This cross post from AllVoices goes with the twitter hash tag #futurewewant:
When we go to Rio De Janeiro in June next year, lots of emotional capital will be invested in the success of the Rio +20 Earth Summit. It’s the twentieth anniversary of the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development in Brazil’s iconic city. This time those two elements are brought together as the World Summit on Sustainable Development.
…Rio +20 needs to be more than a dream. It must come up with more than a platform to negotiate an agreement. It must deliver more that the bare bones ‘institutional framework’.
The summit can be a game changer, an earth mover. It’s over to you!
Rio +20: Earth Mover or Green Economy Carnival
Think this should be in the More in Hope than Expectation category.
Café Whispers 
Every time I come back to the Cafe I come to your post, Kevin, to see who has started to comment and how. I wonder why we have all been reluctant to start? Is it because, like me, some of you feel fear rather than hope? Forget about expectations! Yet that final vote and communique from Durban was a triumph of hope over fear, surely?
Patricia, I’m pleased you got the ball rolling on this important topic.
Time has ben against me the last couple of days but I intend to add my contribution once ‘time’ becomes a bit more friendly.
Contrary to popular myth, no country has walked away from the problem. Politics seem to have put final solutions on hold.
Reality and facts will eventually over power politics.
Life teaches us that unpleasant happenings cannot be deferred for ever.
There is always a day of reckoning.
The longer we hide ourselves from the truth, the worse is the result.
There is no doubt that a huge amount of work is being done and not just by increasing the number of committees. If you check the links, there is a lot of positive news about sustainable development and the UN millennium goals. Let’s hope green economy is not a oxymoron.
Kevin, a lot is also being done in Australia but unfortunately we hear very little about it as it does not suit the media’s anti-government theme.
When I get a chance I can add a lot more about the Government’s contribution. 🙂
Folks, you might like to stir the possum over at AllVoices with some pointed comments. I’ll put a link to the Café on my post there.
Kevin, have done so..also linked via Facebook.
Patricia, Must be worth a pome or two in the coming months. Perhaps some song lyrics.
PS The Café is a fear-free zone. We’ll have to wait till 2015 to judge the worth of the Durban platform. The proof of the cliché is in …
Wow! 2 accents in one comment.
Kevin, that reminds me of the How To from not along after the Café first opened and Bacchus was kindly providing lessons. 🙂
Min
We’re all baristas now.
It’s the little things our Government does that go unnoticed by the wider community. Take our new building, for example.
No longer can we have two monitors for one computer. Yes, it’s a little thing, but it helps reduce the carbon footprint, no matter how minimal.
We no longer have personal rubbish bins. Now we have to place our rubbish in one of three bins, two of which are for recycling. This is designed to get us to think about how we dispose of our rubbish. It is habit-forming, I can tell you.
At least the Government is leading by example.
I remember this from 1985. Still important.
Thank you Kevin Rennie for the link on Twitter, my Scottish half is very proud 🙂
Scottish renewable electricity on track for ‘record year’
Figures reveal country is likely to produce its highest ever levels of electricity from renewable sources
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/dec/22/scottish-renewable-electricity-record-year?CMP=twt_gu
Scotland looks set for its highest ever renewables output, and could produce almost a third of its electricity from renewable sources by the end of 2011.
I’ve been meaning to post this comment for some while.
I’ve sat on a number of tender panels and one of the criteria is that the applicant has to show what initiatives they will implement to convince the panel how they will reduce their carbon footprint.
This has been particularly so in training, education, or building construction.
It’s just another thing the government does that slips under the radar.