 The second is the growing impact on human beings and the ecosystems, of the physical, biological, and atmospheric degradation of our world, with consequences manifested in a sporadic manner through droughts (and consequent desertification), floods, cyclones, climatic changes and the threats of irreversible pollution.The programs advocated at the world Conferences of Rio de Janeiro in 1992 and Johannesburg in 2002 for dealing with such threats, already insufficient solutions in relation to the risks, are afterwards ignored or misinterpreted.The third reason for alarm is the widening gulf between rich and poor, exemplified by the fact that more than two-thirds of the world's population today are deprived of their political, economic and cultural human rights, in contradiction with the promises that have been formulated by the international community since the adoption of the legal instruments drafted by the United Nations.