Johannesburg Earth Summit (2002) Introduction The United Nations World Summit on Sustainable Development, also called Earth Summit 2002, was an international convention on the environment and sustainable development held in Johannesburg, South Africa, 2002. Earth Summit 2002 produced the Johannesburg Declaration on Sustainable Development, an international agreement on the environment and sustainable development. The Johannesburg Declaration reiterates most of the proposals from the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development and Agenda 21, international agreements from Earth Summit 1992. The Johannesburg Declaration contains targets and timetables for achieving the goals of Agenda 21. Numerous environmental organizations have criticized Earth Summit 2002 for not producing any new, substantive international agreements. Impacts and Issues In August and September 2002 representatives from 193 nations attended the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg, South Africa, the ten year follow-up conference to Earth Summit 1992. The United States controversially did not participate in the World Summit on Sustainable Development. Many participants and NGOs consider this summit, also called Earth Summit 2002, less successful than Earth Summit 1992 because it did not produce any ground breaking international environmental agreements. The main agreement produced by Earth Summit 2002, the Johannesburg Declaration on Sustainable Development, merely reiterates many of the goals contained in the Rio Declaration and Agenda 21. The Johannesburg Declaration also does not contain many specific proposals for preserving the environment or promoting sustainable development. Instead, the Johannesburg Declaration addresses the environment and sustainable development in more general terms. The Johannesburg Declaration also requests that nations implements measures to eliminate or minimize all threats to sustainable development, including drug use, terrorism, corruption, ethnic intolerance and the effects of natural disasters. Earth Summit 2002 produced more than 300 partnership initiatives on the environment and sustainable development. Partnership initiatives are not multi-lateral international treaties; they are agreements between two or more governments, non-governmental organizations or private sector participants. These Earth Summit 2002 partnership initiatives pledged more than $200 million to various environmental and sustainable developments projects in the areas of water and sanitation, energy, health, agriculture, biodiversity protection and ecosystem management. .