Review by Mary McKinley Global Environmental Outlook 3: Past, present and future perspectives Published by the United Nations Environment Programme and Earthscan Publications Ltd, 2002; 446 pages plus CD-ROM. The latest edition of the Global Environmental Outlook, a biennial report on the state of the global environment from the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), was planned to coincide with the 30th anniversary of the Stockholm Conference on the Human Environment in 1972. This landmark conference saw the creation of UNEP and a growing awareness of environmental issues. By tracking and analysing important environmental trends over the period 1972-2002, this book, commonly called "GEO-3", provides an integrated explanation of major policies and events that have shaped our environmental inheritance. Continuing the global and regional focus of previous GEO reports, GEO-3 presents a retrospective look at environmental conditions and trends — and associated policy responses — under the themes of land, forests, biodiversity, freshwater, coastal and marine areas, atmosphere, urban areas and disasters. The book highlights the increasing risks and impacts on human health caused by environmental deterioration. Region by region, one can find the good news, i.e., aspects of the environment that have significantly improved, as well as the bad. A few of the global stresses occurring in the last 30 years and catalogued by GEO-3 include: Population pressure: There are over 2 billion more people alive today than in 1972. Soil decline: Around 2 billion hectares of soil, 15 percent of the earth' s surface, are now classed as being degraded by human activities. Water degradation: About half the world' s rivers are seriously depleted and polluted. Serious water shortages were affecting 40 percent of the world' s people by the mid-1990s. Wildlife in decline: Nearly 25 percent of mammal species and 12 percent of birds are regarded as globally threatened today. Lower fish populations: Thirty per cent of global fish stocks are defined as depleted, over-exploited, or recovering from over-fishing. UNEP is not just looking to scare people, but to goad them into action. "We at UNEP remain convinced that it lies well within the scope of human determination and ingenuity to come up with appropriate policy packages and use them to ensure that fundamental environmental conditions can and will get steadily better, not stealthily worse," Klaus Toepfer, UNEP executive director, writes in the preface. This philosophy is made clear in the outlook section of the report, which spans the next 30 years and is presented through four scenarios. This innovative approach demonstrates the choices facing mankind in the present that will result in a more desirable or a disastrous future by 2032. GEO-3 is based on information supplied by more than 40 centres around the world, including the Regional Environmental Center for Central and Eastern Europe. Books reviewed in this column can be found in the REC online library catalogue at: http://www.rec.org/REC/Programs/InformationProgram/Library.html

Global Environmental Outlook 3: Past, present and future perspectives