Science, like government, tends to be compartmentalized into disciplines. A division of labor is useful because it allows for in-depth expertise and efficient action. The only problem is that the real world is not compartmentalized, and changes in population, development, and environment are interwoven. Over a short time horizon these intersectoral dependencies may not be very important, but over a long planning horizon it becomes imperative to address a country's future in a comprehensive interdisciplinary and interministerial manner.

This type of comprehensive analysis of long-term future options has been the explicit goal of this project, which combines more traditional descriptive analysis with interactive computer modeling. The project has been carried out in the context of a population-development-environment (PDE) framework of analysis, developed at IIASA over the past decade and applied to earlier case studies, with close substantive collaboration between IIASA and the national partner institution. Such collaboration between national and international experts, which lies at the heart of the PDE approach, also proved to be a highly successful strategy in this case.

This CD-ROM/Web site (www.iiasa.ac.at/Research/POP/pde/) is only one output from the project. It includes full computer models and other important documentation that allows the user to personally evaluate alternative strategies and scenarios of the country's sustainable future development. Major scientific books documenting the work in detail will soon be available.

It is our hope that these findings will be discussed in both academic and political circles at the national and international levels, and that this discussion may lead to closer collaboration among countries in the Southern African region on these vital longer-term challenges.