A Coming Together of Interests

G.N. Cimarra, a director of Oilinvest (Netherlands) B.V., the holding company of TAMOIL, also addressed the Gathering. TAMOIL provided financial sponsorship for the Gathering. Mr. Cimarra's remarks were quite dramatic for an oil company executive.

"Humanity must recognize that the manner in which it lives today and the means by which it does so are not sustainable in their present form," said Mr. Cimarra. "If we wish to save ourselves the embarrassment of being found guilty of the irremediable damage our acts and/or negligence are causing to nature in general and to the forests in particular, we should take immediate action to change for the better the current course of events."


Symbol for the 1994 World Forestry Charter Gathering

Kerry Brown, the religious advisor to the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) International, saw the Gathering as especially significant for the way in which it brought together diverse personalities representing aristocratic, business, environmental and religious sectors of society.

"As has been said time and again, the environmental crisis is really a human crisis," said Ms. Brown, who attended the Gathering. "And that means it is one primarily of spiritual and ethical values.

"So we have to find a way of coming together as people," said Ms. Brown. "There has to be a dialog such as occurs at events like this, where you've got businesspeople, environmentalists and religious groups all coming together. That is really a great achievement."


OneCountry (e-mail: 1Country@BIC.Org) | Contents | 1994 Issues