A/42/427
English
Page 212
It is absolutely clear now that the present scale and rate of development of the productive forces require a different approach to the questions connected with environmental protection and rational utilization of natural resources. This is a task of immense economic and social significance. For actually it is a question of people's health and a caring approach to the national wealth of each country. Moreover, it is also a question of the future. And on the solution depends
the conditions in which the coming generations will live.A. P. Semyonov
Central Council of Trade Unions
WCED Public Heating
Moscow, 8 Dec 1986
scale. Contamination of soils, ground-water, and people by agrochemicals is widening and chemical pollution has spread to every corner of the planet. The incidence of major accidents involving toxic chemicals has grown. Discoveries of hazardous waste disposal sites – at Love Canal in the United States, for example, and at Lekkerkek in the Netherlands, Vac in Hungary, and Georgswerder in the Federal Republic of Germany have drawn attention to another serious problem.
19. In the light of this and the growth trends projected through the next century, it is evident that measures to reduce, control, and prevent industrial pollution will need to be greatly strengthened. If they are not, Pollution damage to human health could become intolerable in certain cities and threats to property and ecosystems will continue to grow. Fortunately, the past two decades of environmental action have provided governments and industry with the policy experience and the technological means to achieve more sustainable patterns of industrial development.
20. At the beginning of the 1970s, both governments and industry were deeply worried about the costs of proposed environmental measures. Some felt that they would depress investment. growth, jobs, competitiveness, and trade, while driving up inflation. Such feats proved misplaced. A 1984 survey by OECD of assessments undertaken in a number of industrial countries concluded that expenditures on environmental measures over the past two decades had a positive short-term effect on growth and employment as the increased demand they generated raised the output of economies operating at less than full capacity. The benefits, including health, property, and ecosystem damages avoided, have been significant. More important, these benefits have generally exceeded costs.[1]
21. Costs and benefits have naturally varied among industries. One method of estimating the cost of pollution abatement in industry compares expenditures on new plants and equipment that have pollution control facilities to hypothetical expenditure; on
- ↑ OECD, 'The Impact of Environmental Measures on the Rate of Economic Growth, Rate of Inflation, Productivity and international Trade', Background Papers Prepared for the International Conference on Environment and Economics, Vol. I (Paris: 1984).
