3 February 2005Delhi Newsline
The Delhi Sustainable Development Summit, one of the biggest gatherings on balancing economic development with sustainability, started today.
The tone for the three-day-event was set early by the President of Iceland Olafur Ragnar Grimsson who called for the setting up of a "new open network of those who care" to combat catastrophic climatic changes like global warming.
"There are still some who say this is all sophisticated scaremongering...to them, I say, come to my country. The glaciers are melting along the Arctic, it has broken all records in Greenland. Now, we have an ice-season which is shorter by almost a month!
"The evidence is there for all to see, it is dramatic and clear..The tsunami disaster must only be seen as a warning of the kind of destruction that will be caused by rising sea-levels," Grimsson said in his inaugural address.
Among the other speakers who gave a strong message was world-renowned economist and director of the UN Millenium project Prof Jeffrey Sachs. Asking those who think the current US war on Iraq has nothing to do with oil "to think again", he said, "it is time to decarbonise the global energy system...It is mindboggling that we are fighting the crusades of the 11th Century in the 21st!"
The annual summit was organised for the first time five years ago by TERI to tackle problems created by reckless economic development like worsening environmental conditions, rising levels of poverty, disease etc.
The ongoing meet has nearly 400 delegates from across the world and ministerial representatives from over 10 countries including UK, Norway, Finland etc.
