Sukehiro Gotoh

(National Institute for Environmental Studies, Japan Environment Agency)

Abstract

Nine global environmental issues of current public concern, such as global warming and destruction of tropical forests, have been discussed collectively to identify their two major common causes; resource-wasteful industrial activities based on material affluent lifestyles of developed countries that are globalized and poverty-stricken living standards of developing countries compounded by the further population increases. To cope with these global environmental problems, shifting toward and creation of a "recycle society" while intensifying resouree concervation efforts appears to be mandatory and indispensable for every industrial society to sustain in the 21st century and thereafter. Upstream efforts in the minimization of potential waste along the material flow are exemplified by the latest two Japanese laws of recycling and waste management and the packaging minimization ordinances in Germany, and, in this endeavor, waste management is found a key step toward the concervation of future global environment. It is also pointed out that Japan, with her long traditions of resource conservative lifestyle since the Edo Period, is in the best position to pursue the recyle society in the 21st century.

Key words: global environmental issues, sustainable development, recycle society, waste management, energy and material saving