20. Congratulate Callander and Dalbeattie congregations on gaining the first Eco-Congregation awards in Scotland, and urge Presbyteries to encourage other congregations to join the programme.
21. Urge congregations to reduce their waste burden as part of a Scottish-wide campaign of the Scottish Executive.
22. Urge HM Government and the Scottish Parliament to promote policies which would not make the growing of genetically modified and organic crops mutually exclusive in Scotland or the United Kingdom.
23. Urge the Scottish Executive to put greater stress on providing environmental support for farmers, along the lines of the Currie Report.

The World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) focused the world’s attention once again on one of the biggest issues which faces it - what represents a sustainable future for humankind on our planet? In 1992 the Rio Earth Summit put the environment firmly on national and international political and cultural agenda. Ten years later, in August 2002 the Johannesburg Summit sought to integrate not only the environmental but also the economic and social dimensions of sustainable development. Amid the global complexity of powers, needs, injustices, aspirations, fears and muddle, how do we find a sustainable balance for societies and communities, our economic systems, and God’s creation? SRT Project Director Dr Donald Bruce went to Johannesburg at the invitation of the Scottish Executive to represent the churches and aid agencies, in a small delegation drawn from sectors of Scottish civil society. These immense issues, whose contradictions, frustrations and possibilities he saw at first hand, form the context of this year’s report from the Society Religion and Technology Project. We examine what sustainability might mean across the wide range of cutting edge issues in science and technology with which SRT is called to engage.

Dr Bruce joined the ecumenical team of the World Council of Churches, with Christians from all over the world. The WCC was accredited as one of the UN "major groups" from civil society, which enabled attendance at the main summit plenaries and some of the negotiations, and access to UK and other delegates. There were also many side meetings and a large array of exhibits on practical environmental action across the world, and in all sectors of society. Especially valuable was a daily hour long briefing meeting for the UK NGOs hosted by the UK delegation, led by one of the environment ministers. This provided several opportunities to raise some of the churches’ concerns on issues such as renewable energy targets, the removal of hidden subsidies on fossil fuels, World Trade rules, and the precautionary principle. Donald met Scottish First Minister Jack McConnell and talked with him about SRT’s work on environmental policy and about the Eco-Congregation Programme. This was an important chance to bear witness to the Government about the Church of Scotland’s environmental involvement, stretching back over 30 years, and it has created some useful contacts for our ongoing work.

In stark contrast to the luxury conference facilities, the South African Council of Churches provided the chance for the WCC team to link with the grassroots situation in Johannesburg. The team attended an ecumenical service to mark the start of the Summit in a Presbyterian church in the heart Alexandra township, where a population the size of Edinburgh is said to live in just three square miles. Surrounded by a sardine tin mass of tiny shacks built of any waste materials which people can lay their hands on, the worship and singing was both an inspiration and a reality check on the Summit proceedings only three miles away.

The official Plan of Implementation was supposed to set challenging and imaginative goals from which governments, business and civil society could plan for long term sustainable development through this century. In reality, the compromised and watered down agreements represented an opportunity missed. While there are some useful targets, it was depressing to see issues as important as sanitation and renewable energy being traded like pawns in a diplomatic chess game.

The Summit expressed the conflict of two international streams over the last decade. One is the environment and social agenda pursued worldwide since the 1992 Earth Summit, which puts priority to addressing directly the degradation of our global environment, and insists that economic goals be set accordingly. The other is the rise of neo-liberal economic globalisation, which equates sustainable development with free market economic growth. The Johannesburg Summit lay in both streams, in an unsatisfactory and unstable compromise. On the one hand, it was agreed that trade rules of the WTO do not take supremacy over multilateral environmental treaties like climate change and biodiversity. Yet under powerful free trade pressures, especially from the USA, the environmental targets are mostly weak. There was significant erosion of key principles which were major foundations of the treaties agreed in Rio, like the precautionary principle and the notion of the natural world as a shared global commons, in favour of wording more convenient for business interests. There is a risk that we will revert to some of the unsustainable patterns that created global problems like climate change and loss of biodiversity.

But it was not a complete failure. There was much encouragement from numerous practical environmental and social initiatives, which have sprung up all over the world since Rio. The real action lay here. The most important thing about the World Summit was that it happened. Each government and leader had to prepare and say a credible piece about what they were doing about the issues, in the presence of nations suffering drought, poverty and starvation just across the border. It also raised the profile of the sustainable development issues internationally, in the media and with the public. The need is now to ensure that it stays high on the political and personal agenda of Scotland for all parties and sectors. The priority put by Mr McConnell to the issue opens especial opportunities in Scotland, on waste, renewable energy and the link between environment and justice. There is a general acknowledgement that government, corporations and civil society each have vital roles in sustainable development, including and perhaps especially the church. SRT and ACTS are working with both the Executive’s Sustainable Development Forum and the Future Scotland initiative of the Scottish Civic Forum. Indeed, can the churches give a lead in areas where others are struggling?

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2. Sustainability in the Church

The Scottish Executive asked the civic delegation to find out from Johannesburg what each could do in their sector to make a difference in Scotland, following the summit. It was therefore extremely timely to be able to say that the churches had already taken the initiative in setting up the Scottish Eco-Congregation Programme in 2001 for practical environmental action in local churches, and especially that the Church of Scotland had created a new post of Assistant Director of SRT with an emphasis on addressing sustainable development issues.

Victoria Beale joined SRT in June 2002, with a natural sciences degree from Cambridge and an MSc in wildlife management, and having worked with the Christian conservation organisation A Rocha. Her main work has so far been in promoting Eco-Congregation in the churches. This programme has been encouraged by successive Assemblies and was developed from a partnership between Churches Together in Britain and Ireland and the environmental awareness charity Encams. It is designed in the form of resource modules covering both practical and spiritual aspects, to offer something for every church context, regardless of size, location or denomination. In Scotland the programme is jointly co-ordinated by Victoria for SRT, representing ACTS, and Margaret Warnock of Forth Environment Link, on behalf of Encams.

Together they have put on workshops in Perth, Aberdeenshire, Hamilton and Edinburgh to present the opportunities of the programme for local churches, and also to put the churches in touch with local authorities and other organisations with whom congregations can share resources and work together. Falkirk Presbytery are focusing on environmental concerns in their May 2003 conference, including Eco-Congregation materials and input from their local authority. Several more workshops are envisaged and Victoria would welcome regional invitations from presbyteries or ecumenical groups of churches. Over 200 churches have taken the introductory material and 19 have formally registered. Already two churches, Callander and Dalbeattie, have gone on to receive an Eco-Congregation Award in recognition of the improvements made both in practical actions and in bringing issues of care for God’s creation more into the life of the church. In both cases the local MSP presented the award, making a public witness to the achievements.

Whether our churches are in rural or urban settings, we are all affected by environmental problems. Poorer communities in particular often suffer the most degraded, dirty and dangerous environments. We are called to serve the poor and to value and care for the whole of God’s created order. Eco-Congregation is designed to help local churches celebrate the gift of creation and play an active part in looking after it. We would encourage all congregations to join the programme and take advantage of the free materials. It starts with an introductory pack to help the church do an environmental checkup. This enables the congregation to see what things they can do and set a programme suited to their local needs and opportunities. To help them, there are free modules available with ideas and inspiration on :

• worship and preaching
• children’s and youth work
• Bible study groups and personal study
• caring for church premises and grounds
• implications for finances, catering and purchasing
• greening personal lifestyles
• working with the local community
• thinking globally and acting locally

Since the Church Without Walls report recognised "our interdependence in the weave of creation, and our call to be an example as good stewards of God’s creation", this responsibility has been increasingly becoming recognised across the church. SRT has written a section on partnership with creation in the Church Without Walls booklets produced by National Mission. The Stewardship Department’s new Stewardship 4 programme has introduced a new module on stewardship of creation as part of its cycle. For the Board of Ministry, Victoria has spoken to the Candidates Conference, to recently ordained ministers and at the 8-year conference, on SRT’s work and on the integral place of creation care in ministry and in the life of the church. She is also in discussion with the UPA and Rural representatives within National Mission about ways to address their special and differing contexts. The practicalities are familiar to the General Trustees, whose Better Heating Scheme continues to offer consultancy services on energy saving, which grew out of an SRT pilot scheme in 1978. Suggestions are now being made to address environmental issues more pro-actively in 121, following last Assembly’s deliverance. At all these levels, caring for God’s creation is increasingly becoming an integral part of the Kirk’s life. What about yours?

It is also a worldwide issue. As our experience in Johannesburg showed, behind much of the poverty and hunger that afflicts the developing world lie issues of environmental pollution and unsustainability. The two seem to go hand in hand. With our missionary links across the world, the church is uniquely placed to do something about it, often in ways that no one else can. Christian Aid and TEAR Fund now see the environmental dimension as intrinsic to their work of relief and development. We would challenge congregations who have contacts with sister churches in the developing world to find out how they can extend their links to encompass the local environment, to see how what we do in the North impacts on communities of the South, and how together we can make a difference for God’s world.

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3. Sustainable Science and Technology

Science and technology present both opportunities and challenges for sustainability. After 30 years pioneering their ethical and social implications, SRT welcomes the new mood in the UK and Europe to make scientific advances more accountable to wider society instead of standing aloof. "Science and Society" has now become an established concept, and SRT is working on both aspects. In April 2002, Dr Bruce was invited to be a member of the new Scottish Science Advisory Committee, set up to advise the Scottish Executive on science strategy. He is also part of an advisory group on public issues for the Biotechnology Research Council. These represent a significant opportunity for the church to play a role in the direction of scientific research. One of the central problems is how to engage ordinary members of the public who do not necessarily belong to a campaigning organisation or a political party. SRT is working on this in a project with the New Economics Foundation to develop tools for democratic participation in bioethical issues. Called DEMOCS (Deliberative Meetings Organised by Citizens), SRT has helped to devise a card game to give ordinary people the chance to explore and discuss questions like stem cells. The Human Genetics Commission used it as a method for gauging public opinion about the sale of genetic testing kits. SRT also has a long tradition of being pro-active on future technological issues. In March 2003, it was invited to speak at the Royal Institution in London, in a debate on the emerging issues in the field of nanotechnology, whose atomic scale devices may radically change the course of manufacturing, medicine and our everyday lives.

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4. Sustainability, Biotechnology and Agriculture

Does genetic modification represent a sustainable course for biotechnology in agriculture? The controversy continues. SRT has been involved in discussions in the Government’s current consultation over whether to allow the commercial planting of GM crops in the UK, both on the scientific evidence and on how to engage with the Scottish public. We first warned in 1997 of a widening gulf between science and society over genetically modified crops. The 1999 General Assembly report was not, however, opposed to the use of GM crops but it raised concerns that certain applications may be inadvisable on environmental grounds. It said that the emphasis should be on crops with specific health or ecological benefits, rather than the present range of applications of broad agronomic traits in commodity crops. It also stressed that proper segregation and labelling were essential.

Four years on, impacts on the environment remain ambiguous. In some cases GM applications have led to improvements in biodiversity through less use of chemicals on the land. Overall, the experience varies widely and the current field trials may not be conclusive on this point. Scientific evidence is mounting that small amounts of "gene flow" occur in nature between some types of crop plant and their wild varieties or some close relatives. Hence some transfer from GM crops to non-GM varieties of the same species is to be expected, but it would not transfer to unrelated species like many common weeds. Opinions vary about the ecological significance of this, but gene flow in itself is unlikely to cause a major ecological disaster in the UK. Concern is rightly expressed, however, at unintended transfer of engineered insect resistance traits from imported US GM maize to some of the original ‘landrace’ varieties of maize in Mexico, and the accumulation of several gene constructs in one oil seed rape crop in Canada. Under normal crop rotation practices the applications under consideration in the UK seem unlikely to produce so-called "superweeds", however.

Gene flow presents a potential societal problem, if a neighbouring organic farmer was growing a non-GM version of the same crop. Could GM and organically grown crops co-exist in Scotland? Pragmatically the main intended GM crop, oil seed rape, is perhaps less of a problem in Scotland because it is not much favoured among organic growers, but the principle is important. It poses an ethical dilemma. On the one hand, reasonable steps must be taken to ensure that organic growers can pursue their approach to agriculture without fear of losing their certification. On the other, the organic lobby does not have an unlimited right to set purity standards for its produce so stringently that GM farmers would be unable to go about their own business. A policy which recognises the reasonable rights of both is needed.

GM crops are now in extensive use in various parts of the world. Several developing countries like China, India and South Africa have introduced GM technology applications and a number of others have research projects for some of their indigenous crops. At a January 2003 EC conference, the emphasis was on assisting the profitability of small scale farmers, as opposed to the serving the ambitions of multi-national companies. There has been much controversy over the refusal of the Zambian government to accept GM maize as food aid in the current famine. The situation is complex. Claims by the president that the corn, widely used in the USA and Canada, was dangerous to human health were far from the truth. As such, GM maize would be valid short term food aid, but the form it was to be supplied in represented a serious cultural and environmental insensitivity on the part of the USA. The point is that once corn has been milled it can only be consumed as food, but, in the dire local situation, if intact corn were sent some would inevitably also be planted as seeds. This would mean that Zambian maize would become genetically modified by the back door. There has been widespread condemnation that the US government insisted the corn should be sold intact and not milled into flour.

SRT continues to play a role on an advisory committee of the Scottish Agricultural College and took part in a consultation on the future of UK agriculture at St George’s House Windsor Castle, led by Sir Donald Currie, chair of one of the key UK post-Foot and Mouth reports. In England, there seems wide support in both government and the farming community for the Currie recommendation that financial incentives must be made to ensure that the environmental aspects of agriculture play a much larger role, and that the future lies with more environmentally sustainable farming methods. It is of considerable concern therefore that such moves have not received anything like the expected support from the Scottish Executive, nor some sections of the farming community.

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5. Sustainable Health

The Johannesburg Summit drew much attention to the imbalances of health across the globe. A better balance is surely needed between investment in sophisticated and expensive medical technologies and the basic health and sanitation needs of the two-thirds world. Such a context raises questions about what the much heralded discoveries being made in the Human Genome Project should primarily be used for. SRT organised debates on this subject at the British Association’s science festival in Leicester and at the Edinburgh Science Festival. Ways are needed to ensure that commercial incentives to develop the most profitable lines of research do not so dominate priorities that less lucrative but wider human health needs are sidelined.

Dr Bruce attended the International Bioethics Committees of both UNESCO and the Council of Europe as an official observer, and is in discussion over ethical implications of a proposed database for genetic diseases in Scotland. He has also continued to play an important role in the cloning debate in the media and elsewhere. In September 2002, he addressed a meeting with UN delegates in New York, in support of a recent proposal from the French and German governments for a global ban on human reproductive cloning. Such a ban was first proposed by the Church of Scotland General Assembly in 1997.