State of the World 1999: A Worldwatch Institute Report on Progress Toward a Sustainable Society

State of the World

by Lester R. Brown, Christopher Flavin, Hilary F. French

Featuring charts and tables, the latest reference book in an annual series analyzes current global environmental problems and trends, offers possible solutions, and traces the enormous changes of the last century and the challenges to come. Simultaneous.

256 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1999

About the author

Lester Russel Brown is an American environmentalist, founder of the Worldwatch Institute, and founder and president of the Earth Policy Institute, a nonprofit research organization based in Washington, D.C. BBC Radio commentator Peter Day calls him "one of the great pioneer environmentalists."

In the mid-1970s, Brown helped pioneer the concept of sustainable development, during a career that started with farming. As early as 1978, in his book The Twenty-Ninth Day, he was already warning of "the various dangers arising out of our manhandling of nature...by overfishing the oceans, stripping the forests, turning land into desert." In 1986, the Library of Congress requested his personal papers noting that his writings “have already strongly affected thinking about problems of world population and resources.”

He has been the recipient of many prizes and awards, including, the 1987 United Nations Environment Prize, the 1989 World Wide Fund for Nature Gold Medal, and the 1994 Blue Planet Prize for his "contributions to solving global environmental problems."

Excerpted from Wikipedia.