Strengthening coordination and cooperation among research programmes on global change

This strategy features in the framework of Agenda 21 as formulated at UNCED (Rio de Janeiro, 1992), now coordinated by the United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development and implemented through national and local authorities.

Agenda 21 recommends supporting national, subregional, regional and international research programmes on marine and terrestrial systems, strengthening global terrestrial databases of their components, expanding corresponding systems for monitoring their changing states and enhancing predictive modelling of the Earth system and its subsystems, including modelling of the functioning of these systems assuming different intensities of human impact. The research programmes should include the programmes mentioned in other Agenda 21 chapters which support mechanisms for cooperation and coherence of research programmes on global change.

ENTRI, which stands for Environmental Treaties and Resource Indicators, is an online search service for finding information about environmental treaties and national resource indicators. The ENTRI system is organized around a set of nine specific issue areas critical to understanding the human dimensions of global change. These are: (1) land use/land cover change and desertification; (2) global climate change; (3) stratospheric ozone depletion; (4) transboundary air pollution; (5) conservation of biological diversity; (6) deforestation; (7) oceans and their living resources; (8) trade and the environment; and (9) population. ENTRI is a highly collaborative project that draws heavily upon the contributions and expertise of cooperating institutions.