The run up to Rio+20

Rio+20, the UN’s 2012 Conference on Sustainable Development, will take place in Brazil from 20th – 22nd June.

Rio+20 marks the 20th anniversary of the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED), and the 10th anniversary of the 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD).

Heads of state from around the world will be attending the conference which aims to secure renewed political commitment for sustainable development, assess the progress to date, agree how to move forward with objectives which have not yet been achieved and how to address new challenges which have emerged.

The conference has two main objectives. The first is to ensure sustainable development whilst building a green economy and eradicating poverty. The second is to develop global institutions charged with developing and implementing policies on social, environmental and economic sustainable development.

Rio+20 was initiated in 2007 by the then President of Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who proposed convening another summit to be held in Rio exactly two decades after the landmark international conference which produced the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).

The conference is of particular significance because 2012 is also the year when the Kyoto Protocol, which contains legally binding targets to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, is set to expire.  It is hoped that Rio+20 will build on the successes of Durban in late 2011 and will go much further towards meeting its aims of sustainable development.

For more information in the run up to Rio+20 can be found on the UN’s Rio plus 20 website.