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| THE ARICAN CIVIL SOCIETY FORUM IN NAIROBI, KENYA
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| 2. Obstacles to sustainable development in Africa. |
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In the midst of this crisis, African peoples and governments have faced formidable obstacles in their attempts to promote sustainable development and in the implementation of Agenda 21. The following are some of the problems:
- Lack of financial resources.
- Lack of human resource capacity to implement Multilateral Environmental Agreements (MEAs) and Agenda 21.
- Commitments and conventions relating to agenda 21 are not legally binding.
- Lack of technology and knowledge transfer from the north to the south as a result of restrictions placed by new trade regimes e.g. the Trade Related Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPs)
- Decision-making in the international governance system is skewed against Africa and other poor countries.
- Unfavorable economic and trade conditions imposed by the World Bank, IMF and WTO.
- High external debt and debt service costs
- Poor governance (lack of democratic government, human rights abuse and corruption)
- Inter and intra state conflicts and wars
- Increase in HIV/AIDs
- Food insecurity
- Desertification
- Poverty (e.g. 60 000 per day get poorer in Africa)
- Unemployment (lack of quality jobs, loss of skills)
- Mining exploration and exploitation (e.g. inequitable distribution of mineral wealth and lack of mining policies)
- Pollution (even at community levels)
- Lack of basic services (water, health services, education, electricity, and public transport)
- Lack of access to information and public participation
- Biotechnology (leading to loss of biodiversity, food production for small scale farmers and loss of indigenous knowledge)
- Lack of homegrown macro economic policies
- Lack of sustainable agriculture (pastoralism, chemicals)
- Somalia situation, where there is no national government.
- Lack of political will to implement environmental conventions
- Trade barriers (access to market, terms of trade,
- Trade in small arms on the continent
- Environmental degradation and pollution (exploitation of marine resources, desertification, and deforestation), even at community levels
- North not implementing environmental agreements in Africa
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