This report assesses options for reform of the institutional framework for sustainable development (IFSD). Serious reform efforts and initiatives to address perceived shortcomings, gaps, fragmentation and/or incoherence in the IFSD date back to at least the World Summit on Sustainable Development (2002). Notable among them have been discussions at and initiatives of the United Nations Environment Programme’s (UNEP) Governing Council and Global Ministerial Environmental Forum and proposals from the Bali Strategic Plan for Technology Support and Capacity Building (UNEP 2005), the High Level Panel on System Wide Coherence (UN 2006), and the Joint Inspection Unit Management Review of Environmental Governance within the United Nations System (Inomata 2008). In addition, there has been an active debate and wide variety of proposals for reform from member governments, stakeholder groups, and academics. These efforts have so far produced only limited results.

The Rio +20 process presents the greatest political opportunity in the last 20 years to move forward on the IFSD precisely because governments have agreed to make it one of two central themes of the UN Conference on Sustainable Development. There is virtually no debate among member governments or stakeholders that reform is needed. The challenge is to identify which of the many proposals for reform, singly or in combination, will best respond to the evolving social, environmental and economic challenges of sustainable development governance while at the same time be viable given an equally challenging global political and economic environment for any institutional reform effort. To assist member states in meeting this challenge, this report has been prepared specifically to assess the structural, legal, and financial implications of the five options for reform identified in the outcome of the Nairobi-Helsinki Process:

1. Enhancing UNEP

2. Establishing a new umbrella organization for sustainable development

3. Establishing a specialized agency such as a world environment organization

4. Reforming the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) and the United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD)

5. Enhancing institutional reforms and streamlining existing structures 

Attachments:

322IFSD FIVE OPTIONS REPORT - FINAL VERSION 1 NOV for posting.pdf