Outdated economic priorities have focused on short-term exploitation of the world's resources. The plan addresses the loss of natural capital and reliance on fossil fuels as the underlying cause of the financial, fuel, and food crisis of 2008.

"We are pushing, if not pushing past, the limits of what the planet can sustain," says Achim Steiner, UN Environmental Programme's Executive Director. "If we go on as we are today's crisis will seem mild indeed compared to the crises of tomorrow".

The European Commission and the German and Norwegian governments are already funding the 'Global Green New Deal' initiative, spearheaded by the UNEP. UNEP is proposing a two-year, $4 million study of these ideas.