Following text is a text of "THE COUSTEAU SOCIETY/EQUIPE COUSTEAU" BILL OF RIGHTS FOR FUTURE GENERATIONS While most of Earth's people grapple with increasing poverty, hunger and disease, a privileged few live as if enjoying a global feast exhausting the sea and the soil. But it is not our generation that will pay the ever mounting bill. The cost will be passed on to our children and grand children and many generations to come. The Cousteau Society submits there is a way to care for the future. One that guarantees for those who will replace us, a healthful creative life rather thana deprived agonizing existence at the edge of subsistence. THIS IS A REASON WHY THE COUSTEAU SOCIETY HAS WRITTEN THE BILL OF RIGHTS FOR FUTURE GENERATIONS (see text below) WE WILL PRESENT IT AT THE NEXT UNITED NATIONS GENERAL ASSEMBLY IN OCTOBER 1994 AND URGE THAT THESE RIGHTS BECOME PART OF THE GUIDING PRINCIPLES OF THE WORLD. Using the same strategy that was successful in Antarctica, we have decided to mobilize a massive groundswell of popular pressure and therefore have launched a petition for the bill of Rights for Future Generations. By December 1993, it has received 5 million signatures worldwide. It is a long term project AND WE NEED THE SUPPORT OF AS PEOPLE AS POSSIBLE. PLEASE STAND BESIDE US IN THIS CAMPAIGN, ASK FOR PETITIONS, CONVINCE THE PEOPLE OF YOUR COUNTRY TO SIGN IT. THERE ARE 6 MONTHS LEFT. For further information, please contact Isabelle HAYNES - Equipe Cousteau Paris (France) Tel: 33 1 40 53 63 00 Fax: 33 1 40 53 63 03 About The Cousteau Society: The Cousteau Society was founded in the United States in 1974, expanded to France in 1981, then in Australia in 1990. This non for profit organization is devoted to the protection of the aquatic system and to the preservation of all forms of life. Information and education are TCS's two main priorities. It distributes through membership two monthly magazines: Calypso Log and Dolphin Log, the latter for children, publishes books and produces films on the activities and expeditions undertaken by the Cousteau team, issuing original documents on today's world. "THE COUSTEAU SOCIETY / EQUIPE COUSTEAU" BILL OF RIGHTS FOR FUTURE GENERATIONS THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY, MINDFUL of the determination proclaimed by the peoples of the world in the Charter of the United Nations to reaffirm faith in the dignity and worth of the human person and to promote social progress and better standards of life in larger freedom, ACKNOWLEDGING that it is among the purposes of the United Nations to achieve international cooperation in solving international problems and to be a center for harmonizing the actions of nations in the attainment of these common ends, RECOGNIZING that for the first time in the history the rights of future generations to exercise options with respect to the nurture and continuity of life and the enrichment and diversity of their mental and physical environment are seriously threatened, BELIEVING that the preservation and promotion of these rights has a claim on the conscience of all peoples and all nations, CONVINCED that each generation has the inherent right to determine its own destiny and the corresponding responsibility to accord a similar right to future generations as an extension of the right of the living, SOLEMNLY PROCLAIMS the necessity of securing the universal recognition of this right and this responsibility; and to this end DECLARES THAT: Article 1. Future generations have a right to an uncontaminated and undamaged Earth and to its enjoyment as the ground of human history, of culture, and of the social bonds that make each generation and individual a member of one human family. Article 2. Each generation, sharing in the estate and heritage of the Earth, has a duty as trustee for future generations to prevent irreversible and irreparable harm to life on Earth and to human freedom and dignity. Article 3. It is, therefore, the paramount responsibility of each generation to maintain a constantly vigilant and prudential assessment of technological disturbances and modifications adversely affecting life on Earth, the balance of nature, and the evolution of mankind in order to protect the rights of future generations. Article 4. All appropriate measures, including education, research, and legislation, shall be taken to guarantee these rights and to ensure that they not be sacrificed for present expediences and conveniences. Article 5. Governments, non-governmental organizations, and the individuals are urged, therefore, imaginatively to implement these principles, as if in the very presence of those future generations whose rights we seek to establish and perpetuate. THIS DOCUMENT was proposed by the Council of Advisors of The Cousteau Society for the consideration of the United Nations. The Cousteau Society 777 United Nations Plaza New York, NY 10017 USA 870 Greenbrier Circle, Suite 402 Chesapeake, VA 23320 USA P. O. Box 124 Freemantle, WA 6160 Australia Equipe Cousteau 233, rue du Faubourg Saint-Honore 75405 Paris cedex 08 France "Why should we preserve a liveable planet if not for our children and grandchildren?" Copyright 1980 "The Cousteau Society, Inc."