Brussels, 30/08/2012 (Agence Europe) - Since 1970 humanity's annual demand on natural resources has exceeded what the planet is able to provide in a year - a phenomenon known as “Earth Overshoot Day”, which this year fell on 22 August, in the middle of the summer holiday period. To mark the occasion an environmental conference on the EU's response to Ecological Overshoot Day will take place at the European Parliament in Brussels on 5 September. Welcomed by GLOBE-EU (Global Legislators Organisation for a Balanced Environment), it will enable MEPs to meet representatives from civil society, international organisations, the academic world and the European Commission, and discuss with them the EU's response to the threat posed by this overexploitation of the planet's resources and the implementation of the results of the UN's Rio+20 summit on sustainable development.
The high level conference of 5 September is organised in partnership with the NGO Global Footprint Network (which calculates every year the day when humanity's consumption of natural resources has used up what the planet can provide in a year), the European Environmental Bureau (EEB) and CEEweb for Biodiversity. GLOBE-EU brings together parliamentarians from most of the countries of Europe cooperating, beyond their countries and respective parties, on questions on the environment, protection of biodiversity and sustainable development. Last year Earth Overshoot Day fell on 27 September. (AN/transl.fl)