Negotiators at the Earth Summit reported the first significant signs of progress yesterday in overcoming deep divisions between rich and poor nations and between the United States and Europe on the future of the planet.
Anti-privatisation and anti-globalisation activists meanwhile met in Alexandra, the country's poorest slum, and said they would march "in their thousands" on Saturday - with or without authorisation - to the wealthy suburb of Sandton where the summit is taking place.
Former South African president Mr Nelson Mandela called on delegates to help the more than one billion people who do not have access to clean drinking water.
"In impoverishment, it is the absence of clean water that strikes me most strongly," Mr Mandela said as he opened the "WaterDome" exhibition on the fringes of the 10-day summit.
The United Nations announced agreement on a key deal to restore the world's fisheries to their maximum sustainable yield by 2015, and Danish Environment Minister Mr Hans Christian Schmidt told journalists that negotiators who met behind closed doors until after 3.00 a.m. had made "significant progress" on development aid for the Third World and on global trade.
The Antiguan ambassador to the United Nations, Mr John Ashe, said 99 per cent of the text on financial issues and between 80 and 90 per cent on international trade had been agreed.
A senior European official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, however said: "We have advanced a lot on finance but much less on trade." The negotiators are trying to marry economic growth and the takeoff of developing countries with protection of the environment.
Experts at the summit called yesterday for urgent action to provide clean water and decent sanitation for billions of the world's poor and to deflect tensions over shared resources.
The World Bank asked summit leaders to explore ways of promoting joint co-operation between countries sharing water resources to prevent potential frictions and social tensions over clean water.
The World Bank says some 1.1 billion people in the world lack access to clean water, 2.4 billion have no decent sanitation, and four billion are without sound waste-water disposal.
Similarly, some 1.6 billion people, or more than a quarter of the earth's population, have no access to electrical power, and 1.4 billion will still be without it in 30 years unless something radical is done, the International Energy Agency (IEA) warned.
Every year, 75 million more people gain access to electricity, but this will still not be enough to meet a surge in the world's population, which is expected to rise from six billion today to eight billion by then, IEA Executive Director Mr Robert Priddle said.
The groups who want to march on Saturday said their aim was to highlight the "hypocrisy of the summit", which they said would bring more destruction for the poor and the planet.
Organiser Mr Trevor Ngwane told journalists: "No matter what happens, we will march. Whether there are bullets or whether we go to jail. United mass action is the only way forward."
Scuffles also broke out yesterday between Israeli and Palestinian representatives over a map illustrating the encroaching desert, which showed the West Bank as part of Israel. - (AFP)