Participatory development is now widely recognised as a way of achieving technology
transfer at all levels of development endeavour. This has grown from a perceived
need to move from donor driven technology transfer to national needs driven
approaches. However, such a shift in approach is hampered by a lack of international
consensus on what actions any particular country should take; how the international
community should share the task of providing the resources for such actions;
and, the disconnection in some developing countries between domestic politics
and their stance in international fora. There is also a second bottleneck: the
gap that exists between international agreement and domestic consensus in developing
countries that is meant to follow international agreement (Gupta, 1997). Various
of the work tasks initiated by the Subsidiary Body for Scientific and Technological
Advice (SBSTA) reflect the perceived need of developing country Parties to benefit
from capacity building so they are better able to identify their needs for technology
transfer (for example, FCCC/SBSTA/1998/INF2, INF.5). In some ways the Technology
Cooperation Agreements of the IEA are an attempt to build collaborative working
relationships through a participatory forum of all significant actors with a
role in technology cooperation activities relevant to the application of ESTs
in a particular country (OECD, 1998b).
It has been suggested that if the FCCC wants to generate broader support, it
may need to assist the Governments of developing countries to widen the base
of domestic consensus among national stakeholders, investigating and responding
to their needs (Van Berkel et al., 1997). To help address the challenges, countries
are encouraged to engage organised stakeholders representing different societal
interests for the priority sectors into a capacity building process. Three "pillars"
are proposed: creating an enabling environment for stakeholders' participation;
implementing and evaluating mitigation and adaptation actions; and assessing
mitigation and adaptation needs and opportunities. These all link to a roundtable
process which engages stakeholders who represent different societal interests
to produce and implement, in an organised way, a prioritised national action
plan with wide buy-in (Van Berkel and Arkesteijn, 1998). then propose that assistance
is required for the organisation and facilitation of the participatory process
that will result in sound proposals for climate relevant technology transfer
and collaboration.
Table 4.4 Interest Groups | |
INTEREST GROUP | DEFINITION |
Seller interest | Interests of the person selling the technology |
Buyer interest | Interests of the purchaser of the technology |
Third party supporter interest | Interests of those parties supporting the sale-purchase of the technology |
Third party victim interest | Interests of those parties negatively affected by the sale-purchase of the technology |
process-es, Payer interest | Interests of those parties that have a role in financing the transaction |
Other reports in this collection |