AS the Jamaican delegation prepares to join some 60,000 other participants at the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg from August 26 to September 4, the Government is patting itself on the back for its work on environmental issues since the historic 1992 Earth Summit in Rio. But local environmentalists say that the reality is that while there has been a plethora of paperwork and documentation, the government has fallen short on implementation.

The Johannesburg meeting is also known as Rio + 10, coming as it does 10 years after the Rio conference where 172 governments participated and signed landmark agreements on forest conservation, climate change and biological diversity. That conference also launched a wide-ranging blueprint for environmental management and sustainable development, now known as Agenda 21.

The United Nations says the Johannesburg conference will provide an “exciting opportunity” to re-assess progress since Rio and to set targets for action.

In Jamaica’s own national report to the Johannesburg summit, Land and Environment Minister Horace Dalley states that Jamaica has been working towards sustainable development.

“Despite social and financial constraints, Jamaica has been putting in place policies and programmes for a sustainable future, which balance economic growth and development with environment and social justice needs, thus contributing to sustainable development in the years ahead,” Dalley says.

“Ten years after Rio, there have been significant developments in the pace and extent of social, economic and environmental programmes… The Government recognises that there can be no lasting economic development unless the natural resources and services provided by the environment are protected,” he adds.

The list of policies and programmes is impressive.

A coral reef action plan, said to be one of the first created by an island state; the designation of the Black River Wetlands as a Ramsar site; the creation of a National Solid Waste Management Authority; and sewage treatment systems established in Montego Bay, Negril and Ocho Rios are all noted in the report.

It makes mention of the National Poverty Eradication Programme; the creation of the Environmental Foundation of Jamaica to fund environmental and child welfare projects; the establishment of the Jamaica National Parks Trust Fund; the Forest Management and Conservation Fund; the Tropical Forest Conservation Fund; the creation of the Sustainable Development Council of Jamaica; and the amalgamation of the Natural Resources Conservation Authority, the Town and Country Planning Authority and the Land Development and Utilisation Commission into the National Environment and Planning Agency.

In addition, the National Environmental Education Action Plan; the Energy Sector Policy; the Tourism Master Plan; and the Jamaica National Environmental Action Plan are among the documents the Government says it has produced in keeping with its commitment to sustainable development.

Executive director of Call Associates and Recycle for Life, Bevon Morrison, admits that there have been some achievements, but says that more work is needed in other areas.

“We’re one of the few countries that has put together a national sustainable development council, and I think we are already having partnerships,” she says.

Noting that the creation of partnerships between different sectors is expected to be one outcome of the Johannesburg summit, Morrison says that in Jamaica, unofficial moves have been made to create partnerships for sustainable development between the private sector and communities, as well as private sector and the Government.

The establishment of the National Environment and Planning Agency, the Government’s permit and licensing system, and the National Commission on Science and Technology are other achievements listed by Morrison, who is also president of the Jamaica Society of Scientists and Technologists.

However, she wants to see more dialogue with the private sector and its closer involvement in sustainable development processes.

“I would probably give them five or six (out of 10),” she says when asked to grade the Government’s performance since Rio.

Executive director of the Caribbean Coastal Area Management Foundation, Peter Espeut, agrees that the Government can’t be faulted when it comes to developing plans and policies.

“We have policies on every imaginable thing,” he says. “The problem is the implementation. Jamaica is famous for putting in policies and plans. Policy documents line our shelves, but when push comes to shove, you say that whatever development takes place must not damage our environment, and yet, at the same time, what (we) observe is environmental impact appraisals being short-circuited, being avoided, being ignored and development taking place that is clearly not sustainable.”

The Johannesburg report also states that “several pieces of legislation have helped to decrease human impact on the environment, the most remarkable of which is the declaration of parks and protected areas, and an environmental protection area in the years following the Rio Summit”.

It lists legislation enacted to empower the Natural Resources Conservation Authority, the permit and license system, regulations to govern protected areas, the Endangered Species (Protection and Regulation of Trade) Act to support the implementation of the Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), ongoing revision of the NRCA Act, and laws relating to wildlife protection, watersheds and beach control.

But environmental consultant Dr David Smith says that the listing of new legislation alone does not give a full picture.

“There are still policies which require legislation to be enacted, there still is legislation, once enacted, that needs to be enforced,” he says.

“We’ve built a good foundation, we now need to start putting up the walls and the house,” says Smith.

He was reluctant to try and encapsulate the Government’s efforts into an overall grade, saying progress has been mixed.

Smith cites an increase in the number of protected areas and a higher level of public awareness of environmental issues as among the administration’s achievements. On the other hand, he expresses concern about insufficient allocation of government resources to sustainable development, and ensuring protection of the natural resources on which Jamaica’s tourism sector is largely built.

“We are still not doing a very good job of taking care of our coastal zone, we’re still not doing a very good job of managing our rivers, managing our beaches,” Smith says.

He also says it is a good sign that the Government has acceded to “virtually all the major environmental conventions” as the report states.

“We have become parties to many of the conventions. What needs to happen now is, in some cases, the conventions need to be enacted in terms of Jamaican law. The laws have to be revised, written or enacted to allow the conventions to have full force in Jamaica, and we still need to go the next step of making sure those laws are enforced, so signing the convention is only the first step,” he notes.

But Observer columnist and environmentalist, John Maxwell, cites the Government’s failure to ratify the SPAW treaty as a major disappointment.

The SPAW protocol falls under the Cartagena Convention, the only legally binding environmental treaty for the Wider Caribbean. According to the Caribbean Environment Programme, the protocol concerning Specially Protected Areas and Wildlife (the SPAW Protocol) has been internationally recognised as the most comprehensive treaty of its kind.

It was adopted in Kingston by the member governments of the Caribbean Environment Programme on January 18, 1990.

The protocol is an avenue for regional implementation of the global Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) and aims to protect rare and fragile ecosystems and habitats. It speaks, among other things, to the establishment and management of protected areas, national measures for the protection of plants and animals, and environmental impact assessments.

Jamaica signed the protocol when it opened for signature in Kingston, but has not yet ratified it.

“The problem is, when you sign that, most land speculation would have to stop,” Maxwell contends.

It’s an omission that also concerns Espeut. “We’ve put some legislation in place, but we haven’t put the legislation in place for the SPAW protocol to deal with parks and protected areas,” he says. “I guess I would give the Government a B for legislation, but a D for implementation.”

While Espeut gives the Government high marks for involving the public in policy development, he argues that it’s a different story when it comes to public consultation during some developments.

“I’ve been to innumerable meetings where we spent an inordinate amount of time discussing things like sustainable development, and what policies should be in place, so I really can’t fault the Government in terms of actually consulting with people. When it comes, however, to implementing things, that is where the consultation is lacking,” says Espeut.

He cites as an example, the dredging of Kingston Harbour, arguing that the public consultations should have been much more extensive.

“When it comes to planning, they consult us to a fault, but when it comes to implementation, they avoid us. It’s unfortunate the way things are turning out,” Espeut says.

In light of the approaching summit, the role of the environmental non-governmental organisations (NGOs) has also come in for scrutiny. Non-governmental organisations are widely acknowledged to play a critical role in governance through advocacy and watchdog activities, and their operations are usually seen as a critical aspect of a thriving democracy.

However, most people admit that the NGO sector in Jamaica is not as vibrant as it could be.

The Government, in its report to the summit, notes that an NGO council formed in the early 90s has not been very active in recent years, and says that NGO activities and capacities have declined in the latter part of the decade, predominantly for want of resources.

“Generally, I would say the fortunes of the non-governmental organisations increased during the early part of the decade, and started to decline by about 1998, ’99,” explains Smith.

“If one looks at the sector now, while there are probably more non-governmental organisations, serious questions are being raised about the capacity of the organisations to carry out work, and I think we need to look at the capability of the sector,” says Smith, a former executive director of the Jamaica Conservation and Development Trust, one of Jamaica’s largest NGOs.

Maxwell believes that the NGOS have failed to harness popular support.

“One of the things that we haven’t done is to go and get involved with ordinary people on the ground, because those are the people whose livelihoods are most at risk. If the NGOs had really gone out and got those people involved, life would be completely different. But the problem is that politicians think that if you organise poor people you’re taking on a political opposition to them, and they don’t want any other centres of power. This is one of the real problems,” Maxwell maintains.

Despite the plethora of issues affecting Jamaica, which are on the agenda for Johannesburg, Espeut, at least, has limited expectations for what this summit will achieve.

“Ten years ago, there was a great fanfare when several countries signed the agreements. Since then, the United States has backed off, others have followed their lead. It seems to me that we’ve gone somewhat backward. I’m at the stage in my life now when I no longer have great expectations for summits and meetings,” Espeut says.

“These occasions are more for profiling, I’m afraid. I’m sure the government representatives will go to the meeting and declare to the world what a fantastic record Jamaica has in environmental conservation, and of course, it won’t really be very accurate,” Espeut says.