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The Second International Conference on Climate, Sustainability and Development in Semi-arid Regions, the ICID+18, was held in Fortaleza, state of Ceará, Brazil, from 16th to 20th August, 2010. It was organized by the Center for Strategic Studies and Management (CGEE), a social organization linked to the Brazilian Ministry of Science and Technology, at that time presided by Mrs. Lucia Carvalho Pinto de Melo, who supervised CGEE's initiative. ICID resulted from an ample effort that involved the sponsorship of the Government of the State of Ceará, the Ministry of Environment, the Ministry of Science and Technology, the Ministry of National Integration and the Bank of the Northeast of Brazil, and the support from numerous organizations, national and international, such as the DfID, the IRD, the World Bank, the IADB, the National Confederation of Industries (CNI/FIEC), the University of Illinois (SDEP) and many others.
ICID+18 involved the participation of scientists and policymakers from governments, international organizations, civil society, academia and the private sector from 80 countries representing all continents and dryland regions of the world. It took two years for its organization and involved the partnership of many institutions, government and non-government, around the world.
Why to do such an effort? The Drylands of the world represent 40% of the planet´s land surface and 30% of the world´s population, about 2 billion people. Most of the poverty of the world is concentrated in the dryland regions of Africa, Asia and Latin America. To tackle the problems of the drylands is directly related to a commitment with the Millennium Development Goals (MDG), especially in regard to reducing poverty, illiteracy and environmental degradation. And, according to the IPCC and other studies, these are the regions that will be most adversely affected by climate change.
In 1992, the first ICID was instrumental to support the creation of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification and Mitigate the Effects of Droughts, the UNCCD. During the last 18 years, there was important institutional improvement, both at the international and national levels. We have now the UNCCD and the two other Rio Conventions, the UNFCCC and the UNCBD, and certainly there is more awareness in regard to the environmental problems of degradation and desertification, as well as with the impacts of climate variability and change. Notwithstanding these improvements, these regions still lack priority, investments and support to their sustainable development.
The peoples that inhabit these regions lack voice and means to promote their development in a sustainable way. The UNCCD, the Convention to Combat Desertification, is the UN Convention that attracts the least support from governments and international organizations.
The decision to hold another ICID and convene peoples and institutions concerned with the fate of the drylands was again an attempt to call the attention of the decision and opinion makers of the world to the challenges and potentialities of these regions. A new world summit, the UN Conference on Sustainable Development (UNCSD) known as the Rio+20, will be held in Rio de Janeiro in June 2012. The ICID+18 is a contribution of its participants and its promoters to the Rio+20, and a clear objective of ICID is to contribute to strengthen the agenda of the Rio+20 in regard to issues concerning the drylands. The participants in the ICID + 18 expect that not only there will be more space in the Rio+20 agenda devoted to the drylands, but also there will be more commitment from governments and organizations to create and strengthen instruments to effectively support sustainable development in these regions.
In this publication, CGEE is proud to bring to a broader audience of policy makers, scientists, government and non-government representatives, a selection of key documents presented at the ICID or prepared by its participants. Together with the Declaration of Fortaleza, which brings a call for action in the drylands, we have included the statements made by the UN Secretary General, Ban Ki-moon, the Executive Secretary of the UNFCCC, Christiana Figueres, the Executive Secretary of the UNCBD, Ahmed Djoghlaf, and the statement of the Executive Secretary of the UNCCD, Luc Gnacadja. We also include the keynote speech by Professor Jeffrey Sachs, and special presentations by Professors Ignacy Sachs and Jesse Ribot. The booklet also includes words from the Governor of the host state, Mr. Cid Gomes and other authorities that participated in the Conference.
We hope that this publication, containing highlights of the ICID+18 and specially the Declaration of Fortaleza, will be useful to all of us who have a commitment with the well-wbeing of the peoples that inhabit the arid, semi-arid and subhumid lands of the world. The messages contained in the documents published here may inspire decisions and concrete actions that in the end will help to reduce social, environmental and economic vulnerability in the drylands, and to increase prospects for sustainable development for the benefit of their populations.
Antonio Carlos Filgueira Galvão
Director, CGEE
Mariano Francisco Laplane
President, CGEE
