Página 15 - Coordinación de Servicios de Información

SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
.Since the 1980s, sustainable development has evolved into a com–
plex, multifaceted concept that seeks to balance economic growth,
environmental protection, social equity, and citizen participation
in decision-making. Economic growth is necessary for political sta–
bility and for raising standards ofliving, which, in developing coun–
tries, means poverty reduction. Poverty alleviation is thought to
have positive effects on the environment because poor people put
great strains on natural resources, pasture, water, and forests. Yet
economic growth alone will not suffice to restore environmental
quality or to cover the livelihood concerns of impoverished people.
With respect to environmental quality, the consequences of econornic
growth (health hazards of pollution, climate change, biodiversity
loss, and resource scarcity) can no longer be ignored by treating
them as externalities. The costs of those consequences must be in–
corporated into economic decision-making. Where natural renew–
able resources are concerned, environmental economists have cul–
tivated the concept of sustained-yield use. This means that a
resource's rate of use (fish, timber, or animals, for example) should
not exceed the rate of replacement. The minimum goal is to keep
stocks of resources constant; ideally, they would also increase over
time, adding to a country's capital stock.
Nature protecion and ecosystem management have become increas–
ingly important components of sustainable development, especially
after the signing of the biodiversity convention at the Rio Earth
Summit in 1992. Environmentalists stress that ecosystems perform
numerous environmental services. Forests, for example, help to
control greenhouse gases by capturing and storing C02; they are
crucial for watershed stability, constrain soil erosion, and provide
habitat for flora and fauna. These environmental functions also have
value, though they may be difficult to quantify. Thoughtlessly de–
stroying them may adversely affect human health and welfare, for
natural systems protect us, and the maintenance of biodiversity is
crucial to ensure the well-being of future generations.
Moreover, growing awareness exists -especially in developing coun–
tries- that parks isolated from people do not provide a workable
solution for biodiversity conservation. The livelihood needs of ru–
ral populations put pressure on parks. Thus conservationists are
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