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More money EU development commissioner, Poul Nielson is calling on the developed countries to deliver on their commitments.

"The EU and its member states have pledged, as a first significant step towards reaching the UN target of 0.7% of gross national income for Official Development Assistance, to raise the collective average from the current 0.33% to 0.39% by 2006," he says. "Concretely, this should result in an additional annual amount of aid of 9 billion euros by 2006, and about 22 billion euros between now and 2006. The developing countries must take their responsibilities by improving internal policies and domestic governance and creating an enabling climate for investment."

Winners and losers "Some of our partners in developing countries worry about how they will be able to meet such new obligations and are pressing for assurances on funding," says EU environment commissioner Margot Wallstrom in an article on prospects for Joburg.

"But it is in the EU's interest to keep pushing for multilateral solutions to global problems, so we will continue to press this agenda. Johannesburg must set the political targets the world aims to deliver in the coming ten years."

She positions the summit as a direct response to the attacks of September 11.

"We all realise that poverty lies at the root of terrorism, but we are struggling to come to grips with solutions," she says. "In short, the world seems more starkly divided between winners and losers than was the case in 1992."

"The Johannesburg summit should therefore set out an ambitious agenda for change for the coming decades. It presents both an opportunity and a responsibility for world leaders."