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96. Making the difficult choices involved in achieving sustainable development will depend on the widespread support and involvement of an informed public and of NGOs. the scientific community, and industry. Their rights, roles and participation in development planning. decision-making, and project implementation should be expanded.

97. National and international law is being rapidly outdistanced by the accelerating pace and expanding scale of impact on the ecological basis of development. Governments now need to fill major gaps in existing national and international law related to the environment, to find ways to recognize and protect the rights of present and future generations to an environment adequate for their health and well-being, to prepare under UN auspices a universal Declaration on environmental protection and sustainable development and a subsequent Convention, and to strengthen procedures for avoiding or resolving disputes on environment and resource management issue.

98. Over the past decade, the overall cost-effectiveness of investment in halting pollution has bee demonstrated. The escalating economic and ecological damage costs of not investing in environmental protection and improvement have also been repeatedly demonstrated often in grim tolls of flood and famine. But there are large financial implications: for renewable energy development, pollution control, and achieving less resource-intensive forms of agriculture.

99. Multilateral financial institutions have a crucial role to play. The World Bank is presently reorienting its programmes towards greater environmental concerns. This should be accompanied by a fundamental commitment to sustainable development by the Bank. It is also essential that the Development Banks and the International Monetary Fund incorporate similar objectives in their policies and programme. A new priority and focus is also needed in bilateral aid agencies.

100. Given the limitations on increasing present flows of international aid, proposals for securing additional revenue from the use of international commons and natural resources should now be seriously considered by governments.

101. Over the course of this century, the relationship between the human world and the planet that sustains it has undergone profound change. /…