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A 'Sustainable' G20 Communique?

Sara Wolcott | Sunday 27th September 2009

Last Friday, the Group of 20 (G20) meeting was held in (of all places) Pittsburgh, PA USA. The communiqu that came out of it is a largely self-congratulatory document which solidified the importance of the G20 - versus the smaller, and now old-fashioned - G8 as the Group that matters . and the group that 'saved' the global economy from utter collapse. While less dramatic than the April 2 London G20 summit, The Times suggested today that last Friday symbolized a day when 'the developed world accepted that economic power was shifting to the emerging nations'. I wondered what this 'new' body has to say about sustainable development.

Even without the financial crisis, the shift in power from 'developed' to 'emerging' is hardly surprising: China will soon surpass Japan in becoming the world's second largest economy. Not including China and other emerging economies in any global economic body would be nothing short of ignoring reality. When one adds the complications of the financial crisis, it is of no surprise at all. In addition to a host of signals that the 'rulers' of the global economy are becoming more inclusive (a good thing), which will hopefully mean greater attention to the needs of developing countries, how is this 'new' body responding to the need for sustainable development?

While there was discussion on climate change, the G20 failed to call for resources to help the poorest countries tackle climate change. Not good. There was greater emphasis on agriculture via a new trust fund hosted by the World Bank. Focus on agriculture - good; done solely through the World Bank, which has a not-so-great reputation for supporting farmer-led, sustainable agriculture: not-so-good. I had mixed feelings about the ubiquitous use of the term 'sustainability' throughout the communiqu. The word appears 38 times (yes I counted), and I wondered what they meant by it.

The communiqu has much talk of 'Strong, Sustainable and Balanced Growth'. By sustainable do they mean financially sustainable (no more financial crises)? Or do they mean environmentally sustainable? Is it about greening business? If so, it's only superficially: there was little talk of greening investments and little talk of supporting sustainable development in Africa - including adapting to climate change.

Sometimes I fear 'sustainable development' is loosing its meaning. Of course, global documents such as communiqus are generally broad documents, with loosely defined words, which gives politicians the potentially necessary room to make nationally appropriate responses. How much communiqus are rhetoric, and how much they can really shape reality, is debatable. In this case, I must admit that I don't hold out too much hope for true sustainable development given their communiqu - it feels more concerned with returning to 'normal' than creating a new, truly sustainable for people and planet vision and practice of development.

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