Summary: February 12, 2001: The Organizational Session of the United Nations Forum on Forests. Statement by Ambassador Per Norström, Head of Delegation of Sweden on behalf of the European Union (New York)
Mr Chairman,
I have the honor to speak on behalf of the European Union. The Central and Eastern European countries associated with the European Union; Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, and the associated countries Cyprus, Malta and Turkey align themselves with this statement.
Mr. Chairman, the EU supports the candidates for the Bureau that have been proposed and we look forward to pursuing the important matters that lay ahead of us under their competent guidance and leadership.
The EU would like to thank the Secretariat for the good work undertaken since IFF 4 in preparation both of this meeting and of the informal consultations on the work programme that are to follow. The EU welcomes the documentation for the informal consultations, which is a good basis for the discussions. We would also like to express our appreciation for the initiatives which have taken place since the IFF 4, particularly the Eight Country Initiative with its International Expert Consultation
held in Bonn, 27 November 1 December last year, and the International Workshop of Experts on Financing Sustainable Forest Management held in Oslo, 22-25 January 2001.
The EU strongly supports the new international arrangement on forests that includes the establishment of UNFF. The EU considers the Multi-Year Programme of Work of the UNFF of utmost importance for supporting the implementation of sustainable forest management at a global scale in line with Agenda 21, the Forest Principles and the agreed IPF/IFF Proposals for Action. Through the Multi-Year Programme of Work the UNFF can, and should, improve future global co-operation in the management,
conservation and sustainable development of all types of forests. A paper, outlining the EU's evolving thinking on the Multi-Year Programme of Work for the UNFF, has been circulated and will be available in the back of the room.
The Plan of Action should be a tool to support implementation at the primarily national and regional level. It should give guidance in terms of priorities and time frames. In this context, co-operation with the Collaborative Partnership on Forests should be emphasized, and we look forward to the presentation later today on how the partnership is progressing. The EU also considers the participation of civil society important and necessary for the success of UNFF.
The EU recalls that, in accordance with ECOSOC resolution E/2000/35, a set of Rules of Procedure similar to those of the Commission on Sustainable Development should guide the proceedings of UNFF. In line with this, the EU believes that the Bureau should be elected on a yearly basis, as is the case for the Commission on Sustainable Development, and that it should work for the preceding year to prepare the session that it presides. This can be achieved by holding a short meeting of the new
session to elect a bureau back to back with the previous session. However, for the reason of continuity, we feel that it would be helpful if the same Bureau remained in charge for both the first and second substantive session of UNFF, as an exception to the general rule. Nevertheless, to ensure equality for all regions over the next five years, the position of chair should rotate every year. This means, in effect, that the initial bureau would provide two different chairs.
The EU would like to thank the countries that have offered to host the secretariat. The European Union is of the opinion that the offers, including their financial implications, merit careful consideration by this forum. We are of course aware that resolution E/2000/35 of the ECOSOC states that the secretariat will preferably be located at the United Nations Headquarters in New York. The EU looks forward to our further discussions on this subject.
In this context I would like to emphasize that the EU is convinced that the relevance and effectiveness of UNFF would benefit if the sessions were held outside New York. We therefore welcome the decision in the ECOSOC-resolution that UNFF-sessions can be held at venues other than the United Nations Headquarters. The EU hopes that we can agree that UNFF sessions will preferably be held outside New York, depending on offers from interested countries and provided financial support can be obtained
from sources outside the regular UN-budget.
Finally, Mr. Chairman, on the subject of duration of the first substantive session of the UNFF: The ECOSOC resolution stated that the UNFF should meet annually for a period of up to two weeks, therefore we need to decide whether a full two weeks is necessary. The main purpose of the first substantive session of the UNFF, tentatively scheduled for June this year, is to agree on the Multi-Year Programme of Work. This is a fundamental issue for a successful outcome of UNFF and we therefore welcome
the informal consultations that will follow immediately on this meeting. The EU is convinced that these consultations will give us an opportunity to exchange views, which in turn will facilitate our negotiations in June, thereby enabling us to complete our work for that session in one week. By doing so, we can save resources, both financial and administrative, that will come to good use later on in the process. We believe that one week of formal meetings in June 2001 would provide sufficient
time for the adoption of the UNFF Multi-Year Programme of Work and for the other agenda items stated in the ECOSOC resolution.
Mr Chairman, the EU looks forward to pursuing these issues in dialogue with our partners.
Thank you for your attention.
| Top |
European Union Member States
Alerts by email
Email this page
Print this page