Monday, 18 June 2012
Biodisel - really a sustainable solution? Photo: Laura Eggens
The Rio Conventions Pavilion hosted Business Day to discuss sustainable business initiatives. The most competitive companies seem to invest much into their green image.
Sustainable Energy was in the heart of today's Sustainable Development and Dialogue Days' session. All the participants made comments to eliminate subsidies to nuclear energy and improving governance. Instead they proposed to invest more into renewable energy. Biofuels were also fiercely discussed but with growing skepticism.
Simultaneously climate and anti-poverty activists have launched a 24-hour "Twitter storm" against government subsidies paid to the petroleum and coal industry. The online demonstration came as negotiators at the Rio+20 remained divided over proposals to phase out the provision of public funds to carbon dioxide polluters. Some suggested that also nuclear subsidies should be removed by 2020.
Sustainable Agriculture was a topic of the Agriculture and Rural Development day organised by FAO outside conference centre. During the event the speakers acknowledged that more has to be done to empower women and small scale farmers. Brazilian Minister of Environment, Isabella Teixera, stated that there is 'no need to destroy environment to produce more food'. Outreach magazine, published by Stakeholders Forum highlighted the need for improvement in knowledge systems for agriculture and small scale farmers. Moreover the discussions pointed to the need for reducing the dependency of agriculture on fossil fuels and energy lost in food chain. Panelists now drafting exact wording of their recommendation...hope they can do it quicker than the negotiators.
At the same time when panelists draft exact wording of their recommendations for the outcome document of the Rio+20 conference, observers point out that this conference comes in the wrong time. According to Guardian 'the euro crisis sits at the top of the agenda while more important debates are squeezed out'. The future will show if we managed to use or wasted the opportunity.
Text: Marta Dabrowska
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