Remaining Deficits

The Social Dimension:

• The difference in years of life expectancy (at birth) between the richest nations and the poorest is still more than 45 years (79.8 years in Japan to 33.6 in Sierra Leone). Three out of 4 people in the least developed countries today are dying before the age of 50 — the global life expectancy figure of half a century ago.
• Infant mortality in the poorest nations is still more than 50 times higher than in the richest (Finland has 3.9 deaths per thousand live births, compared to Sierra Leone’s 200 deaths per thousand).
• Nearly 800 million people do not get enough food, and about 500 million people are chronically malnourished.
• More than 840 million adults are still illiterate, nearly 2/3 of them are women
• The gender differences in quality of life are still significant; deviations from the natural sex ratio in a number of countries indicate that nearly 100 million women are "missing".

The Economic Dimension:

• The world has become more economically polarized both between and within counties. The richest 20% of the world saw its share of global income rise from 70% to 85% while the share belonging to the poorest 20% dropped from 2.3% to a mere 1.4%. Assets of the world’s billionaires exceed the combined annual incomes of countries with 45% of the world’s people.
• The gap in per capita income between industrial and developing countries more than tripled between 1960 and 1995, from $5700 to 16,168. Since the beginning of the 1990s, average incomes fell by a fifth or more in 21 countries, mostly in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union.
• About 1.3 billion people (nearly a third of the population of developing countries) are living on less than $1 a day (in 1985 purchasing power parity dollars). About 3 billion live on less than $2 a day.

The Environmental Dimension:

• Use of renewable resources (land, forest, fresh water, coastal area, fisheries, air in cities) is in many regions beyond the natural regeneration capacity
• Global developments in the energy sector are unsustainable. Global energy use, which has increased by nearly 70% since 1971, is projected to increase at more than 2% annually for the next 15 years. Less than one-quarter of the world’s population consumes three-quarters of its raw materials and products 70% of all solid waste.
• Greenhouse gases are still being emitted at levels higher than the stabilization target internationally agreed upon.
• In 1997, the Earth’s average temperature was the highest since record keeping began in 1866.
• Natural areas and the biodiversity they contain are diminishing due to the expansion of agricultural land and human settlements. Deforestation continues to shrink world forests with deforestation rates in many countries increasing.
• Global water consumption is rising quickly, and water availability is likely to become one of the most pressing resource issues of the 21^st century. More than 1.2 billion people lack access to safe water, more than 1.5 billion people still live with dangerous air pollution, and more than 500 million poor people live in ecologically fragile regions.
• Acid rain is a growing problem in Asia, with sulfur dioxide emissions expected to triple there by 2010 if current trends continue.
• The complex and often little understood interactions among global bio-geochemical cycles are leading to widespread acidification, climate variability, changes in the hydrological cycle and the loss of biodiversity, biomass, and bioproductivity.

The Political Dimension:

• Despite overall improvements in the global political culture, tens of millions of human beings still suffer from oppression and violence due to ethnic, religious or political pretexts.
• Deficits in "good governance" remain the most significant obstacle to sustainable development in large parts of the developing world.
• Global governance structures, and global solidarity on social as well as environmental problems, remain too weak to make progress a world-wide reality.

The most important task for governments to as partners , catalysts, and facilitators for sustainable development. They must:

• establish a foundation of law
• maintain a non-distorting policy environments, including macro-economic stability
• invest in basic social services and infrastructure
• protect the vulnerable
• protect the environment

The best of present thinking indicates that a human centered, market-friendly approach is the most effective approach to promoting development in a particular country. We have more and better information than any past generation. Further progress on the road to sustainable development is today predominantly a question of the political and individual will to "walk as one talks".

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