Margaret Beckett: The common need to agree on action

As the curtain comes down on the first week of the world summit and commentators ask if we've saved the world yet, I can well understand that unless you are here it might be difficult to work out what it's all about. Frankly, it's not always much easier when you are here. Is a world summit on sustainable development therefore nebulous, intangible, over-worthy and of no relevance to our daily lives? Let me draw an analogy. It's as if we are standing on a burning platform and we've spent far too long discussing the mechanics and details of how we get off it and just noticed that our feet are getting very hot! But time and again it has struck me this week that despite the complexity and detail of the discussions, sustainable development as a concept is just shorthand for what is common sense.

Every day, as individuals, we make decisions in which we think about the balance between the impact of our choices on the people with whom we deal, what the costs and benefits to us will be and the impact on our environment. In short, we want a decent quality of life, and we'd want our children to have the same – if not better. We might disagree on the details but I believe these fundamental points would be common to us all.

As a government, we have to look at the issues in the round and consider their complex interactions – because without a healthy economy, environment and society, we would be failing our people. It is easy to put environment specialists in command of environmental policy and let economists run the economy, but a bankrupt environment would lead to the collapse of the economic and social system and vice versa. In just the same way, this world summit is not a conference just about the environment, nor a conference for the poor, nor a trade negotiation: it brings together all the issues that affect the future of every single person on this planet.

Nor does the Johannesburg summit stand alone. It is part of a continuum of recent steps to put sustainable development at the heart of the global system. The WTO talks in Doha in November last year agreed that the next five years of trade talks should benefit the poor countries. It is in all our interests to ensure that the poor feel the benefits of economic growth and gain from the global trading system, particularly through better access to richer countries' markets, especially for agriculture and textiles.

But trade is not a cure-all. Economic growth does not "float all boats" like a rising tide, particularly when countries lack institutional and regulatory capacity to make the most effective use of their resources.

At Monterrey in March this year, governments pledged to increase aid from $55bn (£35bn) in 2003 to $67bn (£44bn) by 2006, as well as to make aid more effective. The UK's recent announcement to increase our aid budget to £4.9bn (£3.2bn) by 2005/6 represents the first concrete step by any developed country to fulfil these commitments.

This is not though, as I said earlier, a one-way street. Developing countries themselves agreed at Monterrey and beyond to address their own policies including dismantling domestic trade barriers and distorting subsidies, delivering on commitments to democracy, openness and the rule of law, and addressing corruption.

And as we meet here in Johannesburg, we can see that the increased pace of globalisation means that nations are more inter-linked than ever. Instability in another part of the world – economic, environmental or social – impacts globally. As a major economic and diplomatic power, the UK has a duty to play a full role.

Precisely because of the range of inter-linked issues with which we are dealing, progress here in Johannesburg has been difficult and slow. The summit has not delivered a brave new world in its first week. No single event can change the world. But Johannesburg will have been successful if it stimulates action and ensures continued engagement after the summit.

As negotiations draw to a close and heads of government start to arrive, what will we have actually produced? First, a joint statement will be issued next week by heads of government. I'd like to see a renewed and reinvigorated commitment to taking the actions needed to deliver sustainable development. In particular, a robust statement of intent fleshing out how we can begin to deliver the promises made in Doha and Monterrey would send a strong political message, helping build developing countries' confidence and trust that we meant what we said, thereby encouraging them to live up to their side of the bargain because these are issues which require action by us all.

Second, the summit will agree a programme to deliver the priority actions needed. This is where the bulk of negotiations are focused. We and the EU have been pushing for globally agreed targets on areas such as renewable energy, replenishing fish stocks, provision of adequate sanitation, as well as work programmes to deliver safe water, adequate sanitation and clean energy services to those that don't have them. Targets give us a yardstick by which to measure progress on sustainable development and against which we can be held to account. Action will be most effective where there is a clear global mandate. But even where global agreement cannot been reached, the EU can go further should we wish to. And we will. If Europe leads the way, we can demonstrate the clear benefits of decisive action and so, gradually, bring others on board.

We have tried to identify the priority actions to reduce the demands we make on the planet. Economic and human activities are inextricably linked to environmental and social impacts. The environment is a crucial resource but has only a limited capacity for absorbing waste and pollution. Countries like ours need to take a lead as we did on climate change, by embarking on a 10-year work programme to achieve fundamental changes in the way societies produce and consume goods and services, investing in cleaner production processes, encouraging public environmental and social reporting by the private sector and increased use of environmentally sound technology.

These intergovernmentally agreed documents will set standards and focus minds. And while governments must take the lead, other actors have a full role to play. Campaigning groups will continue to remind us of our commitments, if these texts are to be worth more than the paper upon which they are written.

The atmosphere here in Johannesburg has been positive. I spoke at high-level round tables on agriculture and water, where most other speakers agreed on the actions needed and brought to the discussion their practical experience and expertise. It is intangible benefits like this – attention, focus and common creativity – which may well constitute the most important outcome from the summit. The real story from Johannesburg is that action is needed. By all of us. So we'd better get on and do it.

Margaret Beckett is Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs