UAE ORGANIZES ENVIRONMENTAL SUMMIT

UNCLAS ABU DHABI 000212 SENSITIVE SIPDIS DEPARTMENT FOR NEA/ARP, EEB/ESC/IEC/ENR (MONOSSON, SECOR),OES/EGC (THOMPSON), AND S/SECC STATE PLEASE PASS USGS AND EPA AMMAN FOR ESTH HUB (BHALLA) E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: SENV ENRG KGHG PGOV AE SUBJECT: UAE ORGANIZES ENVIRONMENTAL SUMMIT ¶1. (SBU) On February 7, post received a letter from Majid Al Mansouri, Secretary General of the Environment Agency - Abu Dhabi (EAD),requesting U.S. support for an "Eye on Earth" summit in Abu Dhabi. The Summit, tentatively planned for Nov. 15-17, seeks to "launch a multilateral process to design and develop a unified framework to keep the world's environmental situation under continuous review and provide access to data and information" via the Internet. ¶2. (SBU) The text of the letter is provided below. Post understands EAD plans to contact OES directly to follow up, but also welcomes any feedback on USG interest in this event. Begin text: Ref: EAS/SG/24/2010 Date 3rd February 2010 Subject: Eye on Earth Summit: Abu Dhabi 2010 (15-17 November 2010): Fostering international cooperation to keep the global environmental situation under continuous review using advanced technologies Dear Ms. Cooper, As you know, the Abu Dhabi Global Environmental Data Initiative (AGEDI) was initiated by the UAE at the WSSD in Johannesburg in 2002 in collaboration with the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP). We are honored that the United States Department of State has been partner of AGEDI since its founding, and hope this will continue as AGEDI embarks on Phase III. This phase will see much greater emphasis on regional and international levels, requiring a significant degree of partnerships. We believe that such partnering is a process based on programmatic alignment built over time through nurturing stakeholder relationships. The UAE is now calling for an "Eye on Earth" summit in Abu Dhabi involving high-level policy-makers, decision-makers and technical specialists from the international community as well as governmental and non-governmental sectors with the aim of setting in motion a global process that will: * Strengthen, synergize, and extend a global process to bridge the environmental knowledge gap and provide information for decision-making (transformative action) * Reinforce multilateral policies and institutional arrangements to interlink environmental information systems and networks * Support technical cooperation to accelerate the building of an integrated global environmental information infrastructure * Accelerate capacity building and technology support programmes around the world to further close the gap between developed and developing nations This summit will launch a multilateral process to design and develop a unified framework - Eye on Earth - to keep the world's environmental situation under continuous review and provide access to data and information via the World Wide Web. It is envisaged that a global environmental information network initiative will also be launched with the aim of fostering cooperation among stakeholders at all levels from global to local. At this Summit the Abu Dhabi leadership will also announce the launch of the third phase of AGEDI which will focus on strengthening international cooperation on environmental sustainability. A major environmental information technology exhibition will be held in parallel to the Summit where governmental, private and other stakeholders showcase products, services and technologies for environmental applications. We strongly believe that this Summit and the expected follow on efforts can only succeed if the United States government, through its key agencies including the Department of State, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Geological Survey, and others, partner with UNEP and AGEDI in fostering international cooperation. We look forward to welcoming you to Abu Dhabi. Yours sincerely, Majid Al Mansouri Secretary General CC: Achim Steiner, Executive Director, UNEP Kenneth Ferguson, OES/SIC, Department of State, United States of America Fernando R. Echavarria, State/OES/SA Department of State, United States of America End text. OLSON