Consultations and Meetings

North American Workshop on Sustainable Consumption and Production – November 2008

The governments of the United States and Canada held the first North American Workshop on Sustainable Consumption and Production (SCP) in November 2008 in Washington, D.C., United States. This consultation was attended by more than 60 experts from government, the United Nations, business and industry, academia and non-governmental organizations. The meeting was supported by UNEP’s Regional Office for North America (RONA) and the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UNDESA).

The aim of this meeting was to define a regional approach to advance sustainable consumption and production in North America that also contributes to the global Marrakech Process. The meeting provided a platform to shape North American needs and priorities for achieving SCP, to identify success stories, best practices, lessons learned and gaps.

Five sessions were held, covering the following:

1. What is SCP?: Sharing views on what SCP means and ideas on unifying vision, concepts and principles for North America
2. Current Status of SCP in North America: Highlighting the diverse SCP initiatives already underway in North America, noting existing programs, activities and networks that might help frame a regional approach to SCP
3. Looking Forward: Strategies to advance a Regional SCP Framework in North America: Identifying strategies to advance SCP in Canada and the USA over the next 10 years
4. North American Priorities for SCP Action: Characterizing further how we can advance SCP in North America – including which specific issues merit attention and how a shift to SCP can be accomplished
5. The Way Forward: Discussing the way forward both regionally and in terms of the global Marrakech Process and preparing the Co-Chair’s summary of the workshop

The United States and Canada committed to explore increased involvement in the Marrakech Process, such as fuller engagement in existing SCP Task Forces and North American leadership on additional sustainability issues that address priority needs of developing countries. As a result, a number of key activities were proposed, such as:

Framing SCP issues

• Conduct an analysis of how SCP links with and can contribute to greening approaches to help overcome the current economic downturn and climate change;
• Develop ways to measure the progress towards SCP, both for the design of the framework policies and incentives and to monitor their subsequent effectiveness in achieving SCP;
• Collect the work and visions of different stakeholder groups on SCP; and
• Compile and publish SCP success stories, lessons learned, good practices and their potential replicability.

Work in various economic sectors

• Explore the possibility of developing commitments to SCP targets within sectors; and
• Examine and make use of sectoral analysis contained in the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Poznan meeting documents concerning electricity grids, steel, cement and chemical industries.

Other Specific Action items

• Establish a group to look into specific issues, such as ways to reduce the proliferation of product labels; and
• Seek to identify how the SCP work can be related to other discussion topics – transport, chemicals, waste management and mining – at the upcoming CSD18-19 sessions.

For more information, the following are available for download:

• Agenda of the Workshop
• Final Report of the Workshop

Key Documents

Numerous background documents are made available for UNEP’s regional SCP consultations, intended to provide a participants with a concise outlook on North American SCP efforts. These key documents are available for download below.

First North American Workshop on Sustainable Consumption and Production

The United States and Canada held its first North American Workshop on Sustainable Consumption and Production (SCP) in November 2008 in Washington, D.C., United States.

The following background documents relevant to North America were published: (downloadable)

• Paper 1: Background on Sustainable Consumption and Production in the Context of North America
• Paper 2: A Regional Overview of Initiatives and Strategies Promoting Sustainable Consumption and Production (and appendix)
• Paper 3: Sustainable Consumption and Production Perspectives on a North American Vision

Additional background documents include: (downloadable)

• General information on sustainable consumption and production, see the recent OECD Report: Promoting Sustainable Consumption, Good Practices in OECD Countries (2008)
• Information on the European Union’s action plan on SCP

Second North American Workshop on Sustainable Consumption and Production

The Governments of Canada and the United States as well as the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) hosted the North American Sustainable Consumption and Production Workshop on Green Building in Ottawa on 31 January – 1 February. The goal was a multi-stakeholder dialogue promoting bi-national collaboration on green building, as an important application of international sustainable consumption and production efforts. The workshop involved more than 80 experts in green building and sustainability from Canadian and U.S. government, industry and non-government organizations, as well as United Nations representatives.

The workshop covered four panels and a keynote speech. In addition, participants also had in-depth discussions in breakout sessions. The four panels included the following:

• A Review of Existing Canada / US Collaborative Efforts Related to Green Building
• Green Building and Sustainable Consumption and Production: International and Multi-jurisdictional Opportunities and Current Issues and Efforts
• Options for the Path Forward: The Future of the Green Building Sector and Reflections on Canada and US Collaboration
• International Links: United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD), 10 Year Framework of Programmes on Sustainable Consumption and Production (10YFP)

A number of activities on green building were discussed:

• The importance of communicating the need to develop, maintain, and integrate life cycle assessment databases at high levels in Canada and the U.S. was expressed.
• There was an agreement for collaboration between Equilibrium Housing (Canada) and Zero Energy Housing (U.S.).
• Participants expressed support for competitions to raise awareness and help stakeholders develop and learn from best practices.
• There was agreement to convene a meeting between the U.S. General Services Administration and municipalities regarding PULSE (a system to coordinate monitoring and tracking of energy).
• Participants advanced the idea of a “Road to Rio” program for cities to showcase their initiatives and prepare for Rio+20.
• Participants suggested engaging in potential partnerships with the Federation of Canadian Municipalities’ emerging showcase program.
• Support was given to develop the business case for green building retrofits and communicate these to industry groups and politicians.
• Some participants agreed to further explore the opportunities for transforming building codes and standards.

The following documents are available for download:

• Agenda of the Workshop
• Final Report of the Workshop

For more information, please visit: http://scpgreenbuild.wordpress.com

Key Documents

The following background documents were prepared for the workshop:

• #1: Sustainable Consumption and Production
• #2: Green Building Key Topics
• #3: Existing Canada – U.S. Collaboration on Green Building
• #4: UNEP Background Paper on International Processes on Sustainable Consumption and Production

Other documents include:

• Full Minutes of the meeting
• Powerpoint presentations from speakers
• Speakers‘ biographical details
• Whose Logo? Sustainable Consumption and Production in North America. Research Paper
• North American Actor and Activity Map on Sustainable Consumption and Production

Photos of the workshop can be found here.