Global population growth and rapid urbanization demand enormous construction activities and building materials use. Current practices for the management of construction and structures are far from sustainable. Major facilitators for vital transformational change are identified as targeted improvements of codes and regulations, financial incentives together with research and education. Suggested operational instruments for design and integrity management of buildings and infrastructure include explicit consideration of circular economy, life cycle environmental impact assessments, biomimetics, increased use of advanced modelling and analysis methods as well as targeted utilization of new technologies, including data processing and storage technologies. Proposed by the Joint Committee on Structural Safety comprising experts from RILEM, IABSE, fib, CIB, ECCS, IASS, and joined by other organizations, GLOBE Consensus aims to sensitize the global community, including policy makers, industry leaders and decision makers, to the critical importance of the human-transformed environment for sustainable development at global and national levels. A significant step forward is the new fib Model Code for Concrete Structures, approved by the scientific community in 2023, which was developed as a unified design code for new and existing structures during their full life cycle. This document is the basis for the development of the next generation of codes and standards for the design of structural concrete worldwide.