GeMUN 2016
Environmental Commission
Topic 3
Raising awareness in the international community of the importance of
environmental sustainability in order to halt environmental
degradation.
Sophia Mallucci
Index:
Definition of key terms
Introduction
Background Information
Major countries involved
Reliable useful links
 Introduction
Environmental sustainability involves making decisions and taking action that are in the
interests of protecting the natural world, with particular emphasis on preserving the
capability of the environment to support human life. Environmental sustainability is about
making responsible decisions that will reduce your delegation business' negative impact
on the environment.
Businesses can potentially cause damage to all areas of the environment. Some of the common
environmental concerns include but not limited to:
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damaging rainforests and woodlands through logging and agricultural clearing
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polluting and over-fishing of oceans, rivers and lakes
polluting the atmosphere through the burning of fossil fuels
damaging prime agricultural and cultivated land through the use of unsustainable farming
practices
Environmental sustainability forces businesses to look beyond making short term gains and look at
the long term impact they are having on the natural world.
 Background information
Environmental degradation is the disintegration of the earth or deterioration of the environment
through consumption of assets, the destruction of environments and the eradication of wildlife.
There are a number of ways in which environmental degradation can work. In a classic case,
resources simply become depleted. Air, water, and soil are all resources which are vulnerable to
depletion through overuse, as are natural resources like minerals and oil deposits. Habitat
pressures which force animals into a small area can also contribute to resource depletion, as the
animals consume a high volume of material in a small area.
 Definition of key terms
Environment:
1. The surroundings or conditions in which a person, animal, or plant lives or operates.
2. (the environment) The natural world, as a whole or in a particular geographical area,
especially as affected by human activity.
Sustainable : Conserving an ecological balance by avoiding depletion of natural resources.
Degradation : The condition or process of degrading or being degraded.
Pollution : the process of making air, water, soil, etc. dirty; the state of being dirty.
Overpopulation : The condition of being populated with excessively large numbers.
Landfill :The disposal of waste material by burying it, especially as a method of filling in and
reclaimingexcavated pits.
Deforestation : The action of clearing a wide area of trees.
Biodiversity : The variety of plant and animal life in the world or in a particular habitat, a high level
of which is usually considered to be important and desirable.
Ozone Layer : A layer in the earth’s stratosphere at an altitude of about 10 km (6.2 miles)
containing a high concentration of ozone, which absorbs most of the ultravioletradiation reaching
the earth from the sun.
Livelihood : A means of securing the necessities of life.
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UN involvement
In October 2007, at the meeting of the UN System Chief Executives Board for Coordination (CEB),
the Executive Heads of UN agencies, funds and programmes committed to move their respective
organizations towards climate neutrality, and developed the UN Climate Neutral Strategy.
Specifically, the Executive Heads of UN agencies committed to:
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Estimate the greenhouse gas emissions of UN system organizations consistent with
accepted international standards;
Undertake efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions;
Analyze the cost implications and explore budgetary modalities of purchasing carbon
offsets to eventually reach climate neutrality.
The UN Climate Neutral Strategy highlights the advantages of harmonization. A common approach
across the UN system brings greater impact, lowers transactions costs, facilitates practical action
on the ground through the development of common tools, ensures comparability of data across
organizations, and pooling of results for better-informed decisions and knowledge-sharing.
Greenhouse gas emissions of UN organizations and what we are doing to reduce them
As the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), (held on the 30th
November 2015 in Paris), launches its Climate Neutral Now initiative, which encourages and
enables organizations, companies and individuals to measure, reduce and offset their emissions
direct with UN-certified climate credits.
A significant effort has been underway in the UN since 2007, when organizations approved the UN
Climate Neutral Strategy, which commits all UN organizations to measure, reduce and then offset
any greenhouse gas emissions that cannot be avoided. The UN has been measuring its greenhouse
gas emissions from facilities and travel since 2009 and in 2013 emitted at least 1,7 million tonnes
of carbon dioxide equivalent.
On 12 December 2015, the participating 195 countries agreed, by consensus, to the final global
pact, the Paris Agreement, to reduce emissions as part of the method for reducing greenhouse
gas. In the 12-page document, the members agreed to reduce their carbon output as soon as
possible and to do their best to keep global warming not over 2°C, in the goal of reducing global
warming.
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Bibliography
http://www.conserve-energy-future.com/causes-and-effects-of-environmentaldegradation.php
http://toolkit.smallbiz.nsw.gov.au/part/17/86/371
http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/it/spellcheck/inglese/?q=turism+industry
http://www.un.org/en/sections/general/un-and-sustainability/index.html
http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-environmental-degradation.htm
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2015_United_Nations_Climate_Change_Conference