ABSTRACT

The Rio Summit The Brundtland report paved the way for the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (the Earth Summit) held in Rio de Janeiro in 1992. Representatives from 176 countries endorsed a programme of sustainable development designed to meet the challenge of world poverty and environmental crisis. In another part of Rio, at the same time, there was a huge gathering of people representing non-governmental organisations from around the world. The Earth Summit was a landmark in international environmental co-operation, although it did not fulfil many of the hopes invested in it by green activists.