The Foreign Service Journal, July-August 2017

estation are still further steps in the right direction. Along with the heightened interest of LDCs, USAID is now playing an ever bigger role in the environment. Now all projects with significant environ- mental effects are evaluated before approval. In 1971, we in EPA discussed with the State Department how we couldmake a cabal of the “good guy” agencies, including the Peace Corps, AID and EPA—the agencies whose mission is to help people. At that time we were unable to bring off this group effort, but now the new administration appears to be moving more suc- cessfully in this direction. One of the promising plans is to internationalize the new Toxic Substances Control Act by negotiating agreements onmarketing and testing overseas—this is necessary to prevent the growth of pollution havens for these poisons, places where they might be legal once they’re outlawed in the United States. Another forwardmotion is the effort to seek conservation of living marine resources to be agreed to under the Antarctic Treaty signed some years ago. Still another plus is the State Department’s own policy of drafting environmental impact-type statements on important treaties such as the Antarctic Convention and the Panama treaties. Barbara Blum, deputy administrator of EPA, reports proudly that the administration has sent its first “environmental” ambas- sador, Rodney Kennedy-Minot, to serve in Sweden. He was a noted conservationist, she explains, before he became a diplomat. Mrs. Blum also cited her intention to work with the State Depart- ment toward an increased awareness of environmental issues in U.S. embassies abroad. This is a task that began in 1971, and it is encouraging to see it continued. ... In summary, the “Decade of the Environment” has proved faithful to its name. Environmental issues are still enmeshed in our private and commercial life at home as well as our diplomatic and economic involvements abroad. We can see as a nation and as a species that ultimate, tidy control of our environment andman’s industrial effluvia is still being fought for vigorously, and with increasing effectiveness. n THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | JULY-AUGUST 2017 43