Opinion article ahead of Second United Nations Environment Assembly (23-27 May 2016)

“Delivering on the Environmental Dimension of the new Sustainable Development Agenda”, Ulf Björnholm underscores from UNEP Brussels 

In the run up to the Second United Nations Environment Assembly (Nairobi, 23-27 May 2016) Mr Ulf Björnholm, Head of the United Nations Environment Programme’s Liaison Office to the EU institutions, wrote an opinion article for European Sting. 

2015 marked a turning point for global cooperation on sustainable development, with world leaders agreeing on a new UN Agenda for Sustainable Development and the Paris Agreement on climate change. These agreements represent a major shift in mindset, moving away from an inadequate “economic-growth-at-any-cost” approach towards a more inspirational agenda that puts human wellbeing and long term prosperity at center stage. They also bring together governments, civil society, the business community, academia and the public at large in a way that has never been seen before, thereby ensuring  the broadest possible commitment and ownership to real transformation.

This new vision for humanity is in stark contrast to the daily news feed, where you easily get the impression that everything is moving in the wrong direction, with people getting poorer, air and water resources more polluted, and societies more unsafe and unstable. The question is: Will another UN plan really make a difference?

Read the article here: