International community

This archive collects stories in which the international community — nations, multilateral bodies, and coalitions acting collectively — plays a central role in driving positive change. Coverage spans diplomacy, global agreements, humanitarian efforts, and cross-border cooperation that produce measurable progress.

Waves at sunset, for article on high seas treaty

Seventy-plus nations sign historic high seas treaty

By / / Good News For Humankind

Ocean protection just took a huge leap forward: more than 76 countries and the European Union signed the High Seas Treaty on its very first day open for signatures at the U.N. General Assembly. The agreement creates the first-ever legal framework to establish protected areas across international waters, which cover two-thirds of the planet yet remain almost entirely unguarded. It also requires that benefits from marine genetic resources — think pharmaceuticals drawn from deep-sea life — be shared fairly with nations in the Global South. Once 60 countries ratify, the treaty takes effect, opening the door to meeting the global goal of protecting 30% of the oceans by 2030 and giving marine life a fighting chance.

Visualisation of the Covid-19 virus, for article on COVID-19 global health emergency

World Health Organization ends global health emergency declaration for COVID-19

By / / Good News For Humankind

The WHO formally ended its COVID-19 global health emergency on May 5, 2023, more than three years after the designation first triggered a worldwide response. Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus pointed to over a year of declining transmission and deaths as the reason most countries can finally return to pre-pandemic rhythms. He didn’t gloss over the loss — nearly 7 million deaths were officially reported, with the true toll likely closer to 20 million — but he credited vaccines, scientific cooperation, and health infrastructure built during the crisis for bending the curve. The closing of this chapter offers a rare pause to honor what collective action can achieve, and a reminder to protect the systems we’ll need before the next crisis arrives.

Blur of traffic lights in front of city skyline, for article on global EV sales

EVs to capture one-sixth of global market in 2023 amid record growth

By / / Good News For Humankind

Electric vehicles are on track to hit 14 million global sales in 2023, up from 10 million the year before — a jump that has analysts revising their forecasts upward yet again. The International Energy Agency now expects EVs to make up 35 percent of new car sales worldwide by 2030, a sharp leap from the 21 percent it predicted just one year earlier. The shift is showing up in unexpected places too: in India, more than half of all three-wheeled vehicles registered last year were electric, hinting at a faster, leapfrog path through the Global South. With oil demand now projected to peak as early as 2025, the economic logic of the transition is finally pointing the same direction as the climate logic.

Offshore wind turbines in the North Sea at dusk for an article about wind power in the U.K., for article on wind energy capacity

Global wind energy to surpass 1 terawatt milestone by end of 2023

By / / Good News For Humankind

Wind energy just hit a historic milestone: the world’s installed wind capacity has crossed one terawatt, equivalent to the combined output of roughly 500 large nuclear plants running at once. What took more than four decades to build is now expected to double within just eight years, according to Wood Mackenzie. Offshore wind is leading the surge, projected to grow sevenfold by 2032 and reach 30 countries, while emerging markets from Uzbekistan to North Africa are joining the boom. Behind the numbers are decades of engineers, policymakers, and workers steadily making turbines taller, cheaper, and more powerful. It’s a reminder that the clean energy transition, once dismissed as wishful thinking, is now a cornerstone of how the world keeps the lights on.

International waters are the areas shown in dark blue in this map, for article on High Seas Treaty

UN member states agree to landmark deal to protect life in international waters

By / / Good News For Humankind

For the first time, the world has a binding legal framework to protect life across the high seas — the vast international waters that cover roughly half of Earth’s surface and have long existed beyond the reach of environmental law. More than 190 countries agreed to the deal, which creates a pathway to establish marine protected areas in waters that are currently almost entirely unguarded. The ocean absorbs carbon, produces oxygen, and sustains biodiversity we’re only beginning to understand. This treaty shows that even the hardest global problems can bend toward cooperation.\n\n*Word count: 84*

Aerial view of Shanghai traffic, for article on global EV sales

10% of global car sales were electric in 2022 for first time ever

By / / Good News For Humankind

Electric vehicles crossed a quiet but enormous threshold in 2022, making up one in every ten new cars sold worldwide for the first time. Roughly 7.8 million fully electric vehicles found buyers that year, even as overall car sales slipped. China led the charge, with EVs accounting for nearly a fifth of new cars sold there, while Europe wasn’t far behind at 11%. Behind the numbers is a deeper shift: battery prices have fallen dramatically over the past decade, and major automakers are doubling their EV output even as their broader sales decline. Ten percent is the moment a technology stops being niche and starts reshaping an industry — a hopeful signal for the global push toward cleaner transport.

Wind turbines in a field, for article on clean energy investment

Global investment in clean energy matches that in fossil fuels for the first time ever in 2022

By / / Good News For Humankind

Clean energy investment hit $1.1 trillion globally in 2022, matching every dollar spent on fossil fuels for the first time ever. Electric vehicles led the charge, with spending jumping 54 percent in a single year to $466 billion. Wind, solar, batteries, and heat pumps all set records too — this wasn’t a fluke driven by one hot sector, but money moving across the whole clean economy. China poured in nearly half the total, sparking a kind of race that tends to push costs down for everyone. Parity isn’t the finish line — the world still needs to roughly quadruple this pace to hit net zero by 2050 — but it’s the moment the global energy story quietly flipped.

Frog, for article on 30x30 biodiversity deal

In historic deal, nearly 200 countries agree to protect 30% of land and sea to protect biodiversity

By / / Good News For Humankind

Nearly 200 countries just agreed to protect 30 percent of the planet’s land and oceans by 2030 — a leap from the 16 percent of land and 8 percent of seas currently safeguarded. The deal, struck in the early hours of a December morning in Montreal, also commits wealthy nations to send $30 billion a year to developing countries for nature protection. Crucially, Indigenous communities — who steward an estimated 80 percent of the world’s remaining biodiversity — won language protecting their land rights and traditional knowledge in how these areas are governed. Past pledges have faltered, and enforcement remains the open question. But for a world losing species at rates unseen since the dinosaurs, having nearly every nation in one room agreeing to reverse course is a milestone worth marking.