Abstract
This paper demonstrates how quantitative indicators and indices of environmental performance help gauge progress toward global policy goals identified as priorities two decades ago. This study uses the most recent performance and trend data from the 2012 Environmental Performance Index (EPI) and Trend EPI to answer two main questions: What progress has been made on the environmental issues identified by high-level leaders at the Rio Earth Summit in 1992 and subsequently in the Millennium Development Goal 7 (MDG7)? What are some of the factors that can help to explain differences in performance on these issues? To answer these questions, this paper introduces pared-down versions of the 2012 EPI and Trend EPI indices to evaluate performance and progress over the last decade on the five policy categories related to objectives specified in MDG7: Water (Effects on Human Health), Biodiversity and Habitat, Forestry, Fisheries, and Climate Change and Energy. The results presented in this paper demonstrate that progress on the MDG7 environmental goals is uneven – by country, region, and issue. While income, social development, and institutional factors explain some of these differences, we suggest that variable global environmental performance can partly be attributed to challenges within the processes and institutions of the MDGs.
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