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Before the widespread use of the term sustainable
industries, the terms sustainable economy and sustainable development were prevalent. Their
popularization started with the United Nations Conference for Environment and Development (the Earth Summit) in 1992. The conference was prompted by the report
Our Common Future (1987, World Commission on Environment and Development, also
known as the Brundtland Commission), which called for
strategies to strengthen efforts to promote sustainable and environmentally sound development. A series of seven UN conferences
followed on environment and development. They coined the most widely used definition of sustainable development as,
- development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own
needs
Sustainable development, according to one definition, demands that we seek ways of living, working and being
that enable all people of the world to lead healthy, fulfilling, and economically secure lives without destroying the environment
and without endangering the future welfare of people and the planet.
The precise meaning of sustainable development has been widely debated. For example, two years after the Brundtland
Commission's Report popularised the term, over 140 definitions of sustainable development had been catalogued.
The United Nations
Environment Programme position is:
- The intensified and unsustainable demand for land, water marine and coastal resources resulting from the expansion of
agriculture and uncontrolled urbanisation lead to increased degradation of natural ecosystems and erode the life supporting
systems that uphold human civilisation. Caring for natural resources and promoting their sustainable use is an essential response
of the world community to ensure its own survival and well being. (source: Sustainable Management and Use of Natural Resources )
Many people reject the term sustainable development as an overall term in favor of sustainability, and reserve sustainable development only for specific
development activities such as energy development: the former
being the process by which we can achieve the latter.
Sustainable development is one of the issues addressed by international environmental law.
See: Restorative Development
Initiative, Earth Summit 2002, Urban ecology
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