In order to play its part in this new international institutional framework, it is foreseen that civil society will build its own autonomous mechanism for participation in CFS activities, discussion, negotiation and decision-making. The present draft proposal is an initial effort in this direction. It is important to underline that, although this particular mechanism is a new one, we are by no means starting from zero. On the contrary we are building on the extensive networking experience that civil society organizations have accumulated in a range of policy areas and we are extracting lessons from existing examples of mechanisms of interface between civil society and multilateral institutions, including the IPC, the Farmers’ Forum, the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, various NGO coordination mechanisms and others.
It is acknowledged that the Civil Society Mechanism may not function perfectly during the first year of operation (2010/11). However, every effort will be made to ensure that processes to select members of the Coordination Committee, members of the CFS Advisory Group, participants in the CFS Plenary Sessions and to generally facilitate the participation of the broadest range of civil society actors in the work of the CFS, are as inclusive and as transparent as possible. Recognising the challenges of establishing a global CSM of this nature, focal points will be selected to CSM and CFS roles for an initial period of one year. An evaluation of the CSM will be held in October 2011 and improvements made to its functioning, including the composition of the Coordination Committee (in terms of regional, gender and constituency balance). Subsequently, post holders will be selected for a 2 year period in line with the procedures of the CFS itself.
For the informations of CFM negotiations, please visit:
http://cso4cfs.org/