In order to inform environmental and development policy-making processes, UNEP keeps under review the state of the world environment. 

UNEP’s environmental assessments, such as the Vital Graphics series developed by GRID-Arendal, are fundamental communication initiatives that promote the interaction between science and the various stages of the policy and decision-making cycle. They reduce complexity but add value by summarizing, synthesizing and illustrating critical environmental issues. They also identify consensus by sorting out what is known and widely accepted from what is not known or not agreed. 

Vital Graphics packages are an ideal tool for mainstreaming environmental issues, in other words, for preaching to the ‘non-converted’.

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