Nature strikes back: time to fix our economy
First the bushfires, now Coronavirus — is nature trying to tell us something?
Considering recent events, one might be forgiven for thinking that humans have been hit with a biblical plague in 2020. The year itself has a slightly apocalyptic ring to it, and judging by current ongoings, it’s beginning to feel a tad as though ‘the end is nigh’ as well. With talk of the dreaded COVID-19 strain of Coronavirus dominating headlines, it is almost as if another looming, existential threat has been temporarily abated from our memory.
Climate change has long been considered the biggest challenge to our status on this planet. Yet with all the growing awareness that has garnered around it – and in light of recent discussions on outbreaks of zoonotic disease — it would perhaps be somewhat ironic, albeit unlikely, were it to be a disease which ended up wiping us off the face of the planet instead.
A paranoid, tree-hugging, conspiracy theorist may be tempted to look at current events and declare ‘it’s happening!’ — that is, the point where nature ‘strikes’ back. After all, if the Earth were treated as a living entity, i.e. something akin to the Gaia hypothesis, it would not seem too farfetched to assume that the recent Australian bushfires, and now the Coronavirus, signified some form of planetary, karmic retribution.
In a type of tug-of-war between humans and our environment, what we’re now witnessing seems to be a perennial chain of exploitation of land and nature on one side, leading to extreme weather, frightening new animal-borne diseases, and mass extinction on the other. The common thread here being: humans dangerously tampering with their environment and increasing these risks.
One example is the recent bushfires in Australia. According to recent reports, the chances of these fires occurring were believed to have been raised by at least 30% due to climate change.
It also now appears as though the recent strain of Coronavirus may have spread due to humans’ meddling with nature. The virus is thought to have originated in bats and was then contracted by wild pangolins in China. Pangolins are thus thought to be the intermediate host of the virus, as the skin of these scaly mammals is commonly bought and sold to treat ailments in Chinese medicine.
Yet a lot of the rhetoric now, including from The UN, has shifted to how COVID-19 is affecting our economy rather than why or how humans made themselves susceptible to it in the first place. As a response to the pandemic, The UN has also now announced that they have decided to postpone any further climate change meetings until the end of April.
If ‘Mother Nature’ were capable of sending us a message with these recent disasters, we presently don’t seem capable, or interested enough, to receive it.
The only way to start fixing things, and reduce the chance of similar further disasters, is by changing our unsustainable economic and environmental practices. To do this we need to address not only our relationship with nature, but with an economy that detriments our environment in the name of exponential growth. Our climate, and our planet, ultimately depends on it.
Fossil Fuels
There has, as is now widely known, been a response to the climate crisis from the UN, which aims to keep rising temperatures below a net total increase of 2 degrees by the year 2050. Yet scientists project that many areas rich in vital oxygen and biodiversity, such as the amazon rainforest, may be long gone by the time we reach that year. Wildlife habitats are decreasing at a ‘significantly faster rate’ than was previously imagined, meaning events such as the recent bushfires in Australia could just be the start of things yet to come.
Clean energy is often cited as a way of saving our planet, with many countries now agreeing to promote and convert clean energy sources over the forthcoming decades. Though clean energy, as vital as it is, is not the only thing that is needed in order to prevent the ills of climate change.
This, quite simply, is because fossil fuels are not the sole contributor towards Co2 emissions. In fact, 30% of greenhouse gasses emerge from entirely different sources. These sources range from areas such as plastic production, to waste landfills, to deforestation. Industrial agriculture is also a significant contributor, with animal livestock thought to produce around 90 million tonnes of methane annually. The negative impact of agriculture also vitiates the quality of land, ceasing to produce ample habitats for neighbouring plants, insects, and other organisms.
Methane and nitrous oxide — both of which are produced in abundance by livestock — are believed to be significantly more toxic to the earth’s atmosphere than Co2. To illustrate this point, industrial agricultural farming has more impact on the environment than all forms of human transport put together, including cars, busses and even planes.
One positive amongst all this, is that carbon emissions dropped by 2% last year, as electricity companies now begin to distance themselves from coal-fired power plants. Yet, on the whole, this still only accounts for a small fraction of all greenhouse gasses, which are still steadily increasing.
The UN’s response
Concurrently with their climate aims for 2050, The UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) have set out to improve the welfare standards and prosperity of developing countries. Their definition of ‘Sustainable Development’, however, has remained ambiguous since the Brundtland commission first issued their report.
With their opaque emphasis on ‘sustainability’, and apathetic approach toward climate change, The UN have simply drawn their attention to the wrong areas. The key issue isn’t simply about abandoning the use of fossil fuels. Nor is it merely about forcing developing nations to conform to our Western notions of a proper economy. The aim should be halting the currently unsustainable approach to economic growth dictated by already developed nations; an approach which is, in the long-term, untenable.
Narrowing the scope to fossil fuels misses the real issue that needs addressing: the ideology behind our current economic policies.
The UN’s focus on lowering the use of fossil fuels has created a false sense of security, with the belief that if we convert to cleaner energy sources, then our current economic policies will suffice. This belief is misleading. To tackle the effects of climate change, The UN need to address the impact of agriculture, forestry, landfill disposals, and other greenhouse gas emitting sources, and how these areas are practiced under our current economic structure.
Unless these issues are addressed at The Climate Change Conference in Glasgow in later this year, we will continue to use nature’s resources to the Earth’s detriment; we will continue to contract strange diseases by tampering with indigenous species, and we will continue to see more and more events like the recent Australian bushfires.
The Economy and The Climate
One obstacle is the outright reluctance of businesses and nations to address the links between climate change and the nature of our economy. At the recent 2020 World Economic Forum in Davos, Generation Z-er and environmental starlet, Greta Thunberg, gave an impassioned speech to attendees about the state of our climate.
Thunberg’s speech highlighted the overwhelming consensus that climate change is a direct result of nations and businesses exertion of Earth’s natural resources, telling attendees from various sectors of corporate business:
‘Our house is still on fire — your inaction is fueling the flames by the hour’.
She was right. In accordance with our current economic policies, nations which promote industrial agriculture, or deplete habitats to make room for landfills, become wealthier nations. To continue the growth of these sectors is not only flawed, but fundamentally dangerous. By failing to take sufficient action now rather than later, we are only increasing the risk for catastrophe.
Geophysicist Brad Werner’s research demonstrates our current economic policies are a threat to sustainability, and changing our economic approach offers our best chance of preserving the planet.
Similarly, British climate specialist Kevin Anderson’s research has helped lay out a feasible approach to keeping global rising temperatures below the 2 degrees Celsius target which has been advocated by The UN. Worryingly, Anderson notes how The UN’s 2050 target is simply a politically based target that has “no scientific basis” and that any hopes of remaining within secure temperature levels are quickly depleting.
Essentially, what scientists such as Anderson and Werner’s research reveals, is that there is still a chance of avoiding a cataclysmic amount of damage to the planet, but not if we continue to prioritise economic growth above everything else.
Gross Domestic Product
It is believed that to have even half a chance of meeting the goal of preventing an excessive temperature increase, developed countries would have to begin lowering all greenhouse gas emissions by around 10% per annum starting from today. But decreasing emissions by 10% annually has been anomalous since coal mining began driving the economy during the industrial revolution. Alarmingly, drops above 1% per year have brought about uprisings or recessions.
In order to feasibly meet the targets of at least a deduction of 10% of greenhouse gas emissions per annum, industrialised nations need to focus on steadily de-developing rather than placing all their emphasis on continual growth. This would perhaps be achievable if policies such as Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth wasn’t considered an absolute economic priority.
The issue is that our current economy dictates GDP must increase at a level around, or higher than, 3% per annum, which is what is required for businesses and corporations to generate gross levels of profit. This means companies and businesses are constantly seeking to produce more products and, hence, more profit annually; every two decades production is expected to double and redouble again ad infinitum.
On a planet with only a fixed amount of resources available at its disposal, to believe a consistent rate of 3% growth per year is viable defies logic. Similarly, basing a nation’s economy and welfare around the infinite growth of markets is simply ludicrous. As a bemused George Monibot stated on the comedian Frankie Boyle’s show:
‘Since when was GDP a sensible measure of human welfare?’
Is it too late?
If we continue with ‘business as usual’, the kickback from nature is surely imminent, as we’re perhaps now beginning to see. It would be cruel, if not slightly foolish, to decry that nature has ‘plagued’ mankind, and that we’re now facing our comeuppance through recent events and outbreaks.
Nevertheless, we clearly need more than ever to devise an economy which is more sustainable, and beneficial, for both humans and our Earth. This means addressing both environmental and social factors in tandem. Tampering dangerously with wildlife regions, or increasing the risk of fires and extreme weather through excess emissions, is simply out of the question. Likewise, we cannot naively continue to subscribe to an economic system of unlimited growth, which contributes so heavily to climate change.
GDP growth has been often cited as a measure of human welfare and living standards. Yet despite this, it has ultimately failed at eradicating poverty. Rather than make the lives of people in developing nations any easier, it has forced them to compete in an increasingly changing market, and its’ byproducts have caused unwanted extreme weather and natural disasters which have destroyed their hometowns. GDP is simply not an accurate way of measuring welfare. On the contrary, gender, wealth, and ethnic inequalities have risen since we began measuring our economies and welfare by it. It therefore must be abolished as a means of measuring welfare and as a system for promoting economic and material growth.
The concept of interminable economic growth, endless supplies of fossil fuels, and an ever-malleable planet and wildlife habitat to exploit, now fails to resonate with younger generations seeking to preserve their futures rather than wallow in the mistakes of their ancestors’ past. We must create an economy, and a future, which not only benefits those who live within it, but also the environment which provides us with the resources to build such an economy. If ‘Mother Nature’ is still talking to us, it still might not be too late to start listening to her.
