93.2 Follow up of UNCED Conventions re: Women and Development
[Whereas,] Rationale:
Preventing environmental disaster requires world-wide co-operation, encompassing both third world and industrial nations. The Canadian delegation to the United Nations Conference on the Environment and Development (UNCED) in Rio de Janeiro in June 1992, took a leading role in the developing and signing of Agenda 21, the plan of action for saving the planet, as well as the Conventions on Climate Change and Bio-Diversity.
Third world countries need to develop their productive capacities, as well as improve health and education, in order to attack the massive poverty which feeds environmental pollution. Such development can only be accomplished on an environmentally sustainable basis if there is substantial financial and technical assistance from industrialized countries. NCWC believes strongly that such assistance should encourage the full participation of women at all levels of the development process.
[RESOLVED,]
The National Council of Women of Canada urges the Government of Canada to:
- Uphold and support the UNCED Agreements, particularly Agenda 21, by providing increased technical and financial aid to developing nations, particularly those which encourage the participation of women, to a target of 0.7% of GNP by the year 2000.
- Focus its funding on small sustainable projects which usually involve the participation of women on a partnership basis, especially in those nations offering opportunities for women to function in those projects as directors or at the decision-making level.
- Increase the Canadian appropriations for funding UNIFEM, now known as the United Nations Development Fund for Women, and other appropriate United Nations Agencies.