Jacques Rogge, 9th World Conference on Sport and the Environment

Your Highnesses and Excellencies

Ladies and Gentlemen

Dear Colleagues,

This 9

year away from the 20

will help ensure that we mark that occasion with a renewed environmental commitment and a clear

agenda for action.

The 1992 Earth Summit was a seminal event for the environmental movement. It helped create a new

awareness and a sense of urgency around environmental issues. It encouraged individuals, corporations,

governments, NGOs and other entities to act on their environmental responsibilities. It helped change the

way we think about natural resources that we once took for granted.

The Olympic Movement and the world of sport responded to the call.

Our commitment to the environment is more than just a matter of self-interest. It is a matter of values.

The Olympic Movement exists to place sport at the service of humanity.

We also have an obligation to use sport as a tool for positive change at the societal level. The 1992 Earth

Summit helped us realize that we could serve humanity by serving the environment. After all,

environmental sustainability is linked to our very survival as a species.

Our values require us to act on two levels. First, we must do all we can to ensure that our own activities do

not contribute to environmental degradation. At the same time, we have to use sport as a tool to

encourage environmentally responsible behavior by others.

Two years after the 1992 Earth Summit, environmental issues were at the top of the agenda at the 1994

Centennial Olympic Congress in Paris. As a result of that meeting, the Olympic Movement began to

embrace environmental sustainability as part of its core mission.

th World Conference on Sport and Environment comes at a very opportune time. We are now just ath anniversary of the landmark 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro. Our work here

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In another major development that year, the 1994 Olympic Winter Games in Lillehammer set a new

standard for environmental responsibility. For the first time, environmental considerations played a major

role in Games planning and operations.

The Lillehammer Games proved that careful planning could significantly reduce the environmental impact

of our premier event.

The year 1994 also marked the beginning of our collaboration with the UN Environmental Programme.

The success of our cooperation in Lillehammer resulted in a true partnership that continues to this day.

With UNEP’s help, environmental considerations have been integrated into every aspect of the Games,

from the earliest planning stage to the post-Games environmental assessment.

Games organisers are now required to include environmental sustainability as a core goal and a central

element of Games legacy planning. Our knowledge transfer programme ensures that environmental

lessons learned at each edition of the Games are shared with future hosts.

These efforts have produced tangible and measureable results. The 2010 Vancouver Games set a new

standard for environmental sustainability in construction practices, energy conservation and legacy

planning. The Olympic Village is considered a model for environmentally responsible urban planning.

I am confident that our record of environmental progress will continue with next year’s Games in London,

the 2014 Games in Sochi and the 2016 Games in Rio.

The new Youth Olympic Games have given us another opportunity to promote environmental awareness.

Reducing the environmental impact of the Games is extremely important in its own right, but it also serves

our goal of encouraging environmentally responsible behavior by others.

In 1999, the IOC and UNEP collaborated on a more direct call to action — Olympic Agenda 21. Olympic

Agenda 21 was an environmental guide for sport organisations patterned after the global Agenda 21 that

resulted from the 1992 Earth Summit.

Since then, National Olympic Committees, International Federations and National Federations have built

on that foundation with their own creative ideas. They have developed innovative environmental toolkits,

sponsored workshops and reduced the impact of world championships and other major competitions.

I congratulate and thank all of you who have helped lead our environmental efforts within your sports and

your organisations. Here, I would also like to extend a word of gratitude to the Chairman and members of

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the Commission on Sport and Environment for their great support and counsel, provided to the Olympic

Movement in a very important aspect of the IOC’s activities.

As we near the 20

environment is stronger than ever. That commitment was reaffirmed at the most recent Olympic Congress

in 2009.

Through the UN Permanent Observer Status granted in 2009, the International Olympic Committee is

more actively involved in contributing to the Rio +20 process and the expected outcomes of the Earth

Summit led by the UN Commission on Sustainable Development. An updated Olympic Agenda 21

publication will communicate and address the issue of a renewed call to action for this new millennium.

We have come a long way over the course of the past two decades. We have acknowledged and

accepted our environmental responsibilities. We have moved from environmental awareness to

environmental action. We have forged new partnerships to meet our obligations.

But we have still more to do. We are not here to celebrate past achievements, but to lay the groundwork

for future success. The knowledge we have acquired, the partnerships we have formed and the availability

of new technology are the building blocks for more progress.

It is now up to us to make sure that when the world marks the 20

it can truly be said that the Olympic Movement did its part to protect and preserve our environment.

Thank you, and I wish you a very successful conference.th anniversary of the 1992 Earth Summit, the Olympic Movement’s commitment to theth anniversary of the 2012 Earth Summit,