France: Chirac Plans His Last International Event
by Erwan Pianezza, Locronan, Brittany on 12.13.06
Next year, France will be going through the last months of Chirac's presidency: next May, after the second row (6th), a new president will be in charge of international affairs. Treehugger, with ecoloPop (based in France), has already covered the unusual player that wills to change the game: Nicolas Hulot. Former TV star, he's doing his best - and threatening to go for the election if other candidates don't sign his "ecological pact" - to influence candidates towards greater incorporation of environmental issues in their programs. Being one of the most serious counselors on the subject, Hulot was invited today by Jacques Chirac, along with ex-prime minister Alain Juppé. The plan: organize an international conference in February, gathering representatives from more than 60 countries. Objective: talks on a new international organization that would deal with environmental issues. Our question is the following: would the creation a new subsidiary of the UN be really efficient? There are already many organizations in charge of environmental and development issues on the international level: UNEP (environment), GEF (Global Environment Facility), UNICEF (children), FAO (Food & Agriculture), UNIDO (Industrial)... If 60 countries are going to meet next February (schedule is 2nd and 3rd), should talks be targeted towards institutions, or rather towards a more efficient way of making current organizations more powerful?
I think the fact that your post lists five agencies with some area of responsibility already, and there's arguably other agencies which have some area of responsibility that could be defined as environmental. This would suggest that there is certainly not a singular authority.
It would seem that a single body, with overarching responsibility and efficiently run, could be far more effective than this dispersed, disorganised arrangement there currently is.