State of the world 1984. A Worldwatch Institute Report on progress towards a sustainable society.

This Worldwatch Institute State of the World Report is to be the 1st of an annual series that will measure worldwide progress in achieving a sustainable society defined as 1 in which economic and social systems successfully adjust to changes in the underlying natural resource base. The report monitors changes in the global resource base focusing particularly on how such changes affect the economy and is intended to provide news of innovative or particularly successful activities to create a sustainable society to emphasize global economic connections often overlooked by policymakers to review national policies and programs and to survey major financial commitments by government or international development agencies. Attempts were made to make the report useful to policymakers and to identify basic information gaps. The work begins with an overview of news items changing economic prospects the shrinking resource base energy-related structural adjustments resource depletion and the debt problem. The next chapter deals with population stabilization examining population arithmetic countries with zero population growth rapid national fertility declines population versus economic growth population and resource projections and new population initiatives. The remaining chapters examine reducing dependence on oil conserving soils protecting forests recycling materials reassessing the economics of nuclear power developing renewable energy reordering the automobiles future securing food supplies and reshaping economic policies.