Many new skills are required if and when humanity moves towards a sustainable society. At the professional and technical levels, there will be great need for specialists in environmental matters. They will need a broad understanding of the principles of a sustainable society, which entails understanding how systems, wether ecosystems or anthropogenic systems, work and interrelate. Skills can be facilitated by improved telecommunications, education, personnel and information exchange. These needs may be met by increased NGO, independent community action, private sector and governments activities.
This strategy features in the framework of Agenda 21 as formulated at UNCED (Rio de Janeiro, 1992), now coordinated by the United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development and implemented through national and local authorities.