New UN Environment Programme to look at innovation and resource-efficient growth
November 26, 2007
The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) has set up a new resource efficiency think tank to boost both innovation and resource-efficient growth.
The new International Panel for Sustainable Resource Management will focus initially on two key issues, namely assessing the environmental risks of biofuel production and metal recycling.
Established by UNEP, with the support of a wide range of governments, the European Commission and representatives from civil society, the new scientific panel is part of an international partnership on resource management. It will look at the impacts on resources and materials used in all phases of their life cycle.
The think tank is expected to provide scientific and empirical assessments, written in clear language about complex issues, and reports that can be read by those who can take action.
The new panel will provide, on a global level, scientific assessments and expert advice on such aspects as:
i) the use intensity of selected products and services
ii) security of supplies
iii) the environmental impacts of products and services.
Achim Steiner, the UN Under-Secretary General and Executive Director of UNEP, said, "Climate change rightly tops the environmental agenda at the moment, but the world faces more inconvenient truths that must be addressed. Economic growth in our modern times cannot be achieved with old consumption and production patterns."
He added, "We need to provide a boost to resource-efficient growth and innovation. We need to break the links between economic growth and environmental degradation, and finding ways to achieve this ‘decoupling' is what the new resource panel is all about."
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