Economic and Social Council: Press Conference

A panel of environmental experts laid out ways to curb the consumption patterns of individuals and businesses in order to preserve the world’s precious resources, at a press conference held today at United Nations Headquarters.

Three days before the high-level segment of the nineteenth Commission on Sustainable Development, Under-Secretary-General Sha Zukang and Chairman László Borbély highlighted the session’s crucial focus on the need for more efficient use of natural resources during a Headquarters press conference today. “We are focusing on concrete ways to use resources more efficiently,” said Mr. Sha, Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs.

“The Asia-Pacific region is both a growth driver and anchor of stability for the global economy,” said Amr Nour, Director of the Regional Commissions New York Office, at a press conference to launch the 2011 report of the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific.

As delegates geared up for next year’s United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development to be held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, the Secretary-General of that event called on them today to use that gathering to take collective action to save societies from mounting social tensions, ecological damage and the global economic crisis.

Stressing that social security was a human right, a senior ILO official today spotlighted the issue of social protection and its importance in poverty eradication at a Headquarters press conference on a United Nations-backed programme aimed at promoting investment in and access to essential services and social transfers for poor and vulnerable communities.

As the United Nations kicked off the International Year of Forests today at Headquarters, a renowned environmental activist urged Governments and other stakeholders worldwide to take action to protect the planet’s vital forestry resources on which 1.6 billion depended for their livelihood and subsistence.

The International Year of Forests was launched at United Nations Headquarters in New York on a day when ice, rain and snow were blanketing the region, yet the point of the observance was to heighten awareness of the value of forests in people’s lives and to galvanize action for forests around the world, correspondents heard today at a press conference highlighting the Forest Film Festival.

Leading environmental activists lauded today the Rwandan Government’s plan to restore all of the steadily recovering Central African nation’s lost forest lands and boost national development as a far-sighted move that should be replicated by other Governments.

The latest report of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), entitled True Economic Value of Forests, was premised on the notion that a better evaluation of what forests were worth would generate direct benefits for poor forest dwellers, open up new markets and affect global economic growth, correspondents learned today at a Headquarters press conference.

As the world continued to adjust to changed circumstances in the wake of the economic and financial crisis — sluggish economic growth, tight-fisted lenders and wary investors — a senior International Labour Organization official suggested at Headquarters today that Governments seize the opportunity to craft policy measures to boost incomes, create new jobs and provide broad social protection.