(Taken from IIED web site http://www.iisd.ca/climate/sb30/ )

The first two weeks of June are the second preparatory meeting for the UNFCCC meeting in Copenhagen. Stakeholder Forum working with the Stockholm International Water Institute under the Global Public Policy Network on Water Management are trying to get get water into the climate text in the area of adaptation. With a workshop on the 7th and a side event ont he 8th which will be web cast on the UNFCCC web site

(photo from ENB see www.iisd.ca/csd/csd17)  

Together with the BBC World Service Trust and UN Radio, Stakeholder Forum is producing a series of radio programmes and podcastsat this year's.

The Live at the CSD (see http://media.stakeholderforum.org) team meeting to plan the next days radio.

The team is made up of  Richard Black is an environment correspondent with BBC News,  Emily Benson is a project manager at Stakeholder Forum and four training journalists: Merim Tenev is a radio and television journalist from Bulgaria. Catherine Krongo from Kenya's Captial FM Radio, Madhyama Subramanian is an independent filmmaker and visual communication designer from New Delhi, India and Armando Canchanya is the anchor of Peru´s principal radio news programme on RPP Noticias.Thre are four programmes to listern to daily: Today at the CSD- a magazien programme, Pioneers for the Planet is a look at individuals workign to make our planet more sustainable, Earth Talk keeps abreast of the issues under negotiations and Green Tables is a series of Round Tables on different issues.

During the CSD I produced a daily column in Outreach Issues called 'Food for Thought'. These can be downloaded from the Live at the CSD web site.

• May 4th: 100 Days of Obama
• May 5th: Life on Mars
• May 6th: TED
• May 7th: Green Recovery Packages
• May 8th: Governance
• May 11th:  The Tulip Bubble
• May 12th: What to do with a Minister
• May 13th: Banking Greed Hits the Poorest
• May 14th: Targets, Targets, Targets
• May 15th: Structure of the document

Felix Dodds and Hannah Stoddart discussing water and climate with the chief US negotiator Jonathan Pershing  during the UNFCCC meeting in Bonn

 Side event at the UNFCCC meeting  in Bonn to discuss Bridging the waqter and climate agenda - focusing on the role of water for adaptation, policy implications and the actions required. The Panel included: Henk van Schaik of the Co-operative  Programme on Water and  Climate, Thomas Stratenwerth from the German Ministry of Environment and Hannah Stoddart of Stakeholder Forum. We launched the GPPN report on Water and Climate Change Adaption at the side event.

 The Equivalent of the Vienna Cafe in Bonn

It was nearly fifteen months after sitting down with Eric Falt of the United Nations Department of Public Information and Donovan, Jason Rothberg and beining asked to help put together a concert, in the UN General Assembly Hall, to commemorate the slave trade. The concert took place,  on the 25th of March and was an enormous success!!  There were amazing performers Akon, Peter Buffet, Blind Boys of Alabama, Gilberto Gil,Nile Rogers and my favorite of the evening Ky-Mani Marley - Bob Marleys son - singing the redemption song.

Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery;
None but ourselves can free our mind.
Wo! have no fear for atomic energy,
cause none of them-a can-a stop-a the time.
How long shall they kill our prophets,
While we stand aside and look?
Yes, some say its just a part of it:
Weve got to fulfil de book.
Wont you help to sing
Dese songs of freedom? -
cause all I ever had:
Redemption songs -
All I ever had:
Redemption songs:
These songs of freedom,
Songs of freedom.

There were also great readings from Whoopi Goldberg, Staceyann, Carl Lewis and  CCH Pounder   Over the years, the oral history of the Transatlantic Slave Trade has been perpetuated in music by the descendants of the millions of victims of slavery. Too often, that voice has been silenced, but through resilience and resistance the beat goes on.  The concert was  the end to a series of events taking place throughout the day and around the worlld. Congratulations to all those who put the final event together.

UNEP Governing Council this year was very significant. The agreement to start negotiating a Mercury Convention was a real breakthrow. In addition Ministers in their round tables discussed the Global Green New Deal and International Environmental Governance. One critical outcome from the discussion was that  a possible Summit in 2012 might offer a finishing post for the new process on IEG set up at UNEP GC.

The following week to UNEP GC delegates met in New York at the UN Commission on Sustainable Development. Stakeholder Forum organsied a dinner for governments to discuss Earth Summit 2012. A copy of the outcome from the dinner at the Pescatore be found at the Earth Summit 2012 web site.

Cartoons from a lost manuscript - originally drawn by the artist John Charles for a book by Mike Harskin and Felix Dodds on How to Campaign (1991). The publisher lost the manuscript and then Mike died so the book was never redone.

At the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change meeting in Poznan Stakeholder Forum with the CSD Education Caucus held a side event. This was on the missing 5th Building Block: the need for a fifth working group on education for sustainability – otherwise know as the human dimension. The side event was chaired by Pam Puntenney one of the co-chairs of the Caucus speakers included Bremley Lyngdoh  Co-chair of the Education Caucus,  Felix Dodds from Stakeholder Forum and Falk Schmidt from UNU

On the  27th and 28th of November I spoke at the UNEP Civil Sociiety meeting in Sydney, Australia on International Environemntal Governance and the UNEP Medium Term Strategy.

On the 12th and 13th of November Stakeholder Forium hosted a workshop on Earth Summit 2012 - invited governments, stakeholders and intergovernmental representatives to San Sebastian to discuss the possibility of a UN Summit in 2012 and what it might address. The outcome the Donostia Declaration can be found at www.earthsummit2012.org 

One Night Only a part of Race for Tommorrow a project Stakeholder Forum is supporting engaging celebrities around the Millennium Development Goals launches its first video promotion with Donovan. Felix appears on the promotional video discussing the MDGs

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On the 25th of September after the High Level Session on the MDGs Felix attended the opening of Joseph Arthurs Art Exhibition in Jumbo New York.

On the 24th of September Felix attended the MTV, UN Foundation Millennium Development Campaign launch of two videos - one In My Name was opened by the Haiti singer  Wycliffe Jean.

From the 22nd of September you can read an article by Michael Strauss and Felix Dodds on the Millennium Development Goals on the BBC Web site at  http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7621507.stm

Starting on the 18^th of September I am hosting a daily half hour set of radio round tables one on each of the Millennium Goals:

September 25^th 2008: MDG 8 – Develop a Global Partnership for Development

September 24^th 2008: MDG 7 – Ensure Environmental Sustainability

September 23^rd 2008: MDG6 – Combate HIV/AIDS, Malaria and Other Diseases

September 22^nd 2008: MDG5 – Improve Maternal Health

September 21^st 2008: MDG4 – Reduce Child Mortality

September 19^th 2008: MDG2 - Achieve Universal Primary Education

September 18^th 2008: MDG1 – Eradicate Extreme Poverty and Hunger

From the 18th of September to the 21st I will be blogging from the San Sebastian Film Festival

Attending the World Water Week in Stockholm in August, it is possibly the best annual event on environment.

Annika Börje (SIWI), Aaron Salzberg, U.S. Department of State and Felix Dodds at World Water Week party discusing virtual water

July 2^nd 2008: Environmental Films