Description

From 31 May to 2 June 1990, members of Parliamentarians for Global Action met in Bellagio, Italy for a workshop entitled, Global Warming: North-South and the Planetary Partnership. At the meeting PGA established the Partnership for Environment and Development - a coalition of parliamentarians many different political parties dedicated to action across national frontiers.

At this first meeting of the coalition, the challenge of climate change was addressed, and recognised as a common concern of humanity. The broad scientific consensus at that time was that the Earth's average surface temperature has increased 0.3-0.6°C during the preceding century. It was foreseen that a global warming of 2°C above the 1950-1980 average level over the following century would be a more rapid and extreme climatic change than anything that had occurred during the previous 10,000 years. Such a warming would carry the planet to temperatures higher than any experienced during the past 100,000 years.

It was recognized that the risks of rapid global warming could not be reduced through national action alone. The response must be global, based on cooperation by all nations and regions of the planet. PGA called for a planetary partnership of all nations, North and South, to promote sustainable development based on equity among nations and the environmental integrity of the Earth.