MEDIA RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 7, 2007

The Future Starts This Week in Hamburg

Maude Barlow is one of the 50 councillors at the World Future Council taking place in Hamburg this week. (click on image for larger view)

In the future, the WFC will be able to draw on the expertise of the former President of the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, The Honourable Arthur N R Robinson. He has received the Parliamentarians for Global Action "Defender of Democracy Award", the Order of the Caribbean Community and was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. And in 2002 he was honoured with the Peace Leadership Award from the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation.

Joining Robinson as the latest in a long line of prominent figures to join the Council, are Prof Rae Kwon Chung, Director of the Environment and Sustainable Division of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific; Marie-Claire Cordonier Segger, Director of the Centre for International Sustainable Development Law; Mairead Corrigan-Maguire, Co-founder, The Peace People and Nobel Peace Prize Laureate; Jared Duval, National Director of the Sierra Student Coalition; the author Dr Riane Eisler, President of the Centre for Partnership Studies; Wes Jackson, Co-founder and President of The Land Institute; and Baroness Helena Kennedy, President of the School of Oriental and African Studies (London University) and Member of the House of Lords, UK.

The new councillors will meet with the founding members at the WFC Founding Congress, which begins with a celebratory launch at 10am on the 10th of May 2007 in the city hall, Hamburg, Germany. At the ceremony, Ole von Beust, the Mayor of Hamburg, will officially welcome the Council to the city. The initiators of the World Future Council and long term ATCA members and contributors, Jakob von Uexkull (founder of the Right Livelihood Award) and Herbert Girardet (author, environmental expert and film-maker), will outline the aims of the WFC, and also speaking about their involvement in the Council will be interim members of the WFC Executive Committee, Bianca Jagger and Beate Weber, the former Mayor of the City of Heidelberg.

The Council will then go into session until Sunday to set the course for the WFC's future work. The members of the World Future Council will present the results of the founding congress as well as the Hamburg Call to Action to the G8 and the EU at the main press conference at 11 a.m. on Sunday, 14th May.

The Aims of the World Future Council

The World Future Council is a strong new voice in the global arena, which draws on our shared human values to champion the rights of future generations, and working to ensure that humanity acts now to safeguard a sustainable future. Despite having the means to tackle many of the problems we face, the existing global system of governance has so far seemed incapable of addressing them, often failing to adopt available solutions.

Supported by an international staff, the WFC's 50 Councillors will propose ethical guidelines for national and international policies. Detailing how they will go about implementing the proposals, Jakob von Uexkull said the Council will help "introduce these into national parliaments via the e-Parliament, a global online network of democratically elected parliamentarians. Our first in a series of major ongoing campaigns will be on tackling global climate chaos."

Press Contact: Robert Turner
0049 40-3070 914-16 (office)
0049 173-73 20 788 (mobile)
0049 40-3070 914-14 (fax)
email: robert@worldfuturecouncil.org
www.worldfuturecouncil.org