WorldwatchingSpring 2007 newsletter column

Worldwatching
By Frank Levering

With Wanda in New York last week, I had the tall order of filling in for her as an interviewer on our Simple Living show in Washington, where our crew paid a visit to Worldwatch Institute and its downtown offices on Massachusetts Avenue. It’s always a pleasure to visit the folks at Worldwatch – this is the third time in the past three years we’ve shot there. We’ve gotten to know well Gary Gardner, until recently Worldwatch’s Director of Research, and Research Associate Eric Assadorian, who also serves on our National Advisory Board. In addition to being unfailingly generous people, dedicated in their personal lives to simplicity, these are two of the best-informed and keenest analytical minds on global environmental issues you’ll find anywhere. Their work in Worldwatch’s annual State of the World report along with parallel publications Vital Signs and Worldwatch magazine is always authoritative and compelling. But I’d never met Worldwatch’s energetic president, Christopher Flavin.

Now that I have met him – and had the pleasure of interviewing him – I better understand why Worldwatch is arguably the planet’s single most respected and comprehensive source of information on the global environment. From the time in the early ‘80s when Chris Flavin came to Worldwatch as a young researcher, he’s set the bar high. I can remember reading his cogent pieces back in the early days of State of the World, when my activist Quaker father, Sam Levering, would buy each new State of the World by the boxload and hand out books as gifts to friends and acquaintances. Though Flavin still researches and writes, his primary job is keeping the Worldwatch ship afloat, which often involves partnering with other organizations, and always entails meeting financial obligations. Though by some measures Worldwatch is not a large ship, by others – the impact, for example, it has on individuals worldwide and even, in some cases, on governments – Worldwatch is a mighty boat in endangered waters.

Frank's column continued here....

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