The programme is designed for students who wish to gain the knowledge and skills to promote and manage sustainable development, focusing mainly on developing countries; sustainable development aims to provide innovative approaches that balance the need to utilise environmental resources against the obligation to maintain the quality of these resources for future generations; the programme provides a comprehensive coverage of the basic science needed to underpin the essential knowledge required to achieve this goal; the challenges associated with this are illustrated through real-life examples, which show that it is often necessary to find compromises between the environment and development; decisions relating to the environment and development therefore need to link an understanding of biophysical and social-economic sciences; students will acquire the skills to do this and would be able to apply these in their future professional lives; many components of the course consider the role of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGGsD) to deliver the needs of the world's poor; the programme has strong links to international development practices and outside organisations; the skills obtained during the programme would enable students to work for development agencies in the government and non-government sectors.