ABSTRACT
While most developing nations experienced modest but positive economic growth over the last three decades, the economies of many sub-Saharan countries stagnated as a result of conflict, poor infrastructure and adverse climatic conditions. The term sustainable has become widely used as a substitute for environmentally friendly to characterize any kind of economic and social activity. Ultimately, sustainable development addresses concerns about the feasibility of continuous economic development and growing material consumption on a planet of limited resources and fragile ecosystems. In 1983 the World Commission on the Environment and Development was set up by the United Nations to address growing concerns about the accelerating deterioration of the human environment and natural resources and the consequences of that deterioration for economic and social development. Global warming is of course only one of the many environmental challenges humanity faces as a result of expanding economic activity since the industrial revolution.
