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AGENDA 21, CHAPTER 30



STRENGTHENING THE ROLE OF BUSINESS AND INDUSTRY






NOTE:     This is a final, advanced version of a chapter of Agenda 21, as adopted by the
          Plenary in Rio de Janeiro, on June 14, 1992.  This document will be further
          edited, translated into the official languages, and published by the United
          Nations for the General Assembly this autumn.





                                                  ........../2

                         INTRODUCTION

30.1.  Business and industry, including transnational 
corporations, play a crucial role in the social and economic 
development of a country.  A stable policy regime enables and 
encourages business and industry to operate responsibly and 
efficiently and to implement longer-term policies.  Increasing 
prosperity, a major goal of the development process, is 
contributed primarily by the activities of business and 
industry.  Business enterprises, large and small, formal and 
informal, provide major trading, employment and livelihood 
opportunities.  Business opportunities available to women are 
contributing towards their professional development, 
strengthening their economic role and transforming social 
systems. Business and industry, including transnational 
corporations, and their representative organizations should be 
full participants in the implementation and evaluation of 
activities related to Agenda 21.

30.2.  Through more efficient production processes, preventive 
strategies, cleaner production technologies and procedures 
throughout the product life cycle, hence minimizing or avoiding 
wastes, the policies and operations of business and industry, 
including transnational corporations, can play a major role in 
reducing impacts on resource use and the environment. 
Technological innovations, development, applications, transfer 
and the more comprehensive aspects of partnership and 
cooperation are to a very large extent within the province of 
business and industry.

30.3.  Business and industry, including transnational 
corporations, should recognize environmental management as 
among the highest corporate priorities and as a key determinant 
to sustainable development.  Some enlightened leaders of 
enterprises are already implementing "responsible care" and 
product stewardship policies and programmes, fostering openness 
and dialogue with employees and the public and carrying out 
environmental audits and assessments of compliance.  These 
leaders in business and industry, including transnational 
corporations, are increasingly taking voluntary initiatives, 
promoting and implementing self-regulations and greater 
responsibilities in ensuring their activities have minimal 
impacts on human health and the environment.  The regulatory 
regimes introduced in many countries and the growing 
consciousness of consumers and the general public and 
enlightened leaders of business and industry, including 
transnational corporations, have all contributed to this.  A 
positive contribution of business and industry, including 
transnational corporations, to sustainable development can 
increasingly be achieved by using economic instruments such as 
free market mechanisms in which the prices of goods and 
services should increasingly reflect the environmental costs of 
their input, production, use, recycling and disposal subject to 
country-specific conditions.
 
30.4.  The improvement of production systems through 
technologies and processes that utilize resources more 
efficiently and at the same time produce less wastes - 
achieving more with less - is an important pathway towards 
sustainability for business and industry.  Similarly, 
facilitating and encouraging inventiveness, competitiveness and 
voluntary initiatives are necessary for stimulating more 
varied, efficient and effective options.  To address these 
major requirements and strengthen further the role of business 
and industry, including transnational corporations, the 
following two programmes are proposed.


                        PROGRAMME AREAS

               A.  Promoting cleaner production

Basis for action

30.5.  There is increasing recognition that production, 
technology and management that use resources inefficiently form 
residues that are not reused, discharge wastes that have 
adverse impacts on human health and the environment and 
manufacture products that when used have further impacts and 
are difficult to recycle, need to be replaced with 
technologies, good engineering and management practices and 
know-how that would minimize waste throughout the product life 
cycle.  The concept of cleaner production implies striving for 
optimal efficiencies at every stage of the product life cycle.  
A result would be the improvement of the overall 
competitiveness of the enterprise.  The need for a transition 
towards cleaner production policies was recognized at the 
UNIDO-organized Ministerial-level Conference on Ecologically 
Sustainable Industrial Development, held at Copenhagen in 
October 1991. 1/ 

Objectives

30.6.  Governments, business and industry, including 
transnational corporations, should aim to increase the 
efficiency of resource utilization, including increasing the 
reuse and recycling of residues, and to reduce the quantity of 
waste discharge per unit of economic output.

Activities

30.7.  Governments, business and industry, including 
transnational corporations, should strengthen partnerships to 
implement the principles and criteria for sustainable 
development. 

30.8.  Governments should identify and implement an appropriate 
mix of economic instruments and normative measures such as 
laws, legislations and standards, in consultation with business 
and industry, including transnational corporations, that will 
promote the use of cleaner production, with special 
consideration for small and medium-sized enterprises. Voluntary 
private initiatives should also be encouraged.

30.9.  Governments, business and industry, including 
transnational corporations, academia and international 
organizations, should work towards the development and 
implementation of concepts and methodologies for the 
internalization of environmental costs into accounting and 
pricing mechanisms.

30.10.  Business and industry, including transnational 
corporations, should be encouraged:

     (a)  To report annually on their environmental records, as 
well as on their use of energy and natural resources;

     (b)  To adopt and report on the implementation of codes of 
conduct promoting best environmental practice, such as the 
International Chamber of Commerce's Business Charter on 
Sustainable Development and the chemical industry's responsible 
care initiative.

30.11.  Governments should promote technological and know-how 
cooperation between enterprises, encompassing identification, 
assessment, research and development, management marketing and 
application of cleaner production.

30.12.  Industry should incorporate cleaner production policies 
in its operations and investments, taking also into account its 
influence on suppliers and consumers. 

30.13.  Industry and business associations should cooperate 
with workers and trade unions to continuously improve the 
knowledge and skills for implementing sustainable development 
operations.

30.14.  Industry and business associations should encourage 
individual companies to undertake programmes for improved 
environmental awareness and responsibility at all levels to 
make these enterprises dedicated to the task of improving 
environmental performance based on internationally accepted 
management practices.

30.15.  International organizations should increase education, 
training and awareness activities relating to cleaner 
production, in collaboration with industry, academia and 
relevant national and local authorities.

30.16.  International and non-governmental organizations, 
including trade and scientific associations, should strengthen 
cleaner production information dissemination by expanding 
existing databases such as the UNEP, International Cleaner 
Production Clearing House (ICPIC), the UNIDO Industrial and 
Technological Information Bank (INTIB) and the ICC/IEB, as well 
as forge networking of national and international information 
systems.


          B.  Promoting responsible entrepreneurship

Basis for action

30.17.  Entrepreneurship is one of the most important driving 
forces for innovations, increasing market efficiencies and 
responding to challenges and opportunities.  Small and 
medium-sized entrepreneurs, in particular, play a very 
important role in the social and economic development of a 
country.  Often, they are the major means for rural 
development, increasing off-farm employment and providing the 
transitional means for improving the livelihoods of women.  
Responsible entrepreneurship can play a major role in improving 
the efficiency of resource use, reducing risks and hazards, 
minimizing wastes and safeguarding environmental qualities.

Objectives

30.18.  The following objectives are proposed:

     (a)  To encourage the concept of stewardship in the 
management and utilization of natural resources by entrepreneurs;

     (b)  To increase the number of entrepreneurs engaged in 
enterprises that subscribe to and implement sustainable 
development policies.

Activities

30.19.  Governments should encourage the establishment and 
operations of sustainably managed enterprises.  The mix would 
include regulatory measures, economic incentives and 
streamlining of administrative procedures to assure maximum 
efficiency in dealing with applications for approval in order 
to facilitate investment decisions, advice and assistance with 
information, infrastructural support and stewardship 
responsibilities.

30.20.  Governments should encourage, in cooperation with the 
private sector, the establishment of venture capital funds for 
sustainable development projects and programmes.

30.21.  In collaboration with business, industry, academia and 
international organizations, Governments should support 
training in the environmental aspects of enterprise 
management.  Attention should also be directed towards 
apprenticeship schemes for youth.

30.22.  Business and industry, including transnational 
corporations, should be encouraged to establish world-wide 
corporate policies on sustainable development, arrange for 
environmentally sound technologies to be available to 
affiliates owned substantially by their parent company in 
developing countries without extra external charges, encourage 
overseas affiliates to modify procedures in order to reflect 
local ecological conditions and share experiences with local 
authorities, Governments and international organizations.

30.23.  Large business and industry, including transnational 
corporations, should consider establishing partnership schemes 
with small and medium-sized enterprises to help facilitate the 
exchange of experience in managerial skills, market development 
and technological know-how, where appropriate, with the 
assistance of international organizations.

30.24.  Business and industry should establish national 
councils for sustainable development and help promote 
entrepreneurship in the formal and informal sectors.  The 
inclusion of women entrepreneurs should be facilitated.

30.25.  Business and industry, including transnational 
corporations, should increase research and development of 
environmentally sound technologies and environmental management 
systems, in collaboration with academia and the 
scientific/engineering establishments, drawing upon indigenous 
knowledge, where appropriate.

30.26.  Business and industry, including transnational 
corporations, should ensure responsible and ethical management 
of products and processes from the point of view of health, 
safety and environmental aspects.  Towards this end, business 
and industry should increase self-regulation, guided by 
appropriate codes, charters and initiatives integrated into all 
elements of business planning and decision-making, and 
fostering openness and dialogue with employees and the public.

30.27.  Multilateral and bilateral financial aid institutions 
should continue to encourage and support small- and 
medium-scale entrepreneurs engaged in sustainable development 
activities.

30.28.  United Nations organizations and agencies should 
improve mechanisms for business and industry inputs, policy and 
strategy formulation processes, to ensure that environmental 
aspects are strengthened in foreign investment.

30.29.  International organizations should increase support for 
research and development on improving the technological and 
managerial requirements for sustainable development, in 
particular for small and medium-sized enterprises in developing 
countries.

Means of implementation

     Financing and cost evaluation

30.30.  The activities included under this programme area are 
mostly changes in the orientation of existing activities and 
additional costs are not expected to be significant.  The cost 
of activities by Governments and international organizations 
are already included in other programme areas.


                             Notes

     1/   See A/CONF.151/PC/125.
.
