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Curtain Raiser: Ninth Sustainable Development Conference (SDC)
Date: Wednesday, 6 December 2006
Press Conference: 4.00 pm
Venue: Deewan-e-Khaas, Holiday Inn Hotel, G-6, Islamabad
Tea: 5:00 pm
SDPI is organizing a Curtain Raiser/Press Conference for the media about its forthcoming international conference titled Missing Links in Sustainable Development: South Asian Perspectives.
Dr. Saba Gul Khattak, the Executive Director of SDPI, will address the media personnel.
The SDC is established as the leading conference on sustainable development issues in South Asia. Delegates are invited from South Asia and other regions of the world. The Ninth SDC focuses on five major themes:
- Globalization
- Gender
- Peace and Peoples’ Rights
- Education
- Environment
Contact:
Shamil Shams: 051-2278134 (ext. 220) shamil@sdpi.org
Aimal Khattak: 051-2278134 (ext. 216) aimal@sdpi.orgGo to Top
SDPI’s Ninth Sustainable Development Conference 2006 ‘Missing Links in Sustainable Development: South Asian Perspectives’ starts from 13th to 15th December in Islamabad
Islamabad, December 6, 2006: The Sustainable Development Policy Institute (SDPI) held a curtain raiser press conference to announce its Ninth Sustainable Development Conference (SDC), titled ‘Missing Links in Sustainable Development: South Asian Perspectives’ from 13 to 15 December 2006. The Conference will be held at the Hotel Best Western, Islamabad. Dr. Saba Gul Khattak, SDPI’s Executive Director, addressed the press conference and briefed the media about the forthcoming international Conference and gave an overview of the preceding eight conferences in the series.
The Ninth Sustainable Development Conference (SDC) will host a number of reputed national and international scholars, academicians, researchers and activists, both from civil society and the government. The speakers will cover SDC’s five major sub-themes: Globalization, Gender, Peace and People’s Rights, Education and Environment. An anthology of last year’s Eighth SDC titled ‘At the Crossroads: South Asian Research, Policy and Development in a Globalized World’, containing 23 chapters jointly published by SDPI and Sama Editorial and Publishing Services, will also be launched and presented at the forthcoming Conference. Prof. Dr. Atta-ur-Rehman, Chairman Higher Education Commission, will be the Chief Guest for the inaugural session of the Conference and will launch the Eighth SDC anthology.
The Conference will be addressed by prominent keynote speakers including Dr. Walden Bello, Director of Focus on the Global South, Bangkok, a project of Chulalongkorn University's Social Research Institute, and Professor of Public Administration and Sociology at the University of the Phillipines; Ms. Urvashi Butalia, a publisher and a writer, co-founder of India's first feminist publishing house, Kali for Women, and Director Zubaan; Mr. Dipak Gyawali, Research Director, Nepal Water Conservation Foundation; and, Institute for Social and Environmental Transition, Nepal; and Mr. I. A. Rehman, Director Human Rights Commission of Pakistan.
Apart from Pakistan, delegates will be coming from Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Sri Lanka, North America, Canada and Europe.
The concept of sustainable development is essentially an interdisciplinary one. Economists, environmentalists, anthropologists, political scientists and others have advanced rigorous theories to explore the various dimensions of sustainable development. Yet, often their findings and suggestions have not been noticed beyond disciplinary boundaries; they have been ignored in the policy arena and thus could not contribute to solving problems at the grassroots level. The South Asian region has posed a challenge for SD. It hosts the largest number of the world’s poor, is characterized by the widest gender gaps in access to resources, and by latent and violent conflicts over the equitable distribution of natural resources.
Dr. Saba Gul Khattak told the media: “The success of the previous conferences lie in the impact they have had at various levels—from civil society and private sector to public sector and policy-makers.” Policy dialogues, she said, proved fruitful where speakers from Pakistan were able to share their ideas with counterparts from South Asia and other regions of the world. As such the conference attracts leading intellectuals and policy-makers to come together.
The Ninth SDC, she said, would examine the multiple facets of sustainable development in the contexts of South Asia. Narrowing the gaps in sustainability research and bridging the space between the policy discourse on Sustainable Development and practical steps towards a sustainable South Asia has been the mission of SDPI’s sustainable development conference series. This year’s Conference thus aims at identifying the missing links in SD for South Asia and proposes fillers for those. Questions addressed at the Ninth SDC will include why benefits of globalization have failed to trickle down to the region’s vast population and steps towards a process of global economic integration that benefits the marginalized. It asks, which channels exclude women from access to resources, such as land, decent work, and human security, and how these structures can be changed. Many sound ideas for tackling deforestation, the declining water availability and deteriorating water quality are on the table. Yet, the capture of water governance through the powerful leads to unsustainable water management in South Asia. The Conference looks below the surface of these and many more issues, for reasons and steps towards change.
For this task, the region’s pool of cutting-edge academics have been tapped and top researchers invited together with policy-makers, activists and other relevant stakeholders for a vibrant three-day debate, explained Dr. Khattak.
The Sustainable Development Policy Institute acknowledges the financial support of the following institutions for the Ninth Sustainable Development Conference:
- Canadian International Development Agency-Program for the Advancement of Gender Equality (CIDA-PAGE);
- Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC); and
- The Royal Norwegian Embassy.
SDPI is also grateful to its project partners:
- The RING alliance of policy research organizations;
- International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED), UK;
- International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD), Canada;
- SUNGI; and
- The Pakistan Fisher Folk Forum.
Contact:
Shamil Shams: 92-51-2278134 (ext. 220); email: shamil@sdpi.org
Aimal Khattak: 92-51-2278134 (ext. 216); email: aimal@sdpi.org
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