Current Affairs, Science & Technology, IAS Mains 2010

The Earth Summit(1992 in Rio deJaneiro,Brazil)
The Earth Summit conference was the largest gathering of world leaders in history. Over 100 heads of state, and representatives of 178 nations attended the first international Earth Summit, which was convened to address urgent problems of environmental protection and socioeconomic development.
The Earth Summit conference resulted in:
a set of agreements which represent a significant advance in international cooperation and sustainable development issues.
political commitment to achieving the goals of the agreements.
the placing of the issue of sustainable development at the heart of international agendas.
new paths of communication and co-operation between official and non-official organisations which work towards development and environmental goals.
an enormous increase in public awareness. TI- is ought to facilitate the adoption of policies and allocation of additional resources to fulfil the task.

Earth Summit documents:The main documents agreed upon at the Earth Summit are:
The Convention on Biological Diversity - a binding treaty requiring nations to take inventories of their plants and wild animals and protect their endangered species.
The Framework Convention on Climate Change, or Global Warming
Convention - a binding ,treaty that requires nations to reduce their emission of carbon dioxide, methane, and other greenhouse gases thought to be responsible for global warming. (It did not set binding targets, however.)
The Declaration on Environment and Development, or The Rio Declaration - 27 broad, non-binding principles for environmentally sound development.
The Statement of Principles on Forests - aimed at preserving the world's rapidly vanishing tropical rainforests, is a non-binding statement recommending that nations monitor and assess the impact of development on their forest resources and take steps to limit the damage done to them.
Agenda 21 - (a 300-page document) that outlines global strategies for cleaning up the environment and encouraging environmentally sound development.
Agenda 21 is a blueprint on how to make development socially, economically and environmentally sustainable. Agenda 21 contains strategies for preventing environmental degradation and for establishing a basis for a sustainable way of life on the planet into the twenty-first century.
Agenda 21 identifies nine majorgroups as partners with governments in the global implementation of the Rio agreements. They are:
1.women
2.farmers
3.young people
4.trade unions
5.business and industry
6.local authorities
7.scientists
8.indigenous peoples
9.NGOs working in environment and development.

The Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD) was created to monitor and report on implementation of the Earth Summit agreements. It was agreed that a five-year review of Earth Summit progress would be made in 1997 by the United Nations General
Assembly meeting in special session.
The Earth Summit+5
Earth Summit+5 was a special session of the UN General Assembly that took place 5 years after the '92 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro. It aimed to evaluate how well countries, international organisations and sectors of civil society have responded to the challenge of the Earth Summit. Its objectives were to:
revitalise and energise commitments to sustainable development frankly recognise failures and identify reasons why recognise achievements and identify actions that will boost them define priorities for the post-97 period raise the profile of issues addressed insufficiently by Rio. It found that while interest in and concern about the environment remains high, and some advances have been made, there are still major environmental problems facing future generations.
SD rise in the use of the sustainable development concept has been caused by growing recognition that:
1.the impact of development on the environment is so great that development cannot be contemplated without reference to its effects on the environment.
2.environmental and developmental concerns must be integrated.

In 1980, the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN), the United Nations Environment Programme (LINEP) and the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) published the World Conservation Strategy in which they defined sustainable development in terms of ecology.
According to their definition, sustainable development had three priorities:
1. to maintain essential ecological processes and life support systems
2. to preserve genetic diversity
3.to sustain utilisation of species and ecosystems.

The World Commission on Environment and Development (also known as the Brundtland Commission ) which was formed in 1983, redefined sustainable development. Its final report, Our Common Future, which was published in 1987, defined sustainable development as:
Development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability offuture generations to meet their needs.
The principles and strategies of sustainable development: following strategies for SD have been outlined in Our Common Future(Brundtland Report,1987)
1.reviving economic growth in developing countries as a means ofmeeting basic needs. After all, economic growth is a prerequisite for environmental protection in developing countries.
2.changing the quality of growth. The aim is to achieve improved distribution of income, equity, reduced vulnerability to economic crisis and, more or less, to make growth less dependent on energy and materials.
3.meeting the essential needs (jobs, food, energy supply, water, health care, education,
4.sanitation) of most of the world's population enabling a sustainable level of population (refer back to the information on population growth).
5.conserving and enhancing the natural resource base through waste management, cleaner technology, use of substitutes such as alternative sources of energy etc.
6.reorienting technology and managing environmental risks
7.merging environmental issues and economics in decision-making.
8.Envirornmenat nd development are no longer opposites. They are inter-related and must be considered complementary.
The Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety to the Convention on Biological Diversity is an international treaty governing the movements of living modified organisms (LMOs) resulting from modern biotechnology from one country to another. It was adopted on 29 January 2000 as a supplementary agreement to the Convention on Biological Diversity and entered into force on 11 September 2003.