Gro Harlem Brundtland Quotes

We learned that economic growth and environmental protection can and should go hand in hand.

The current challenge facing the environmental authorities is how to properly deal with the environmental problems caused by economic development.

The pathway to a more sustainable future for all children must include access to the basic building blocks of good health, including nutrition, water, and immunizations.

True security is based on people's welfare - on a thriving economy, on strong public health and education programmes, and on fundamental respect for our common humanity. Development, peace, disarmament, reconciliation and justice are not separate from security; they help to underpin it.

If you want to help Africa, you should help them out of poverty, not try to build solar cells and windmills.

The main environmental challenge of the 21st century is poverty. When you don't know where your next meal is coming from, it's hard to consider the environment 100 years down the line.

We need to accept the seemingly obvious fact that a toxic environment can make people sick and that no amount of medical intervention can protect us. The health care community must become a powerful political lobby for environmental policy and legislation.

I think there's a lot of work to be done with our societies. My biggest passions are the environment and health. And when I say 'health' I mean the secrets behind health and our food system.

In many developing countries environmental problems are relegated to the periphery because they do not appear to be as urgent as other issues … We cannot survive without clean drinking water, food and pure air. Environmental concerns are not a luxury in Africa.

Every time we try to do something to improve the environment someone predicts that it will ruin the economy.

National security is not only building war machines to kill. National security is as much a policy of the living who prefer life over death, wellness over sickness, work over idleness, education over illiteracy, and food over hunger.

The primary task of developing countries is to develop the economy and eradicate poverty. Without economic growth, there would be no material basis for a better life or better environment for the people. But economic growth must not be achieved at the cost of environment or resources. In the absence of proper resource and environmental protection, there could be no sustainable economic development.

I have never believed we had to choose between either a clean and safe environment or a growing economy. Protecting the health and safety of all Americans doesn’t have to come at the expense of our economy’s bottom line. And creating thriving companies and new jobs doesn’t have to come at the expense of the air we breathe, the water we drink, the food we eat, or the natural landscape in which we live. We can, and indeed must, have both.

… authors generally neglect that growth has lifted billions of people out of grinding poverty and that others may remain poor because of the developed world’s environmental concerns …

You cannot, for instance, sustainably protect the environment if the majority of the people are still in primitive agriculture leading to the encroachment of forest reserves.

The world faces enormous human development and environmental challenges, from poverty and disease to food security and climate change.

There are billions of people in the world who deserve the better quality of life that products such as soap, shampoo, and clean drinking water can provide.

Infrastructure investment in science is an investment in jobs, in health, in economic growth and environmental solutions.

If Africa seeks prosperity, it must provide for the health and nutrition of all – including the poorest.

We are now heading down a centuries-long path toward increasing the productivity of our natural capital - the resource systems upon which we depend to live - instead of our human capital.

To deal with these problems - of world population and hunger, of peace, of energy and mineral resources, of environmental pollution, of poverty - we must broaden and deepen our knowledge of nature's laws, and we must broaden and deepen our understanding of the laws of human behavior.

My capital budget maintains my commitment to the education of children, health of the Chesapeake Bay, and safety of all Maryland citizens. We will continue to focus on the five pillars of my Administration as we build today and look forward to the projects of the future.

It angers me when sustainability gets used as a buzz word. For 90 percent of the world, sustainability is a matter of survival.

Healthy children are more likely to attend school and are better able to learn. Healthy workers are more productive. More productive economies mean greater stability in developing countries and improved security in the West.

Raising awareness on the most pressing environmental issues of our time is more important than ever.