Synopsis

A joint publication by the World Resources Institute, the United Nations Environment Programme, the United Nations Development Programme, and the World Bank

Explores the links between environmental quality and human health, looking both at the environmental threats associated with poverty and those associated with unwise development.

Executive Summary

The eighth biennial issue of the most authoritative report on the global environment brings together in a highly readable format the latest ideas on a broad spectrum of natural resource issues and suggests strategies for addressing them.

World Resources 1998-99 focuses on the critical issue of environmental change and human health. Drawing on the latest scientific data, this section of the report explores how environmental conditions contribute to the current burden of death and disease around the world and how that may change over the coming decades.

World Resources 1998-99 looks at several critical trends that are changing the physical environment such as the intensification of agriculture, industrialization, and rising energy use, and that have the potential to influence human health.

As in previous volumes, World Resources 1998-99 also looks at the current state of the environment as it relates to population and human well-being, consumption and waste, and resources at risk. The book also contains the latest core country data from 157 countries and new information on poverty, inequality, and food security.