A green or greedy economy? Sustainable development at risk

 

Tejo Wahyu Jatmiko, Jakarta | Wed, 06/13/2012 9:01 AM

 

In Rio de Janeiro 20 years ago, world leaders gathered in search of a solution to the Earth’s sustainability. As a result, a concept called “sustainable development” was established.

The model integrated economic and social development with environmental sustainability. The agreement was also provided with action plan Agenda 21, but unfortunately, to this very day the aspirations of the world have not transpired. Instead, they have worsened with the escalation of starvation, global economic crisis and deteriorating environmental management. People start to realize that economic development will intensify pressure on our planet.

Luckily, this month, world leaders will again regroup in Rio, under the name “Rio+20”. The solution offered is green economy and the institutionalization of sustainable development.

The Rio de Janeiro Earth Summit of 1992 succeeded in grounding important basics for international cooperation in sustainable development, such as polluter payments, common but differentiated responsibilities and the precautionary principle.

Yet the ambiguity within this commitment occurs in its persistence to deify unlimited development. On the one hand, it acknowledges the rights and roles of indigenous people, especially regarding biodiversity preservation. On the other, industrial countries and corporations are guaranteed intellectual property rights over seeds and genetic resources.

In practice, the Rio agreement and action plan barely work. Facts and figures show that earth sustainability remains at risk. The current extinction rate of plants and animals is 1,000 times faster than during the prehistoric age. Forests are vanishing, ocean resources draining and agricultural biodiversity failing due to modern industrial agriculture. Furthermore, irregular climate change aggravates the destruction of environment irrecoverably.

An extreme example could be seen in the fisheries sector. The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) predicts 70 percent of the world’s fisheries have been completely exploited, overexploited or significantly deleted. This started in the 1950s when large-scale fishery industries began to operate.

The failure of this sustainable development commitment à la Rio 1992 is first of all caused by a more powerful economic development agenda compared to its sustainable development counterparts, due to influences from developed countries and corporations. Too focused on its economic affairs, social and environmental pillars are often neglected. As a result, economic, environmental and social crises occur, as well as the accumulation of wealth/capital and the weakening of state functions.

The second cause of failure is a stronger economic agreement between countries that includes the rejection of the Rio principles. Third is the substantial influence from global economic institutions without equal transparency for the people. Fourth is a lack means of implementation (financial, technological and capacity building) that is an integral part of cooperation to achieving sustainable development and fifth is poor integration to the three pillars of sustainable development at every policy level.

The limelight falls on the world’s main economic actors, namely transnational corporations (TNCs). Data from 2006 shows that there were 78,000 corporations whose assets reached US$51 trillion, compared to the aggregate of global GDP, which merely reached $48.5 trillion. Consequently, poor countries invite transnational corporations for investment in the hope of improving their local economy, while TNCs are interested in more efficient production costs by reducing environmental and labor standards.

On the other hand, state roles have weakened due to global economic domination. Globalization has created non-state actors who are in fact neck-deep in degradation and environmental destruction, while there are no binding international laws in place.

Attempting to justify persisting deviated development, the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP), with support from experts, launched a book titled Towards A Green Economy: Pathways to Sustainable Development and Poverty Eradication (UNEP, 2011). This concept in particular will be one of the objectives of Rio+20.

According to UNEP, one of the foundations is that there is no dilemma between economic advancement and environmental sustainability. If it turns out that “concurrent crises of different kinds” (the climate crisis, the crisis in biodiversity, fuel, food and water, and finally the financial system and the entire economy) have always existed, it is in fact the result of the “misallocation of capital”.

During these two decades, such big capital is only allocated for land, fossil fuel, and financial assets with its derivatives. Only a little is allocated to renewable energy, energy efficiency, mass transportation, sustainable agriculture, environmental protection, and biodiversity as well as to conservation of land and water.

Another viewpoint within the concept is the description regarding “market failures”, which is defined as an acknowledgment of the market concept failure of building civilization. However, why do responses to this concept still tend to signify maximization of short-term profits?

In reality, there are still numerous notions to be explored further within the Green Economy concept: First, the Green Economy is directed to the earth’s conservation by offering value/price to biomass, biodiversity and ecosystem functions that are integrated as sellable items to the financial market.

Second, the fact that the capacity of existing political systems are very limited in controlling and restricting markets due to political pressure and corporate-originated finances.

Third, the Green Economy’s main targets are developing countries wealthy in biodiversity, and fourth, the main actors who will be invited to be the motors of the green economy are transnational corporations and international financial institutions, the behaviors of which have run counter to sustainable development.

Adjacent to that, it needs to be addressed that the biggest challenge in reducing poverty is not relentless growth, but how to achieve fair distribution of the Earth’s limited resources. It is truly impossible to reduce poverty when 1 percent of the population controls a half of the planet’s prosperity resources.

If the concept of the Green Economy is not significantly altered during discussions at Rio+20, a Greedy Economy, as opposed to a Green Economy, will emerge, which will inevitably make the Earth and its population suffer. We should have learned from our own experiences by now.

The writer is national coordinator of the Alliance for Prosperous Villages.

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