Present scientific understanding of ecosystem services is substantial and extremely relevant for policy purposes. Therefore, it merits urgent attention by decision-makers since current patterns of human activity are unsustainable and threaten to impair critical life-supporting functions. Failure to maintain biodiversity undermines economic prosperity, food security, and other aspects of human well-being. While the international community remains far from fully understanding the importance of the ecosystem services, the accelerating rate of disruption of a plethora of ecosystems and the biosphere makes imperative the incorporation of current knowledge into the policy making process. Thus, key questions and topics in this debate would be the following:
The Kyoto Protocol has generally been seen as an important first step towards a verily global emission-reduction plan that would stabilize GHG emissions, and would provide the essential architecture for any future international agreement on climate change. By the end of the first commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol in 2012, a new international framework needs to have been negotiated and ratified that can deliver the stringent emission reductions indicated by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). A consensus must be developed on the new and improved methods for the reduction of greenhouse gases with special reference to how current and future energy projects align with the previous protocol's goals. This is to occur on both a small-scale arena within national communities and a large-scale arena in international structures. The current international economic status, the accelerating need for energy production in developing nations, and the sustainability management for future emission targets must all be taken into account. Some key questions and topics to consider are: