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On the opening of the World Summit on Sustainable development, President Thabo Mbeki made his official welcome speech to tens of thousands present at Ubuntu Village. Children representatives from around the globe accompanied Mbeki as he made his address. The children representatives spoke in simple yet clear voice that the future belongs to them. The message challenged not only the delegates at the Ubuntu Village but millions of other viewers on television. The children challenged us to ensure that through our actions they will inherit a world free of indignity, poverty, environmental degradation and patterns of unsustainable development. Essentially, the children called for a change of attitude and a change of mindset in our approaches to sustainable development. The children set the scene for what was to become a bustling and confusing conference. 

During the tenth day of the conference delegates were seen attending sessions, listening to deliberations from key speakers, ensuring that certain words are not omitted from texts, seeing sustainable development practices at the Ubuntu Village and Waterdome, witnessing the signing of agreements, visiting the nearby townships of Alexandra and participating in the Global Peoples Forum March. "The overriding theme of the Summit was to promote action," as stated by the UN Secretary General Mr. Kofi Annan. Mr Annan said that significant progress was made in addressing some of the most pressing concerns of poverty and the environment, with commitments to increase access to clean water, proper sanitation and energy services, to improve health conditions and agriculture, particularly in drylands, and to protect the world's biodiversity and ecosystems.
An implementation plan was produced at the end of the summit. The plan contains targets and timetables to encourage action on issues including halving the proportion of people who lack access to clean water or proper sanitation by 2015, restoring depleted fisheries to the preserving biodiversity by 2015, and phasing out toxic chemicals by 2005. 
Specific targets, which were formulated, are discussed in the subsequent sections including concerns raised by green campaigners:

Water and Sanitation 

Water has become a scarce commodity in Swaziland

Governments agreed to halve the number of people lacking clean drinking water and basic sanitation by 2015. The deal was welcomed by development charities as an important step towards preventing millions of deaths from preventable diseases.

Around the world, about 1.1 billion people lack access to adequate drinking water, according to the United Nations. It is estimated that half the people in 25 countries in sub-Saharan Africa will not have access to drinkable water by 2025. Bringing proper sanitation would significantly reduce diseases such as cholera. 

Swaziland signed a river sharing agreement between the governments of Mozambique and South Africa. Plans are underway to build a dam to irrigate more than 11 000 hectares of land. The project will draw its water from the Inkomati and Maputo watercourses. The project will be managed by the Swaziland Komati Project Enterprise.

Poverty
Governments agreed to half poverty by 2015 and push for effective mechanisms to deal with poverty reduction. Tony Blair, UK Prime Minister stated that Poverty and environmental degradation, if unchecked, spell catastrophe for our world. This is the reason why poverty reduction strategies are seen as the cornerstone to sustainable development. However, a joint statement issued by WWF, Oxfam, and Greenpeace said that the summit had nothing for the poor and for the climate. 

Energy 
Governments agreed to take action to help the poor gain access to affordable energy but failed to agree on specific targets to boost the share of global energy produced from renewable "green" sources such as solar or wind power. The European Union wanted targets but the United States and some other oil-producing countries opposed them. Michael Brune, from Rainforest Action Network stated, "We are proud to be from America but embarrassed by American policies". 
 
 

The envirornment suffers because of poverty

The summit’s action plan effectively called on countries to "substantially increase" the global share of renewable energy, including the US. However Green campaigners and aid groups attending the summit said that the Johannesburg

summit was a missed opportunity to deliver energy and will go down in history to two billion people on earth who have no access to energy services. They added that the summit failed to kick-start a renewable energy revolution that is required to protect the climate.

Global Warming 
The Kyoto treaty on global warming got a new lease of life at the summit when Russia announced that it would ratify the treaty. Russia’s backing means that big producers of greenhouse gases have signed up to bring the treaty into effect. The treaty received a massive blow when the US said it would not ratify it.  Gerhard Schroeder, German Chancellor stated that "Climate change is no longer a skeptical prognosis, but a bitter reality. This challenge demands decisive action from us," he added. 

Natural Resources and Biodiversity 
Governments agreed to cut significantly by 2010 the rate at which rare animals and plants are becoming extinct. The plan does not set specific targets and the wording does not inhibit countries from pursuing development projects. The Worldwide Fund for Nature said the plan "will not provide significant movement forwards... in some cases it actually constitutes a step backwards."

Trade
The text stated the willingness of rich countries to reach an agreement by 1 January 2005 within the WTO for "substantial improvements in market access" for food exports from developing countries. 

Human Rights and Governance 
At Nasrec, venue for the Global Civil Society Forum the issue of  "good governance" was hotly debate. Delegates suggested that unless power is democratically exercised and maximum participation and involvement of all people in matters of governance are ensured, sustainable development will be an elusion.  African governments were particularly cited as culprits in instituting governments that do not allow for equal recognition of all citizens. However, the summit plan emphasises the need to fight corruption and promote democracy and the rule of law and it does not make aid conditional on good governance. 
The issue of wars was also highlighted as a major contributing deterrent in implementing sustainable development projects and eradication of poverty. War victims are always on the run, landless and poor and can therefore not be thinking sustainable development.

Health 
The plan recognises that access to healthcare should be consistent with basic human rights and "cultural and religious values"
The Johannesburg Plan of implementation was seen as too broad with very few commitments from world leaders to tackle key sustainable development challenges. The plan did not go to the extent of detailing where funding will come from, and specific time frames. The plan was criticised for its lack of binding goals to cover action for providing fresh water sewerage, and electricity for the poor and slowing the planet’s loss of biodiversity depletion of fisheries and forests. Rather only a few of the aims had a deadline attached to them, and details about how they will be achieved, the funds, skills and transfer of technology were sketchy or larded with escape clauses.
The United Nations was ultimately seen as responsible for monitoring the implementation of the Summit plan, but other institutions should also be seen to join in the monitoring process. It is critical for the UN to move as quickly as possible to determine what mechanisms should oversee implementation. Global movements, regional and national, should be "keeping an eye" on this process to ensure that the Johannesburg Summit was not a talk shop and lived up to its theme as People, Planet and Prosperity.

What are the Johannesburg outcomes for Swaziland?
Issues such as poverty, water and sanitation, energy, biodiversity loss and HIV/AIDS continue to challenge Swaziland, like her counterpart countries in southern Africa. These issues formed part and parcel of the most pressing concerns and outcomes from Johannesburg. However, these issues were not new to Swaziland, as she had already identified them during preparatory consultative processes facilitated by both government and civil society. Nevertheless, Swaziland needs to discuss these outcomes in line with the implementation framework that came out from the summit with the goal to formulate strategies that will take her forward in addressing the issues.

As has been discussed above, a change of attitude and mind set is critical for Swaziland to achieve meaningful progress in addressing her issues. She needs to unpack the implementation plan from Johannesburg, set targets with timelines, and commit resources for the achievement of the targets. In as much as we appreciate resource constraints we are faced with we should not look up to the United Nations to help us address our issues. Charity begins at home. In this vein, we should rather re-look at how we are allocating our resources and be able to take the initiative to deal with our problems once and for all. A eleven year old child attending a Global Children’s Environment Conference in Canada, May 2002 said that, " too many adults are too interested in money and wealth to take notice of serious problems that affect our future." He added that, "Our future generations call for us to recycle our attitudes!"