• Interview with Luis Gómez Echeverri, UNDP resident coordinator

BY JOAQUIN ORAMAS

DESPITE predictions that the World Summit on Sustainable Development scheduled for August 26-September 4 in Johannesburg will be a failure, Luis Gómez Echeverri, United Nations Development Program (UNDP) resident coordinator in Cuba, is optimistic; he considers that beneficial measures will emerge from it to avert the world from coming to an end.

The UNDP official affirms that Cuba’s participation at the Summit will be important because the country is an example of what a small nation can achieve with scant resources (and also subjected to a blockade).

Before he took up his current post, Gómez Echeverri was UNDP Environmental Director, a position that gave him the opportunity to work on environmental themes in many countries. He was present at the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, and is will also be at the upcoming event in Johannesburg. He knows that there have been successes and setbacks during the 10 years that have passed between the two summits.

At the Rio Summit, the majority of countries had neither the environmental organizations nor legislation that exist nowadays; this is a positive factor.

But a negative factor is how few actions have been implemented due to scant resources, added to insufficient aid from the rich countries, which promise much but do little.

This summit will probably be one of the last ones for many years to come; hence a change of attitude in favor of a desire for important achievements to emerge from Johannesburg has been registered.

Gómez Echeverri considers that after the Earth Summit, many nations made efforts to set up institutions and mobilize resources; each country took major steps forward. However, the environmental ministries in those countries are not powerful and their role is normative, offering no specific projects. The case of Cuba is different, Gómez Echeverri confirmed, because the Ministry of Science, Technology and the Environment (SITMA) is very influential, is listened to, and enjoys great political and technical influence. Its expert personnel are accomplished negotiators.

The environmental theme has become central to the island’s agenda and development, unlike other countries, particularly in Latin America, he pointed out.

This favorable situation has been translated into important, wide-ranging programs in Cuba, an experience that many other nations could learn from. To reinforce that idea, he cited the results of a reforestation program.

“As far as I know, Cuba, as a developing country, has made the most advances in this type of project,” remarked the UNDP agency representative.

He likewise highlighted Cuban accomplishments in protected areas, praising the island’s decision not to close off large areas, but to deal with them in a different way.

Gómez Echeverri explained that a national system of protected zones has been created to make sure that destruction does not accompany development, in reference to the island’s sustainable development policy.

He stated that one of the largest impacts he has noted in Cuba is the high qualification in this context of technical personnel coming out of the Academy of Science. “That helps to establish credibility at a national level, something that perhaps doesn’t exist in other countries I’ve worked in,” he observed, adding that the difference can be seen in the way that consideration is given to SITMA opinions and decisions.

Vulnerability due to climatic variations was another aspect that emerged during our interview. The UNDP program director thinks that Cuba manages problems of hurricanes and other natural disasters very well; it doesn’t confine itself to merely implementing measures in order to avoid victims among the population, but also has a stratagem for managing natural resources and an organization to mitigate the middle- and long-term impacts.

This is evidenced by the fact that, in less than one year since the damage reeked by Hurricane Michelle, thousands of people have returned to their new or repaired.

In Cuba there is a more integrated way of facing the theme of vulnerability, he stressed.

Gómez Echeverri also praised the island’s excellent organization in terms of training people, resulting in less damage from natural disasters; he pinpointed that Cuba concerns itself in facing such problems in a more integrated fashion.

He confessed that one of the world’s main environmental problems is that those very problems are viewed in a fragmented manner, and the major challenge for all nations is to look at them in a coordinated and integrated way. “Cuba is an example because it has managed to confront those problems in a more integrated way,” he explained.

He likewise indicated that the UNDP Environmental Program in Cuba is the organization’s most important project here, as it comprises some 40% of programs and is aimed at improving the ambiance and quality of Cubans’ lives. The project has various entry points: for example offering support to energy programs for improved use of biomass and other renewable resources. Help is also given to create institutions and strengthen the system of protected areas, such as coastal zone management.

The UNDP agency official cited the highly important project for the vulnerable northeastern area of Sabana Camaguey and the cleaning up of Havana Bay as examples of improving the quality of life for thousands of inhabitants.

Referring to the UNDP’s role on the island, he added: “in the past, we worked alongside the Cuban government because the island owes its success to the fact that it is a country that knows what it needs and has a high scientific and technical level. Nowadays, in the forestry sector for example, we support local communities in reforesting water basins because that’s where we can make the most impact.”

THE CAUTO PROJECT GOES TO THE SUMMIT

A Cuban project demonstrating the value of sustainable development work has been selected out of more than 420 projects from 60-plus nations attending the Johannesburg Summit. The River Cauto Basin has been chosen as a successful restoration program undertaken with minimum resources, an experience that could be implemented globally.

Desertification and reforestation programs were initiated from the socioeconomic point of view, water usage, among others, and there are close to 20 related topics that could be included.

“The Cauto Basin shows us that it can be done, but we now have to reproduce the experience a thousand times over in other countries, including Cuba,” observes Gómez Echeverri. He then enlarged upon his agency’s role: “In Cuba, the UNDP has become an agency that supports development programs. We have moved out of funding small projects to facilitating and mobilizing resources for works prioritized by the Cuban government. This change means that the agency’s program on the island has multiplied in a very short time,” he explained.

ANTICIPATING SUCCESS IN JOHANNESBURG

We then discussed the world event that opens on August 26 in the South African capital of Johannesburg. He recalled that the UN decided to call the meeting to review what the EU had achieved in the 10 years since the last summit, and adopt measures for action.

Gómez Echeverri pauses before continuing: “I’ve just finished evaluating what Cuba is accomplishing. I wish I could say the same is happening in other developing countries. Unfortunately it’s not the case.” He mentions the lack of financial, human and training resources and scant international support.

The UNDP agency director thinks that Johannesburg will be a good occasion to make an inventory of what has actually been achieved and what is yet to be done, “because if we don’t take more care in managing natural and all types of physical resources, we will have to foot the bill later and the cost will be greater. It’s comparable to the health sector. Those nations, such as Cuba, which pay more attention to primary prevention care, also pay more heed to environmental concerns. They treat the two with almost the same importance because environment affects health, the economy and social aspects.”

He explained how the UN Secretary General identifies five points of entry important for discussion in the Summit.

They are the themes of water, energy, public health, agriculture and biodiversity.

After highlighting the relevance of water scarcity and quality, Gómez Echeverri moved on to the theme of electrical energy, mentioning that 95% of Cubans have access to power, whilst two billion people throughout the world do not.

Regarding agriculture, he affirmed that the spotlight would particularly focus on the African continent - the only one that does not produce enough to feed its inhabitants. However, he clarified this by explaining that this is not to say that there are no hungry people in the other continents, but that they are so as a result of distribution problems and the assignment of resources.

Biodiversity is a little understood and poorly explained theme, he suggested. Nevertheless, it must be conserved because 80% of the world’s medicine is developed from it, and it is a source of favorable results in agricultural production, among other benefits.

Gómez Echeverri added that the UN is seeking greater efforts to link biodiversity to all problems of humanity’s survival, an extremely important theme that not many people are aware of.

He repeated that action plans need to emerge from this summit that will confront all the indicated problems that take their toll, and so that everyone can support them. For example, he recalled that the island’s government has offered to provide the human resources (Cuban medical personnel) and infrastructure to resolve serious health problems in Sub-Saharan Africa, with funding from a developed country, which is something that should be implemented.

The UNDP official confirmed that the Johannesburg agenda includes the five problems highlighted above, with trade and finance among other topics under discussion. There is much to be done regarding the two latter themes, including the fulfillment of economic aid to developing nations. Similarly, the Summit will include the question of the foreign debt that many developing nations are burdened with.

Gómez Echeverri pointed out that the Johannesburg document makes a reference to the Kyoto Protocol and a call to all countries, particularly the United States, to ratify it.

The Summit is a suitable place to reiterate the importance of the Convention on Climatic Changes which includes the Kyoto Protocol, facilitating technology, resources and renewable energy transfers, as well as how to clean up traditional energy sources so that they do not become contaminants.

He also referred to the dangers of climatic changes that are threatening to cause the disappearance of islands in the Pacific Ocean and Caribbean Sea, causing equal damage to the coasts of various countries.

As 50% of the world’s population lives in coastal areas, climatic changes and rising sea levels mean that many people will be affected, the agency director observed. “We must see what adaptive measures we need to take to reduce danger, but these require immense spending and investment and we know that many developing countries cannot deal with the problems. Countries in the North, meanwhile, are able to transfer cities and towns to safe locations.

“Problems will persist over the next 100 years if we do not halt the effects of current climatic changes,” insists Gómez Echeverri. “We are expecting long periods of drought in the Caribbean so Cuban scientists are diagnosing the situation in order to adopt measures to adapt to the coming changes.”

Those predictions notwithstanding, the UNDP official is convinced that the world is not going to end.

He spoke briefly about the history of planet earth, mentioning that immense changes have occurred in the millions of years since it came into existence. Nowadays we have science, technology, and intelligence accumulated over thousands of years, which is enabling humanity to adapt itself to problems. But there will be difficulties of equality: those who are able to make the most of changes are those with the resources, whilst those who will suffer the most are the poor and vulnerable. This is how the future can be presented today.