State Department official John Matuszak delivers sustainability statement after CSD 17

On Earth Day this year, the new U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack was asked to characterize his vision for the Department of Agriculture, and he answered with one word – “sustainable.” We should apply this same deceptively simple concept to our thinking about constructive outcomes from CSD-17. What are the best ways to shift our development patterns to sustainability? What specific policies and programs offer the most promise? Our challenge...is to define pragmatic sustainable development solutions to the daunting list of global challenges – environmental degradation, food insecurity, climate change and the economic crisis. We need to consider new ideas, and at the same time be practical and realistic as we account for the real-world details of successful implementation. We need to think carefully about how change actually happens. We believe that the CSD process of defining policies and practices that work – and then focusing on how to share, replicate, improve upon and adapt these ideas –is the best, if not the only way, to make progress. In our view, the path forward must include: expanded support for science, research and education, empowerment of local communities to make decisions and creative use of communications technology to make information widely available.

The United States is committing itself to finding and sharing solutions, and implementing them. At the recent G-20 meeting, President Obama called upon the U.S. Congress to double funding for agricultural development in developing countries to more than $1 billion in 2010. In January, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton agreed to work with the international community in forming a global partnership on agriculture and food. We are providing $5.5 billion to fight global hunger in 2008 and 2009. Already, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) is recruiting new agricultural development staff and providing $29 million for U.S. land grant universities to work with developing countries on agriculture and rural development. The U.S. National Science Foundation is partnering with the Gates Foundation to provide $50 million for “innovative solutions to critical agricultural challenges in developing countries.”