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REPORT OF THE CSD AD HOC WORKING GROUP ON FINANCE:: 6-9 MARCH 1995

The Commission on Sustainable Development's ad hoc open-ended working group on finance opened on Monday, 6 March 1995. During the four-day meeting, delegates discussed a wide-range of issues relating to finance, including: the international policy environment and financial flows; national policies and resource mobilization; innovative international mechanisms for resource mobilization; financing for sectoral and cross-sectoral issues of Agenda 21; and the Matrix of policy options and instruments designed by Harvard's Dr. Theodore Panayotou. While some delegates attempted to move the discussions beyond the usual post-Rio rhetoric and actually discuss new ways and means to finance sustainable development, the debate inevitably returned to the call by the G-77 and China for the developed countries to fulfill their commitments, as contained in Chapter 33 of Agenda 21, to achieve the target of 0.7% of GNP for ODA. By Thursday afternoon, delegates adopted a report prepared by the Chair, which included a series of recommendations to present to the CSD at its meeting in April.