Global Green USA will join presidents, prime ministers, other world leaders and thousands of citizens and activists from Brazil, the U.S., and around the globe in Rio de Janeiro for the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development (a.k.a. Earth Summit) next June.
I will be leading a Global Green USA delegation, which will include a chosen citizen entrepreneur who took our I AM Challenge to fight climate change and demonstrated a community action to help us in the fight. I hope you will also take the challenge, and get the chance to join me there.
The Earth Summit is especially meaningful for us at Global Green USA: Leaders from around the world at the 1992 Rio Earth Summit called upon President Mikhail S. Gorbachev to start and lead the Green Cross. In April 1993, Green Cross International (GCI) was founded by President Gorbachev, and Global Green USA -- the U.S. arm of GCI -- was started a few months later.
In 2002, we raised awareness about the 2002 Earth Summit in Johannesburg, South Africa, and at the conference were joined by mayors and congressional members in calling for a $50 billion global solar fund.
We knew then, as we know now, that there is no time to wait in taking steps to protect our planet for future generations. Before the 2002 meeting, we called on President Bush to attend and put forth an action plan on climate change. We plan to issue the same call to President Obama. This time, however, we need more action to result from the Earth Summit, regardless of which heads of state attend.
The expectations are high for the Rio+20 gathering, which should set the agenda for the decades ahead with work to combat critical global challenges. We do not need empty promises or treaties and action plans that are unfulfilled. The Earth Summit is about protecting our planet -- and preserving our future. Now, we are joining our colleagues at GCI and other environmental nonprofits in asking everyone, but particularly younger generations, to become engaged and speak up for a brighter and greener future. We are asking citizen entrepreneurs to call upon world leaders as they prepare for Rio+20 and urge them to take real actions to immediately put us all on a more sustainable path.
Public comments concerning the conference are being accepted by the United Nations through November 1. Please sign our letter to the UN now and share your comments.
Together, we can make sure the most important environmental meeting in a decade results in more than talk.