UNEP: Overhaul of Global Environmental Governance to Meet 21st Century

Posted by Craig Clarke 
on Feb 26, 2012
 
Nairobi, 20 February 2012--A complete overhaul of the way the planet is managed is urgently
needed if the challenges of global sustainability are to be met for seven billion people.
This is the conclusion of a wide-ranging Foresight Process conducted by the United Nations
Environment Programme (UNEP), involving a Foresight Panel and more than 400 leading
scientists and experts from around the world.
 
UNEP’s Foresight Process was an eight-month process to identify and rank the most pressing
emerging issues in the sphere of the environment-- issues which perhaps do not currently
receive the attention they deserve - but which have a huge impact on the planet and on human
well-being.
 
While the scientific community is on the frontline of assessing emerging threats and finding
innovative solutions to environmental challenges, the report reveals that they need more
support from international political and delivery structures if real progress is to be made and a
sustainable century realized.
 
 
Achim Steiner, UN Under-Secretary General and UNEP Executive Director, said: “The Foresight
Process has brought a unique and sharp focus to the emerging issues the world is facing. It is a
snapshot of expert scientific opinion, underlining how even long standing issues such as
governance, food security and water scarcity are evolving and metamorphosing as accelerating
environmental change presents fresh and fundamentally new challenges”.
 
“The findings dovetail with the summary for policy makers of GEO-5, which comes in advance of
the full report - to be launched in early June-- just weeks before Rio+20. The final report will
offer the analysis and the scientific foresight that can not only inform governments, the public
and civil society on just how far the current development path is stretching the planet and fast
forwarding 'tipping points'. It hopefully will be also read, understood and digested by everyone
interested in transforming sustainable development from theory and patchy success into
implemented day to day practice,” he said.
 
UNEP’s Foresight Panel consists of 22 distinguished members of the scientific community from
16 developing and industrialized countries, covering all world regions and who are
internationally recognized because of their expertise in one or more environmental or related
issues.
 
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