Developing policies to halt and reverse the two major harbingers of unsustainable development – massive resource degradation and population growth. These include cross-sectoral issues (particularly trade, financial mechanisms, structural adjustment and technology transfer) and sectoral issues (including biodiversity, forests, agriculture and pesticides).
At the Earth Summit in Rio (1992), the phrase "sustainable development" became a vital instrument in focusing attention on the need for better environmental stewardship. The concept of sustainability, however goes well beyond the protection of natural resources. It also encompasses human welfare in the broadest sense, including education, health, equality of opportunity, and political and civil rights.
The Society for Development Alternatives recommends a seven-point programme to which all future development action be directly assigned above all other priorities: (a) satisfying the basic needs of every citizen; (b) fulfilling the potential of children; (c) raising the status and self-determination of women; (d) creating meaningful work and living wages for all; (e) enlarging the possibilities for social advancement; (f) enhancing the personal security of old people; and (g) facilitating access to the means of family planning.
Too often, action to achieve objectives for sustainable development in one policy area hinders progress in another, while solutions to problems often lie in the hands of policy makers in other sectors or at other levels of government. This is a major cause of many long-term unsustainable trends. In addition the absence of a coherent long-term perspective means that there is too much focus on short-term costs and too little focus on the prospect of longer term "win-win" situations.