Assessments are required continually to guide rational and effective decision-making for environmental policy formulation, implementation, and evaluation at local, national, regional, and global levels. To improve the global capability for keeping the environment under continuous review, urgent action is required in the following fields:

investment in new and better data collection, in the harmonization of national datasets, and in the acquisition of global datasets;

increased understanding of the linkages among different environmental issues as well as of the interactions between environment and development;

enhanced capabilities for integrated assessment and forecasting and the analysis of the environmental impact of alternative policy options;

better translation of scientific results into a format readily usable by policy-makers and the general public; and

the development of cost-effective, meaningful, and useful methods for monitoring environmental trends and policy impacts at local, national, regional, and global levels.

Figure 6 illustrates the relationships among key actions, major environmental trends, and the ensuing overall improvements in environment and human health and well-being. To achieve advances in one or all of these key areas for action, a change in the "hearts and minds" of everyone will be required, along with a world-wide transition towards equity and resource efficiency. The necessary financial resources will have to be made available at national and international levels. Estimates have indicated that if 2-3 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP) could be devoted to environmental education, protection, and restoration, great strides could be made in halting the progress of major negative environmental trends. Implementing the pledges made at Rio to increase development aid to the equivalent of 0.7 per cent of industrial countries' GDP and to provide new additional funding is the prerequisite for initiating action to reverse global environmental degradation.