PRESS RELEASE No 98/2011 23 September 2011 Rio+ 20: make-or-break moment for a new economic order, claim EESC and European Commission Rio+20 must rise to the challenge of paving the way for a new economic order, where sustainability and not just GDP is a key concept, argued the European Economic and Social Committee during a debate with Janez Potočnik, the EU Commissioner for the Environment, and Ricardo Neiva Tavares, Head of the Mission of Brazil to the EU. The Commissioner made it clear that the Rio+20 could not succeed without the constructive input of civil society. EESC president Staffan Nilsson assured the Commissioner that the Committee, as a representative of European organised civil society, was ready to take on this challenge. He reminded the Commissioner that the EESC would continue intense and wide-ranging dialogue with civil society in the EU and throughout the world concernng the...