A Day In The Life Of Mother Earth : A World of Difference Since ’72 U.N. Conference

The global political backdrop has changed dramatically since the first international environmental conference 20 years ago in Stockholm.

In 1972, the war in Vietnam, Cold War antagonisms and Third World suspicions of a hidden Western agenda colored efforts by the U.N. Conference on the Human Environment to fashion a global response to mounting environmental problems.

Some developing countries suspected that a global network of air monitoring stations to track changes in the Earth’s climate would become bases for subversion.

The United States was denounced by Sweden’s Prime Minister Olof Palme for defoliating vast swaths of Vietnam jungle. He demanded that “ecological warfare cease immediately.”

The Soviet Union and other members of the old East Bloc boycotted the entire affair because East Germany had been excluded from full participation on grounds that it was not a U.N. member.

Now, two decades later, as representatives of more than 100 countries head for the U.N. Conference on Environment and Development at Rio de Janeiro, old animosities have given way to new cooperation. Treaties to reduce global warming and protect the planet’s biodiversity are expected to be signed.

But pressing needs by developing countries to raise living standards are more acute than ever, which increases pressures on the environment. Since the Stockholm conference, the world’s population has surged by 1.6 billion.

“Every major global indicator of the Earth’s environmental health shows dramatic deterioration since 1972,” said Lester Brown, president of the Worldwatch Institute, a private Washington-based environmental research organization.

Since 1972, the world has lost nearly 494 million acres of trees--an area the size of the United States east of the Mississippi, Worldwatch said. Chemicals have ripped a hole in the ozone layer. Deserts have expanded by 297 million acres, claiming more land than is planted to crops in China and Nigeria combined. An estimated 480 million tons of topsoil, roughly equal to that which covers the agricultural land of India and France, has been lost. Thousands of plant and animal species no longer exist.

Meanwhile, atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide--the principal greenhouse gas--have climbed by 25% since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution.

“The Stockholm conference made an effort to generate a lot of global alarm about the environment,” said former World Bank President Barber B. Conable Jr. “(But) I think it was viewed as a pretty ho-hum sort of a thing for the first 10 years after they held it.”

To be sure, there were accomplishments. The United Nations Environment Program was born, and the global air monitoring network was approved. More than 115 nations have established environmental agencies or ministries since 1972. An estimated 100,000 non-governmental organizations dedicated to enhancing the environment now exist.

But most environmental problems discussed in Stockholm were local or regional in nature--polluted streams, urban air pollution, for example--and could essentially be handled by individual nations within their own borders. Little heed was paid to underlying economic forces that affect the world’s ecosystems.

“Since Stockholm, we have learned . . . we must significantly modify our economic behavior as individuals, as industries and as nations,” said Maurice F. Strong, chief organizer of the Stockholm conference and general secretary of next week’s Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro.

The Rio Agenda Here’s the tentative agenda for next week’s Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro:

June 3

* U.N. Secretary General Boutros Boutros-Ghali to open summit in the morning.

* General debate to begin in afternoon.

June 4-12

* Main committee to give progress report by June 10. General debate expected to end by June 12, when heads of state will make statements.

June 5

* Brazilian President Fernando Collor de Mello and King Carl XVI Gustav of Sweden to co-host ceremony marking 20th anniversary of U.N. Conference on the Human Environment.

* Separate signing ceremonies to be held for conventions on climate and on biological diversity.

June 13

* Heads of state to participate in morning and afternoon sessions.

* President Collor to host luncheon and, later, reception for delegates.

June 14

* Signing ceremony and closing.