18 February 2009

The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and Microsoft have signed a memorandum of understanding to work together on using ICT solutions to help address complex environmental challenges.

The signing took place during UNEP’s 25th session of the Governing Council and Global Ministerial Environment Forum on the theme ‘Globalisation and the Environment’, held at UNEP headquarters in Nairobi, Kenya, and attended by more than 100 environment ministers.

“We view our partnership with Microsoft as key to delivering solutions on a scalable level to a community of more than 190 nations and the UN system as a whole,” said Achim Steiner, UNEP executive director. “UNEP’s ability to mobilise information technology and the platforms for sharing environmental information is a precondition for working together as an international community to tackle environmental issues.”

We view our partnership with Microsoft as key to delivering solutions on a scalable level to a community of more than 190 nations and the UN system as a whole

Achim Steiner, UNEP  One major area of collaboration between UNEP and Microsoft is on Research4Life, which includes the Online Access to Research in the Environment (OARE) consortium. OARE includes an online library of more than 7,500 scientific journals, books and databases, made available by 130 publishers at low or no cost to developing countries. The idea is to provide scientists, practitioners and policy-makers in participating countries with the information they need to implement targeted programmes and make environmentally sound decisions.

UNEP and Microsoft are also developing knowledge platforms for enhanced information sharing and collaboration between environmental groups and governments. For example, the UNEP Global View for the Environment platform will use the Microsoft Single View Platform and Microsoft Virtual Earth to visually represent environment projects, statistics and polices.

Microsoft is also developing specialised applications that help measure and monitor environmental sustainability. For example, in collaboration with the William J Clinton Foundation, Microsoft is delivering a free tool called Project 2°, an emissions tracker for cities to measure and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

“If the world is to address the challenges of climate and environmental sustainability at scale, there will need to be many more partnerships between companies, governments and nongovernmental organisations,” said Rob Bernard, chief environmental strategist at Microsoft. “We are honoured to work with UNEP to help accelerate leveraging science and ICT to enable people around the globe to both manage and reduce their impact on the environment.”

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