Local communities and governments, environmental activists, civil society, and even private businesses are taking the lead in devising and implementing solutions to major environmental problems.

And they are beginning to put the world on a more sustainable path, says the 20th State of the World report, released in Washington last Thursday by WorldWatch Institute.

"What is often called the impossible revolution is already happening," said WorldWatch President Christopher Flavin. '"The question is whether we have the political will to scale up these efforts to the global level", where progress in recent years has been disappointing at best.

Last summer's World Summit for Sustainable Development (WSSD) in Johannesburg described in the report as ''something between a modest step sideways and a small step backwards'' was particularly dismaying due to major conflicts between developing countries and the industrialised world on financial and trade issues and doubts about the commitment of the US to multilateral institutions.

But even WSSD had its positive side: the participation of more than 8,000 non-governmental organisations (NGOs), most from poor countries, and hundreds of corporate and labour union leader a sign of growing "global issues networks", which can better address the scale and complexity of many problems with which traditional nation-states or governmental processes can no longer cope well.