr. Günther Bachmann – Director, German Council for Sustainable Development
  • Vladimir Zakharov – Director of the Institute of Sustainable Development, Civic Chamber of the Russian Federation
  • Jean-Francois – Director, European Economic and Social Committee (EESC)
  • Paula Caballero – Director for Economic, Social and Environmental Affairs, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Government of Colombia
  • Farooq Ullah – Head of Policy and Advocacy, Stakeholder Forum

The workshop’s full program can be viewed here.

Please RSVP to:[email protected]

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