Sustainable development is a very simple idea.
It is about ensuring a better quality of life for everyone, now and for generations to come. To achieve this, sustainable development is concerned with achieving economic growth, in the form of higher living standards, while protecting and where possible enhancing the environment not just for its own sake but because a damaged environment will sooner or later hold back economic growth and lower the quality of life and making sure that these economic and environmental benefits are available to everyone, not just to a privileged few. There have been many attempts to produce formal definitions of sustainable development. The most widely used, particularly internationally, is the 'Brundtland' definition which refers to 'development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs'. Perhaps more important than formal definitions, however, are the key objectives which underlie sustainable development.