WITHOUT CONSERVATION, ECONOMIC GROWTH CANNOT BE SUSTAINED,
SECRETARY-GENERAL STATES
Following is the text of remarks made in Brussels yesterday by Secretary-General Kofi Annan, at the King Baudouin International Development Prize Ceremony:
It is a great pleasure and an honour to be here with you today, and I would like to thank Their Majesties, King Albert II and Queen Paola, who have invited me to this moving ceremony.� Let me also pay tribute to the King Baudouin Foundation for all it does to improve the lives of people around the world.
I must say that I am greatly impressed by the activities of FUNDECOR in the Costa Rican Central Volcanic Range, which has been declared a biosphere reserve under United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO)'s Man and the Biosphere Programme.� You certainly deserve the Prize you have won today.� Our wholehearted congratulations.
What impresses me most is that you have succeeded in making conservation, and the sustainable use of forests, an economic alternative and a central element of forest development for forest owners in Costa Rica.� That proves that those who say we face a choice between economic growth and conservation are wrong.� In fact, we now know that without conservation, growth cannot be sustained.
Alongside failures of governance, negligence and greed, poverty is one of the causes of the ecological crises we confront today.� Indeed, many parts of the developing world are caught in a vicious cycle of environmental degradation and deepening poverty.� That is why any strategy to achieve sustainable development must address economic, ecological and social concerns all at once.�
By basing its approach on these three pillars of sustainability, FUNDECOR is not only serving the interests of the local population.� It is also working for the benefit of the entire planet.� Conservation and reforestation help to preserve biodiversity, which in turn provides a bountiful store of medicines and food products, and reduces vulnerability to pests and diseases.� Reforestation also helps to reduce atmospheric carbon levels that would otherwise contribute to global warming.
Sustainable ecosystems are in everyone's interest, and they are everyone's responsibility.� It heartens me to see that, around the world, civil society organizations like FUNDECOR are taking up the challenge of protecting our planet and preserving it for future generations.
I often quote an African proverb which says: "The earth is not ours, it is a treasure we hold in trust for our children and their children".� The World Summit on Sustainable Development, to be held next year in Johannesburg, will offer world leaders an opportunity to prove that they are worthy of this trust.� May they be inspired by your success.�
I hope they will take concrete measures to reflect the "new ethic of conservation and stewardship", which they resolved to adopt at the Millennium Summit in New York last September.� And I hope they will follow the lead of those who, like FUNDECOR, have understood that the earth is our unique heritage.�
Thank you very much.
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