SAN FRANCISCO: The five-day U.N. World Environment Conference, ended here Sunday, saw mayors of some of the largest cities around the world signing a series of accords pledging to improve urban conditions, especially taking their cities on a greener, cleaner and healthier development path.
Mayors from as many as 50 of the major cities in the world signed a document in the ornate rotunda at City Hall committing to "build an ecologically sustainable, economically dynamic, and socially equitable future for our urban citizens".
They vowed among other things to ensure increased use of public transportation, substantial reduction in the use of trash in landfills and better access for more and more people to potable water. The accords, though non-binding, have 21 specific actions meant to make cities greener.
After the historic signing ceremony, the mayors heard a 500-member choir sing in unison a song composed for the occasion, "Together We Can." They also listened to U.S. House minority leader Nancy Pelosi say "What you are doing here today is taking a different approach — a united approach — on the stewardship of the environment." Pelosi later described the accords as a "blueprint for the future health of our children".
As participants in the accords, the mayors pledged to take at least three actions every year, that would cover initiating new laws and policies in the areas of energy, waste reduction, urban design, urban nature, transportation, environmental health and water. The accords have several noble aims -- like access to potable water by 2015 to the entire population of the universe, affordable public transportation for all city residents in 10 years, recreation facilities within half-a-mile vicinity for every city dweller by 2015 and zero growth in the amount of waste being sent to landfills and incinerators by 2040. One another notable recommendation has been the increased use of renewable energy to meet 10 per cent of a city's peak electric load within seven years.
The mayors who attended the conference came from cities like Jakarta, London, Seattle, Rio de Janeiro, Lausanne, and Kolkotta.
U.N. secretary general Kofi Annan told the mayors that by 2030, as much as 60 per cent of the entire world's population will be dwelling in cities. This growth poses great challenges for the urban planners and problems like clean water supplies and garbage removal, he said. "Already, one of every three urban dwellers lives in a slum. Let us create green cities."
June 5, the date on which the first environmental summit was held in Stockholm in 1972, is observed the world over as the World Environment Day. For 2005, the summit had adopted the theme, "Greener planning for cities".
The conference deliberated on global warming and what mayors can do to curb greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide.
Environmentalists have described the accords as the municipal version of the Kyoto Protocol on global warming, which requires countries to sharply reduce greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by 2012. The Bush administration, however, opposes the treaty because officials believe it would raise energy prices and cost millions of U.S. jobs.
Former US vice-president Al Gore, in an address, told the mayors to initiate steps to fight global warming. Gore, one of the architects of the Kyoto document, said that climate change was already melting glaciers, raising temperatures and altering weather patterns worldwide.
"We are witnessing a collision between our civilization and the earth, a transformation of the relationship between our species and the planet," he said. "Is it only terrorists that we're worried about? Is that the only threat to the future that is worth organizing to respond to?"
