Conclusion

Abstract

The preceding chapters have examined how the development and institutionalisation of the FSC and the MSC have contributed to global commodity governance. While trade in commodities, including forest and fisheries products, is longstanding, late twentieth-century globalisation and concomitant development of natural resources have provided significant opportunities for growth and expansion. At the same time, increasing demand for commodities has heightened concern over the depletion of natural resources, the degradation of associated environments, the negative impacts on workers and indigenous peoples and the responsibility of conventional approaches to management for these negative externalities. This enhanced environmental and social awareness of the state of the world’s natural resources and how they are managed is another artefact of globalisation. In response states have acted individually to implement policy and legislative reforms that centre on improving the social and environmental management of resources and worked with each other in intergovernmental forums and institutions to address these concerns. We note the impact and consequences of the most significant of these initiatives: the World Commission on Environment and Development, whose report was released in 1987; the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development of 1992; and the World Summit on Sustainable Development held in 2002.