Living in a world where there is no guarantee of a safe tomorrow, where every breath we take is toxic and every morsel of food we eat is full of Pesticides, protecting and saving Mother Earth should be at the top of our to-do list. But unfortunately this is the least of our worries. We are at the tipping point, at the point where we cannot go back and correct our mistakes and if we delay any longer, it will be too late. There are questions we need to ask ourselves and governments from time to time: Are our governments doing enough to protect our greenery? Are they allocating enough money to save our environment? And if they are, is all the money being used legitimately? Better coordination between governments and adequate funding are needed to address this problem effectively. The United Nations Rio+20 summit on sustainable development that took place in Brazil in 2012, a prototype of unsuccessful collaboration between governments of different countries, was not very successful in its goal of sustainable development. development. it is one of many examples of the inability of different nations to decide on an agenda for sustainable development. The final negotiated conclusion “The Future We Want,” made up of paragraphs of declarations and affirmations, was really just a call for a better environment. Kumi Naidu, executive director of Greenpeace International, said the conference was “a failure of epic proportions” and further added that the statement itself was “the longest suicide note in history. The world is no better than it was a few centuries ago. The list of endangered species continues to grow and major environmental problems such as global warming are melting the polar ice caps, so in just a few years all the low-lying coastal cities... middle of paper... are killing millions of people right now. Investing the same amount to provide safe drinking water, sanitation and control water and air pollution will save countless lives. Putting pressure on our governments to act quickly to save our environment is our duty as responsible citizens of this planet. We need to focus on solving short-term problems that can save millions of people instead of depending on our governments to save our planet. All we can do is fix the small problems and hope that the big ones aren't as bad as we fear. Works Cited • Rio+20 and Kumi Naidu Retrieved December 14, 2013, from http://content.time. com/time/health/article/0,8599,2118058,00.html• Copenhagen Summit, Retrieved December 15, 2013 http://ieet.org/index.php/ieet/more/dvorsky20100110/• Copenhagen Failure Retrieved on 15 December 2013 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8426835.stm