10/12/2005 - Organized by the Division of Environmental Conventions, UNEP in conjunction with the London School of Economics.
Several reports and processes addressing the link between poverty reduction and a healthy environment have been released in recent months, including the report of the UN Millennium Project, “Investing in Development: A Practical Plan to Achieve the Millennium Development Goals”; the report of the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MA), including its synthesis reports, “Ecosystems and Human Well-being” and “Biodiversity and Human Well-being”; and the report by the UN Development Programme (UNDP), “Environmental Sustainability in 100 Millennium Development Goal Country Reports.”

The High-Level Brainstorming Workshop on Creating Pro-Poor Markets for Ecosystem Services is one of the follow-up activities to the Workshop for MEAs on Mainstreaming Environment Beyond MDG 7 held in July 2005, in Nairobi, Kenya. Participants at this Workshop included heads of various MEA Secretariats, senior representatives of UNDP, the UN Millennium Project and internationally recognized experts in the field of environment and development. They agreed on concrete short-, medium-, and longer-term activities to help ensure that the objectives of the environment and development communities mutually support each other on the ground as well as at the international level.

Economic instruments, including the creation of markets are increasingly recognized as having an important role to play in the implementation of many MEAs, in addition to spearheading sustainable development and reducing poverty. These instruments can generate financial resources, divert funds to environmentally friendly technologies, create incentives for investment, and increase the involvement of private agents in environmental protection.

The London Workshop will consider the opportunities and possible perverse effects resulting from the creation of markets for ecosystem services especially in the form of exclusion of the poor. One of the objectives of the Workshop is to explore ways for the MEAs to support and contribute to pro-poor markets for ecosystem services, if such markets are deemed desirable.
In order to do so, the Workshop will be structured in two segments:

Gather eminent economists, ecologists, heads of MEAs, private entrepreneurs and other interested parties to discuss the desirability of markets for ecosystem services from the environmental and development perspectives, as well as the salient features of such markets to ensure that the MDGs are not achieved to the detriment of environmental sustainability and vice-versa.
Draw on the first segment’s conclusions and the outcomes of the 2005 World Summit to identify the process and institutional mechanisms required to support the creation of pro-poor markets for ecosystem services, if such markets are deemed desirable and feasible. To this end, the second segment of the Workshop will bring together senior representatives of various MEA Secretariats, UN agencies and other interested parties.