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| USING THE PAST TO SHAPE THE FUTURE |
The temporal linkage – how we progress over the years – makes us ask ourselves the fundamental question: Do we influence events or do events influence us?
Never has this question felt more pressing – or less abstract – than when recalling the environmentally-linked conflicts and events that overshadowed 2005. Time after time we realized how humankind’s careless decisions and actions in the past have caught up with us, and forced a sober reckoning.
Some of these reckonings broke with dramatic impact; the earth shook, exploded or submerged. Others worsened silently and invisibly and gradually over time, like crippling poverty or mass extinctions of amphibians.
All these crises tested our character and willpower. Yet it is precisely then, in our rational, political, economic and emotional responsiveness, that we reveal how much and how fast humans can learn and adapt.
How do we respond? We inform people with better knowledge, for example through our support for the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment that helps pinpoint where the human hunger for resources is taking its heaviest toll. We empower people, especially the poorest, to sustain the shared natural surroundings from which we all live. And we improve long-term governance of natural resources, protecting mountain resources or marine coral reefs, across the membership of the World Conservation Union.
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actions for
a greener
and better
future |
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