With less than nine months to go before the Rio+20 conference, international momentum is building as a result of growing understanding of the need to re-think economies and reform an international system of governance that is falling short of what is required. On issues ranging from desertification to biodiversity loss, current responses and the institutions established to facilitate them are struggling to keep up with the magnitude and velocity of environmental, social and economic change. Governments, civil society and business are meeting under an agreed timetable to follow a road map to sharpen and shape their positions on Rio+20’s twin themes — the Green Economy in the context of sustainable development and poverty eradication and an institutional framework for sustainable development. October’s meeting of the desertification convention, for example, will include a focus on livelihoods in drylands and sustainable agriculture.