June 5, 2007
UN Conference on the Human Environment, 35 Years Later
by
Daniel Hecht

June 5 marks the 35^th anniversary of the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment, in Stockholm, Sweden. The event is widely regarded as a pivotal meeting of minds that laid the foundation for the current, global quest for sustainability.

Remember, this was before the Arab oil embargo sensitized us to fossil fuel issues and long before global warming became a household word. The US Environmental Protection Agency had been created only 18 months earlier.

The conference’s concluding declaration was among the first documents to state the importance of a healthy environment in creating economic prosperity and fostering democracy – and, importantly, vice versa.

As we Vermonters work to protect the environment and to provide ourselves with basic securities in the face of resource shortages and global warming, it’s worth considering these thoughts from 35 years ago. They offer some useful points of reference – and a sobering reality check on our progress since 1972. Some sections worth considering:

6. A point has been reached in history when we must shape our actions. . . with a more prudent care for their environmental consequences. Through ignorance or indifference, we can do massive and irreversible harm to the earthly environment on which our life and well being depend. Conversely, through fuller knowledge and wiser action, we can achieve for ourselves and our posterity a better life in an environment more in keeping with human needs and hopes. There are broad vistas for the enhancement of environmental quality and the creation of a good life. What is needed is an enthusiastic but calm state of mind and intense but orderly work. For the purpose of attaining freedom in the world of nature, man must use knowledge to build, in collaboration with nature, a better environment. To defend and improve the human environment for present and future generations has become an imperative goal for mankind. . . .

7. To achieve this environmental goal will demand the acceptance of responsibility by citizens and communities and by enterprises and institutions at every level. . . Individuals in all walks of life as well as organizations in many fields. . . will shape the world environment of the future. Local and national governments will bear the greatest burden for large-scale environmental policy and action within their jurisdictions. International cooperation is also needed. . . A growing class of environmental problems, because they are regional or global in extent, will require extensive cooperation among nations and action by international organizations in the common interest.

Principle 2: The natural resources of the earth, including the air, water, land, flora and fauna . . . must be safeguarded for the benefit of present and future generations through careful planning or management.

Principle 3: The capacity of the earth to produce vital renewable resources must be maintained and, wherever practicable, restored or improved.

Principle 4: Man has a special responsibility to safeguard and wisely manage the heritage of wildlife and its habitat, which are now gravely imperiled by a combination of adverse factors. Nature conservation, including wildlife, must therefore receive importance in planning for economic development.

Principle 5: The non-renewable resources of the earth must be employed in such a way as to guard against the danger of their future exhaustion and to ensure that benefits from such employment are shared by all mankind.

Principle 15: [Rational] planning must be applied to human settlements and urbanization with a view to avoiding adverse effects on the environment and obtaining maximum social, economic and environmental benefits for all.

Principle 19: Education in environmental matters. . . is essential in order to broaden the basis for an enlightened opinion and responsible conduct by individuals, enterprises and communities. . . . It is also essential that mass media of communications. . . disseminates information of an educational nature on the need to project and improve the environment. . . .

Principle 20: Scientific research and development in the context of environmental problems, both national and multinational, must be promoted in all countries. . . The free flow of up-to-date scientific information and transfer of experience must be supported and assisted, to facilitate the solution of environmental problems. . . .

Presciently, the declaration’s drafters recognized the opportunities that lay in environmental action and the relationship between a healthy environment and a healthy society. They also wisely pointed out the need for smart planning; for the application of education, technology, research, and financing to environmental preservation; for free flow of information and media unfettered to tell the truth; for control of urban sprawl; for protection of specific, endangered species.

In some areas, we’ve made progress; in others, precious little. Yet for all the urgency of the challenges we face, the declaration includes a lovely line that should guide our approach today: “What is needed is an enthusiastic but calm state of mind and intense but orderly work.”

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To read the full text of “Declaration of the UN Conference on the Human Environment,” go to www.unep.org/documents, then search for “Stockholm 1972.”

Daniel Hecht is a novelist and executive director of Vermont Environmental Consortium. For more information on any Green Grapevine topic, contact vec@norwich.edu.

Copyright 2007 by Daniel Hecht

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