Sustainable growth: It’s all about where we live and how we live
By Jessica Tinkler MSc Climate Change: Impacts, Adaptation and Mitigation Graduate (Ethical Team Intern Associate)
CREDIT: Photo by Larm rmah Unsplash.
The appearance of COVID-19 is the culmination of decades of environmental misuse and unsustainable livelihoods. Far from escaping the challenges fought throughout the 20th century, civilisation faces new and exacerbated threats of climate change, pandemics, and population growth. This World Population Day, we need to turn to our population challenges which cannot be overlooked any longer.
CREDIT: Photo by Live Studio Int Unsplash
Sustainable growth: It’s all about where we live and how we live
Celebratory messages and images seep into the media mix and tales of success stories pour from nations like China which have spent decades improving living standards for their populations, although this success is now overshadowed. These media tales share a cherry-picked selection of the realities of poverty worldwide, which many academics anticipate to rise in the coming years following the shocks of coronavirus and climate change. Philip Aston, Australian academic, blames so-called “misplaced triumphalism”, wasting precious time over the past decade which could have built global resilience to cope with the COVID-19 pandemic. COVID-19 has been another set back to the eradication of poverty, forcing 250million people to starvation and dashing hopes of the 2030 end to extreme poverty.
CREDIT: Photo by Clay Banks Unsplash
Discussing “population” cannot simply be an arbitrary conversation of demographic trends and changes but must scrutinise how people live today and the quality of life endured by many.
Where we live.
The disconnect between urban conglomerations and the environment on which they depend is becoming increasingly disparate. We anticipate 68% of the global population will live in urban areas by 2050. With this growth, which could be as many as 2.5 billion additional people, there will be an increased demand for energy, transportation, housing, water and food provisions. To avoid further catastrophic environmental degradation, urban policies must focus on sustainable urban growth, and crucially, build conjoint urban and rural agendas.
CREDIT: Photo by Buyi Huang Unsplash
How we live.
With nearly 8 billion people now inhabiting an increasingly overcrowded Earth, we are quickly reaching the carrying capacity of our planet, exploiting the resources which we require to sustain us. Advances in technology, maximising yields, increasing efficiencies and extending planetary boundaries has enabled us to optimise the current carrying capacity. But, our destructive nature of deforestation and degradation, overfishing, climate change, biodiversity loss and pollution are depleting the planet’s natural resources at a quicker rate than ever before. Few countries in the world still retain an ecological surplus, capable of sustainable utilisation and unsurprisingly most western countries have an ecological deficit.
CREDIT: Photo by Antoine- Giret
While the global population is growing exponentially, the real challenge is the relationship with the planet. It’s well known that reproduction rates decrease with economic development and therefore, population growth is reduced in developed nations. However, the environmental impact of each individual is far in excess of those in developing nations; a child born in America will have the same environmental impact as three children born in India. So perhaps, the real challenge is not the number of people on the planet but the means in which those people live.
CREDIT: Photo by Ryoji Iwata
So what can we do?
COVID-19 draws attention to the challenges of where and how we as a species are living with our planet and the rise in zoonotic diseases is just the symptom of decades of unsustainable growth, of wildlife exploitation, climate change and land degradation. We have a unique opportunity here to realign our development agendas to create a future living within our planetary boundaries.
Climate change is unfair, it’s unfair to nature, it’s unfair to the planet and it’s unfair to people. Some ecosystems are affected more severely than others, and in the same way, climate change will disproportionately impact certain regions and particular groups of people. Until now, race and climate change have rarely been linked, but with the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement inciting more conversations about race, the commonalities of the climate emergency and racism, and their solutions, are uncovered. The parallels between environmental challenges and racism could be perceived as tenuous, but they’re not.
Why are some people more affected by climate change than others?
Future climate projections show the
uneven distribution of hazards. While the global ambient temperature will
increase, the changes will be most significant in polar regions. Similarly, the
global hydrological cycle will be intensified and sea levels are rising
however, this will result in extreme flooding events in some cities like Mumbai, Accra, Jakarta and Bangkok, while others will
escape these challenges.
However, while the prevalence of
and exposure to these climate hazards
might increase, the vulnerability of
communities and therefore the impact of a hazard, is dependent on additional
composite factors. Fundamentally, the vulnerability
of a system is entirely dependent on the conditions of the system. Vulnerability, while a contentious
concept throughout climate change research, amalgamates the social and economic
background of a population in relation to a climate hazard. These non-climatic
factors could broadly include indicators such as poverty, access to resources
or livelihood diversity. The IPCC (2014) states, with
high confidence, that vulnerability also results from multidimensional
inequalities driven by uneven development. They clarify further that people who
are marginalised in any capacity (politically, culturally, socially etc) are more vulnerable to climate change.
CREDIT: Photo by Richard Laxa on Unsplash
However, as discussed,
vulnerability is a composite measure, and cannot be based on a singular factor.
More often, vulnerability is the result of compounding social pressures which
can include racial discrimination. These pressures can
lead to income and socioeconomic inequalities, exacerbating the impacts of
climate change. Marginalised groups therefore have the least means to adapt to
and prepare for climate change and are likely to live in areas more exposed to climate hazards.
What does justice have to do with climate change?
Climate justice is a relatively new concept which examines climate change through a human rights perspective, knowing that climate change has different outcomes for different groups of people. The impacts can differ based on gender, affluence, age and race. With the understanding that Black and Minority Ethnic (BAME) groups are marginalised in society, we can acknowledge the potential vulnerability of these groups to climate change, now and in the future.
CREDIT: Photo by Obi Onyeador on Unsplash
Already, the disproportionate impact of COVID-19 evidences the vulnerability of the BAME community to external forces; in the UK a black man is three times more likely to die with COVID-19 than their white counterpart. Just as, historically, environmental disasters impact BAME groups more significantly than others. Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans impoverished and displaced swathes of primarily black people, already living in precarious and exposed locations. The devastation for these communities was a result of their exposure but also a governmental oversight of their communities, with a lack of evacuation procedures, resilient infrastructure and flood defences for these groups. Racial oppression led to the elevated vulnerability of black Americans in New Orleans, where white communities were entitled to and supplied with safer conditions. This story is not unique to New Orleans, marginalisation consistently leads to vulnerability of BAME groups to climate change, but we can still change this.
CREDIT: Photo by Callum Shaw on Unsplash
The likes of Greta Thunberg and the “School Strike
for climate” movement have highlighted the intergenerational inequalities of
climate change, but when will there be a movement shining a light on the racial
inequalities? Racism is systemic and entrenches climate
vulnerability within communities. Until racism is tackled, and core injustices
addressed climate justice cannot be attained. We need to take this opportunity
to create a cohesive and inclusive climate change movement. In doing so, we can
simultaneously tackle the greatest inequalities and prejudices of society and
create resilient communities.
Next year, if extreme rainfall
causes flooding in both Miami and Dakar, which city will be given the most
attention? It’s time to start talking about racial justice for climate justice.
COVID-19: A clarion call to rebuild our cities greener and finally put nature centre stage.
By Jessica Tinkler MSc Climate Change: Impacts, Adaptation and Mitigation Graduate (Ethical Team Intern Associate)
CREDIT: Markus Spiske | UNSPLASH
Most of us know our
current relationship with the environment is broken. In fact, it compromises
our own long-term survival as a species. As governments and big business
continue to exploit the planets finite natural resources, we can only standby
and witness the acceleration of climate change and the deterioration of the environment.
This is the new public health emergency alongside the existing climate
emergency.
Recognising
the need to sustain Rainforest but also the crisis in our biologically
impoverished cities
This week
coincided with World Rainforest Day. Deforestation and the removal of natural
vegetation reduce the Earth’s capacity to sequester carbon and naturally
regulate the climate.
Deforestation
and land-use change, however, are not exclusive to the rainforests, as it is
often portrayed, but are also prevalent locally. As urban areas expand, natural
areas are cleared and paved for habitation, leaving biologically impoverished
cities. The environmental sphere of influence of urban areas extends beyond the
confines of a city, with parallel land use changes in rural areas for
agriculture and infrastructure. With demographic changes and population growth,
these spheres are swelling. With this, we not only reduce our ability to remove
carbon and pollutants from the atmosphere and ecosystems, but we inhibit our
natural environmental protections and increase our susceptibility to future
climate hazards, including flooding, droughts, urban heat island and weather
extremes.
Climate
change, poor urban planning, public health and nature are all inextricably
linked
It is clear COVID-19
has resulted from our failure to embrace long term environmental stewardship.
Indisputable evidence
is emerging, linking the environmental determinants of many diseases including
infectious diseases and zoonoses but also allergies and mental health
disorders, and so without a change in culture and behaviour, it is likely
further public health emergencies will emerge
in the future.
With half of the
global population residing in urban areas, an ever-increasing population, and
global net rural to urban migration, urban areas must become more resilient to
future natural hazards while safeguarding public health. Enveloping ecosystem
services, the essential benefits we obtain from the environment, into urban
planning will enable us to simultaneously reach our climate adaptation goals,
increase urban resilience and reduce the public health burden.
Time to
accelerate city-based solutions from green roofs, bioretention initiatives,
rainwater harvesting initiatives to integrated urban ecosystems.
“Green cities” must
incorporate nature into urban planning, conserving wild ecosystems where
possible or recreating natural areas where this is unfeasible. With nature at
the forefront of development initiatives, we can design living spaces which are
climate-resilient, with synergistic outcomes of improved air quality, clean
water systems, improved food production and biodiversity. These ecosystem
services are fundamental for human health and wellbeing both directly, and
indirectly in the long and short term. Post-COVID-19 we could see futuristic
green cities, abundant with green roofs and walls, bioretention initiatives
(vegetated areas created to extract contaminants and improve drainage during
extreme rainfall events), rainwater harvesting initiatives and urban
ecosystems.
Governments
are failing to deliver on their environmental election policy pledges
The Committee
on Climate Change (CCC) denounced the government in 2019 for failing to
address any aspect of climate change
sufficiently, and urban areas are no different. Unfulfilled “tree-pledges”,
insufficient at the outset, fail to integrate urban areas which urgently need
green spaces to reduce soil degradation, regenerate groundwater supplies and to
absorb the impacts of temperature extremes and rainfall throughout the year. In
spite of this, across England
the public have been offered the opportunity to decide where trees will be
planted, might these decisions incorporate the needs of urban areas?
Potentially, this could incite the development of “green cities” across the UK.
What we need now
– a consensus that we can harness this disruption to recalibrate our future
The
CCC advises the UK government to focus the COVID-19 recovery on creating a
cohesive and holistic green agenda, including investment in green
infrastructure, tree planting and ecosystem restoration. And so, in the wake of
COVID-19 we must force governments to adopt green energy policy and green
infrastructure planning to safeguard public health and create climate-resilient
living spaces without any delay.
By Jessica Tinkler MSc Climate Change: Impacts, Adaptation and Mitigation Graduate (Ethical Team Intern Associate)
CREDIT: Andrew Gook | Unsplash
In the first
week of “Emerging
Planet”, I eluded to the possibility of green infrastructure as an economic
recovery tool during COVID-19. Key components of urban areas for climate
mitigation and adaptation planning include decarbonisation of the energy
network but also creating resilient, adaptable cities through introducing green
urban planning and clean transport.
COVID-19 has presented society with a period of uncertainty. Looking forward, we must also anticipate and prepare for the insurmountable impacts of an uncertain future and a changing climate. To mitigate climate change and to maintain a global temperature rise of 1.5℃, the UN states that emissions must be cut by 7.6% every year for the next decade. World leaders must, therefore, focus on trying to sustain and increase the emission reductions observed during this lockdown.
CREDIT: Mircea Iancu | Pixabay
How can infrastructure and improving access to sustainable mobility help?
It is well
understood by economists that infrastructure investment can strengthen the
economy for a sustained period, creating vital jobs, to assist us through
economic hardships. The focus on stimulus packages to revitalise the economy
will almost certainly include infrastructure, but where investment will be
allocated is up for debate.
Throughout lockdown, emissions have sharply declined across the developed world, a glimmer of promise and potential for the green economy. As lockdown is lifted, and risks posed by public transport are made explicit, the workforce are taking to the roads. Despite weeks of reduced emissions, up to a quarter lower than usual, it is likely that emissions will escalate to unprecedented levels without intervention, surpassing the pre-pandemic rates.
CREDIT: Coen van den Broek | Unsplash
If governments choose to respond to this foreseen trend in emissions, it can be countered through:
Proposals to support “work from home” in the long term and “flexi-working”, automatically reducing traffic on the roads.
Through investments in walking and cycling infrastructure.
Requirements to socially distance have been a wake-up call that the UK has outdated roads and pavements which are unfit to support individuals who wish to cycle safely and those who choose to walk. In May, Transport Secretary Grant Shapps, released a £250M emergency fund to introduce “pop up” bike lanes and wider pavements across the country which have been well received. These pop-up lanes have been visible in major cities across the country and are a step towards cycle-friendly cities in the interim.
CREDIT: Swaminathan Jayaraman | Unsplash
The UK could seek to imitate the “supercycle” highways introduced by Copenhagen, Denmark. This is transforming urban planning and infrastructure development with climate change and public health at the forefront of design and investment. Recent socio-economic analyses have estimated that Copenhagen’s “superhighways” have provided an economic surplus of €765 million. The Danish government advocate for prioritisation of cycle infrastructure as it is a relatively inexpensive transportation mechanism to install and has innumerable economic benefits; reducing air pollution and decreasing healthcare costs for instance.
In the wake of COVID-19 cycle investment could reduce pressure for the NHS while reducing our emissions and improving the local environment.
In the UK,
promises and plans around cycling and walking before and during COVID-19, have
been the environmental “buzz” for both the Scottish Government and Westminster.
But whether these promises will materialise into tangible action or mere
tokenism, time will tell. Let’s hope these plans don’t fall to the same fate as
the afforestation
commitments.
Will COVID-19 be the last call to preserve our oceans? Introduction to World Oceans Day | Reanimated Oceans
By Jessica Tinkler MSc Climate Change: Impacts, Adaptation and Mitigation Graduate (Ethical Team Intern Associate)
CREDIT: Andrew Bain | UNSPLASH
This brief intermission in societal life has prompted the reinvigoration and reanimation of our oceans. In quick succession, images have poured from Venice of “nature’s comeback”, shoals of fish and seabirds have returned to the city. The endangered Spiny Seahorse has been sighted in a small enclave off the coast of Dorset in the largest recorded observation since 2008. Also, sensitive seagrass around the UK shows early signs of recovery, thanks to respite from marine traffic. Initial indications point to benefits for humpback whales as well which respond to quieter seas, devoid of tourists and fishing fleets. Marine scientists hope that the undisturbed breeding season, which has coincided with the lockdown, coupled with the implementation of additional restrictions on commercial whaling will result in population growth. These observations indicate some recovery of marine life, perhaps these early signs could lead us to some cautious optimism for the future.
CREDIT: Seyiram Kweku |UNSPLASH
COVID-19 and Human Activity
Fortunately for developed countries, resilient economies and strong social welfare systems have momentarily cushioned the economic hardship for most of their populations. However, this is not representative of the wider global community, many of whom reside in developing nations, not entitled to furlough schemes and are often reliant on subsistence livelihoods. This can result in the exploitation of local ecosystems, with people seeking their own social security by the only means accessible to them. Communities have turned to the forests and the ocean, increasing hunting and fishing to buffer the inevitable economic strain of the pandemic. This echoes patterns of natural resource destruction following the 2008 financial crash, which saw low-income communities globally exploiting natural resources to mitigate economic distress. These behaviour patterns are possible due to gaps in law enforcement’s ability to control exploitation allowing overfishing, deleterious fishing practices and the unlawful misuse of marine protected areas (MPAs).
CREDIT: Krisztian Tabori | UNSPLASH
The current pandemic has had a significant impact on maritime transport and tourism and the hospitality industry, with parallel challenges for fisheries. Fishing exports are projected to decline by one third due to the decrease in demand. Whilst this is problematic for the industry which has until now unsustainably exploited a third of the fish stocks worldwide; this hiatus could allow for the recovery of fish populations in the short to medium term. The economic value of fisheries is high for many countries but especially significant for the livelihoods of small-scale fishers who lack the adaptive capacity to find alternative means of living. This trade-off is not feasible for many, and poses questions about how oceans could be replenished sustainably for all?
CREDIT: Amelia Barklid | UNSPLASH
What now?
Our oceans are in turmoil, with everyone clamouring to take their piece. Fish stocks are plundered for consumption, coral reefs are devastated by ocean acidification, coastal areas are suffocated by eutrophication, fuel spills threaten fragile ecosystems and habitat destruction infringe upon sensitive areas. The emergence of Covid-19 has triggered outrage at the relationship that we, as humans, have with the environment. In the past, such crisis’ have brought forth environmental changes and the development of strategic conservation plans. The synergy between Covid-19 and the environment, both in its conception and potential recovery solutions, could establish effectual conservation strategies; protecting human health and the environment above and below the ocean. This is encouraged by Patricia Scotland, Secretary-General of The Commonwealth, who states:
“While the fallout from the pandemic has had a huge impact on our blue economies, it also presents a crucial opportunity to strategise on how to accelerate the transition towards more sustainable economic practices built on climate resilience and ocean sustainability”.
In
times of crisis, we see the interrelationship of people and the ocean, with 3
billion people reliant on the ocean for
food and the rest are dependent on the ocean for health, wellbeing and
livelihoods. Covid-19 might be the impetus we need to demand renewed marine
protections. Sustainable
management of the blue economy is essential to build resilience and key for the
preservation of our oceans.
Can we ensure further uptake of renewables and decarbonisation of the economy post-COVID -19?
By Jessica Tinkler MSc Climate Change: Impacts, Adaptation and Mitigation Graduate (Ethical Team Intern Associate)
CREDIT: Biel Morro -UNSPLASH
Covid-19
has called for drastic and unprecedented action from world leaders. It has
taken a herculean effort to suppress the devastating impact of coronavirus and
the challenge looks to persist long into the future. As lockdowns ease, this
presents an opportunity to align environmental and economic agendas to ensure
our own long-term survival.
The
pandemic has revealed that it is
possible to reduce emissions across polluting sectors when compelled. In the
UK, lower energy demand has enabled ‘greener supplies’ to govern the grid,
which might provide a flavour of a greener future if society demands it.
Although absolute lockdown cannot be sustained long term, are there lessons to take
from restrictions? And how could these insights inform sustainability and
environmental agendas in the coming years?
While
the coronavirus pandemic has dominated media headlines, for now, it is critical
to see how the environmental discourse will develop in a post-Covid world.
A Tool for Economic Recovery?
While
there are early signs of levelling or, in some cases, restoration, the pressure
to revive global economies is mounting and governments seek to stimulate
growth. Immediate responses to mediate the damage and absorb economic shocks
must reform into longer-term solutions. This might resemble infrastructure
investment or renewable
energy pledges.
Fossil
fuels seem a viable tool to instigate
economic recovery, the option to invest in high carbon energy to stimulate
growth is appealing. Australia, notorious for its high carbon energy mixture,
looks set to hold natural
gas at the heart of its Covid-19
recovery plan. Whether this will be reflective of wider recovery proposals
remains to be seen.
CREDIT: Nicholas Doherty: UNSPLASH
With
renewable energy production exceeding coal in the United
States for the first time and the United
Kingdom observing the first coal-free month
ever, we could be optimistic for the future of green energy. In spite of this
progress, however, the proportion of the global energy mix extracted from
renewable sources and the efficiency of energy systems will still fall short of
the 2030 targets of Sustainable
Development Goal 7 without drastic amendments. Covid-19
has interrupted the supply
chain of renewables, and consequently,
the generation of electricity from renewable sources has declined, although
less dramatically than its’ corrosive counterparts.
In
a unanimous endeavour Greenpeace, HSBC, Siemens, Asda and the National Grid are
among the organisations calling for the UK recovery
plan to stress the decarbonisation of
the economy. A recovery plan prioritising emission reductions will revive the
economy and protect jobs, they insist. Renewable energies are quickly becoming cost-effective sources of energy and therefore offer a window of
opportunity for the global economy in uncertain times. The UK should not
neglect or overlook the medium- and long-term goals of the country and,
instead, move environmental obligations to the forefront of the UK’s recovery
plan. Implementing progressive policies and prioritising low-cost renewables
will adapt markets and reflect a green economic revival. The EU has already pledged €750bn to a green recovery package, the
largest green stimulus package ever, the question is whether the UK and other
nations will follow suit.
On
this World Environment Day, we should be able to look optimistically to a
future with sustainable economic growth, powered by clean energy. World leaders
could and should use this pandemic to leap into a new era of green energy and
green living.
Two good reasons to eat fewer animals. Shifting to a flexitarian diet will help to prevent pandemics, fight climate change, and feed the world sustainably.
Deforestation for agriculture and livestock, Menabe, Madagascar. | Flickr/USAID. CC BY-NC 2.0.
Over the past year the world has witnessed an alarming succession of environmental disasters. Millions of hectares of forests have been incinerated in Amazonia and Australia. Floods have submerged whole cities like Venice and its historic and cultural heritage. An ever-increasing number of cetaceans, turtles and birds are dying in agony due to the ingestion of plastic. And most recently, the global Covid-19 pandemic reminds us that messing with our planet can have consequences that are deadly.
The past 60 years have been characterised by the increasingly frequent emergence of new ‘zoonoses,’ which are infectious diseases transmitted from animals to humans – as is most likely to have been the case with the coronavirus. The majority of these zoonoses (more than 150) were transmitted by wild animals, including Ebola (1976 in western Africa), HIV (identified in 1981 in the USA), SARS (2003 in China), and most recently Covid-19.
This may partly be due to climate change, which alters temperature and rainfall patterns in ways that favour disease carriers like mosquitoes. Melting glaciers may also release viruses that have been buried for thousands of years. But the rise in new zoonoses is primarily caused by the ways in which we are pushing into, and extracting resources from, the few remaining pristine ecosystems left on the planet.
When the Amazonian rainforest is burned to obtain cheap land for cattle ranching, or African territories are cleared to extract timber and minerals like coltan for electronic devices, or uncharted landscapes are penetrated to hunt exotic animals and sell their meat, skins, ivory, and body parts for presumed medicinal uses, humans come into contact with previously‑isolated populations of wild animals that host hundreds of thousands of viruses and bacteria to which we’ve never been exposed.
These microorganisms aren’t new – viruses have been on planet earth for more than three billion years – but our interactions with them are quite recent. This explains why the majority of new infectious epidemics are linked to deforestation, which creates novel rural landscapes where wild animals and humans intermingle, and which also facilitates the entry of illegal hunters into pristine ecosystems.
Certain species of bats and rodents prosper in these modified landscapes, and due to their high numbers and tolerant immune systems these animals act as ‘reservoir’ species that host viruses asymptomatically. Once these viruses enter the human body they can be lethal. Many viruses also make use of an ‘intermediate vector’ through which they can evolve and transit from reservoir species to humans.
For example, insufficiently-cooked meat from wild animals is one of Ebola’s main vectors, where the animals involved were probably infected by eating fruits that were partly consumed by bats that host the virus. The Nipah epidemic in Malaysia in 1998 broke out when a large intensive pig farm was established together with fruit orchards at the edge of a forest, with the virus transmitted first from bat to pig through fruit contaminated with the bat’s saliva and urine, and then from pig to human through direct contact with sick pigs or their contaminated tissues.
Thus, as long as we keep encroaching into the last uncontaminated ecosystems on earth to extract resources, new infectious diseases will continue to emerge. As explained by Alanna Shaikh, an expert in global public health, even if every country in the world was able to develop effective protocols to contain new disease outbreaks by identifying new viruses as soon as they emerge, immediately treating infected people, and sharing all the necessary information so that other countries can be prepared, new viral disease outbreaks will be inevitable so long as we continue to abuse our planet.
The sharing of diseases between animals and humans reminds us of something fundamental: we are animals too, and as such form an integral part of nature. The only way to mitigate environmental disasters is to learn to accept and respect this basic truth.
The causes of ecosystem disruption are several, but they are all linked to the overconsumption of natural resources. One form of consumption in particular lies at the root of both the increasing risk of zoonotic pandemics and global warming: the consumption of animal‑sourced foods. As is well known, climate change is caused by greenhouse gas emissions, especially from electricity and heat production (which account for 25% of the total); deforestation, crop cultivation and livestock ranching (24%); industrial production (21%), and transportation (14%).
In order to curb emissions and mitigate climate change, governments tend to focus on the energy and transport sectors, but the second of these areas – the global food system – is also key, especially livestock production. The farming of poultry, pigs, cattle, goats and other livestock is responsible for between 72% and 78% of agricultural food-related greenhouse gas emissions. This is due to the fact that livestock is the world’s largest user of land and water resources, and also to cattle gut fermentation (which produces methane), and manure-related gas emissions.
With its high requirements for land, water and feed, livestock production is also one of the main causes of the habitat destruction that brings humans into increasing contact with wild animals. Since the expansion of livestock and feed production occurs predominantly in tropical countries, the risk of new zoonoses is also concentrated in tropical forests which are characterised by high mammal species diversity, and which are undergoing land conversion for crop and livestock production. Moreover, due to their high density and low genetic diversity, intensive livestock farms can also act as amplifiers for the transmission of new pathogens.
There is a growing consensus among the scientific community that greenhouse gas emissions cannot be sufficiently mitigated without a radical reduction in the consumption of animal‑based foods. The Oxford Martin Programme on the Future of Food and the Special Report on Climate Change and Land of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) both assert that the target of keeping global warming well below 2°C won’t be met without intensifying sustainable agriculture, reducing food loss and waste, and adopting diets that are low in animal-sourced protein.
A so called ‘flexitarian’ or ‘planetary health’ diet consists of large amounts of plant-based foods like vegetables, fruits, legumes, wholegrains, nuts and seeds, along with modest amounts of animal-based foods such as fish, poultry, eggs and dairy produce and very low amounts of red meat (i.e. beef, pork and lamb). A global shift to a flexitarian diet has the potential to reduce food‑related greenhouse gas emissions by 56% and feed more than nine billion people by 2050 in an environmentally-sustainable manner.
The EAT Lancet Commission on Food, Planet, Health in 2019 reached the same conclusions. In addition, the commission highlights how a plant‑based diet rich in fruits, vegetables, nuts, legumes and wholegrains , along with cutting unhealthy products like red meat, added sugars and highly processed foods, could prevent approximately 11 million deaths per year (or 19 – 24% of total adult deaths). High levels of consumption of red and processed meat are linked to chronic diseases such as diabetes, heart diseases and some cancers.
Therefore, in order to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and the risk of new epidemics, it’s crucial that each one of us begins to shift to a flexitarian diet as soon as possible, as well as purchasing more sustainably-produced food (like organic products) and eliminating food waste from our households.
The Covid-19 pandemic shows that each and every one of us is vulnerable to the consequences of environmental degradation. Therefore, we all share the responsibility to act in order to prevent land and water pollution, floods, drought, famine, and epidemics from becoming increasingly prevalent.
In evolutionary terms, what distinguishes humans from other animal species is not, as many suppose, the capacity to feel emotions or express oneself through technology and art. Other animal species share our capacity to feel fear, joy, pain and expectation, and to develop knowledge and transmit it to their offspring.
Rather, what distinguishes us from other animal species is our cerebral capacity to imagine something that doesn’t yet exist, and communicate it to the rest of our community in words and images so that we can turn abstract ideas into concrete action. But to do so requires that we activate this capacity.
We are already feeling the consequences of our inaction. Our children and grandchildren, and those human communities and non-human animals who lack the privilege of choice that’s available to many of us in wealthy societies, will have it much worse if we do nothing.
How product certification can win consumers’ hearts and minds
The age of restorative and regenerative brands is taking center stage. In an era of heightened environmental challenges and climate change in the daily news, there’s mounting evidence consumers are differentiating brands by their authenticity, values and sustainability credentials at an unprecedented rate.
Branding always has played a vital role in purchasing decisions. But what’s behind the label as we witness a cultural overhaul and the rise of “purpose-driven” brands?
Alongside this growing consumer consciousness and awareness, we’re witnessing the mainstreaming of certification, with the surge in certified products appearing in our weekly shopping baskets — from coffee in Lidl, chocolate in Asda to bananas in Aldi and Tesco. For example, in the United Kingdom, you’re spoiled for choice for where to buy your coffee from Rainforest Alliance Certified farms: from McDonald’s, Costa, EAT or POD.
Everyday consumers can make ethical purchasing decisions in their daily lives and vote with their wallets. Some would argue retailers exist only as curators of products and services and soon would stop stocking items that didn’t sell. Consumers, therefore, are holding ever-increasing power when it comes to “hearts and minds” issues based on what a brand is conveying.
According to the Edelman 2018 Earned Brand Report, “Brands are now being pushed beyond their classic business interests to become advocates for a better society.”
Today, opinions count, and as consumers evolve, they’re becoming increasingly educated and environmental savvy, thus certifiers also must evolve along with them to ensure radical transparency at the touch of a smart-phone button. According to the 2018 Edelman “Trust Barometer, The State of Trust in Business” report (PDF), 63 percent of respondents agreed that “A good reputation may get them to try a product — but unless they come to trust the company behind the product, they will soon stop buying it, regardless of its reputation.”
Part of the solution
The rise of sustainable products and services has allowed consumers to become part of the solution and not just the problem by being able to differentiate a brands sustainability values and credentials about its supply chain through its certification. This retail tipping point slowly has been taking place as both retailers and producers have sought to ensure product traceability as a necessity and commercial survival strategy.
However, this silent food retail revolution has been occurring in the background for some time, as most responsible brands have sought to measure the impact of their supply chain and ensure that they can identify where, how and when something has been produced to meet their environmental commitments.
In fact, companies are in a unique position to act as drivers of change and influence consumption habits. For better or worse, they profoundly affect our lives, and not just through our wallets. From Apple, Google, Amazon, Microsoft, Uber and McDonald’s to Facebook, major global corporations possess unparalleled scale, power, reach and influence with the potential to use their resources for good, and help ensure a fairer, safer and more equitable world for us all.
However, we really must rethink the terminology and now substitute the word “sustainability” with the word “responsibility” in business. In our “conversations for action,” the business of business is unequivocally humanity in an era of global climate change and other unprecedented environmental challenges ahead.
Hearts and minds
The clear drivers influencing shopping habits are the proliferation of product choices, making differentiation a hearts-and-minds issue, to breakthroughs in technological innovation at the farm level, enabling data collection, measurement and benchmarking against established metrics.
These drivers are contributing to the rise in purpose-driven brands. And because of the internet age, the provenance of a brand and its supply chain can be checked in seconds, which also adds a risk to an organization’s reputation simply overnight. In fact, a report by Deloitte shows that 87 percent of millennials believe that the success of a company should be measured by its social and environmental impact, as well as on its financial performance.
As millennials are the retail food shoppers of the future in a competitive retail environment, it would be natural to think that all brands eventually will embed supply chain transparency into their operations to maintain market share as much as they would want to “do the right thing.”
Fortunately, our food producers, farmers and food supply chains have become faster at disclosing their environmental and social data as a result of advances in digital technology and are helping to provide radical transparency. Alongside the evolution of sustainable packaging solutions, which are driving the public discourse, it is arguably almost second nature for consumers to make more enlightened purchasing decisions based on their products’ origins, production techniques, packaging, gender equality, carbon emissions and environmental considerations.
According to another recent report, “The New Sustainability: Regeneration” by advertising agency JWT, British consumers recently have mobilized and become highly concerned about single-use plastics, with 60 percent believing that products are overpackaged. In fact, many shoppers see familiar certifications as much a part of intrinsic packaging design as an ethical brand promise. This demonstrates that the brand is “doing their bit” across all these issues and is somewhere on the sustainability journey now that eco-consciousness has gone mainstream.
Supply chain insights
So how does one’s choice of morning coffee, tea, banana or chocolate really make a difference? Can certification provide the guarantees necessary? How do we communicate that sustainability is a journey and not an endpoint?
Certification is an important tool for making sectors more sustainable. It helps all the players to work towards unified standards: It sets the standards and provides independent verification against them.
Three key points about certification:
Certification can offer deep supply chain insights that are hard to achieve otherwise and a level of transparency that few other systems do.
Certification forms the basis of a fully scalable system that engages both farmers and companies along the supply chain, bringing them together with markets and civil society resulting in positive impacts.
It is most effective at catalyzing sustainable transformation when implemented within a larger context of collaboration between companies, NGOs, governments and others.
From a long-term perspective, certification helps ensure the future viability of farming and agriculture, which likely will confront increasing pressures from climate change and socio-economic factors. By applying good practices related to environmental management, worker health and safety, and farm productivity, certified farms are preparing to be able to deliver high-quality, sustainable produce in the future.
It’s never too late to build brand ethics into your marketing as sustainability has become synonymous with quality. It’s also clear that employees also want to work for purpose-driven brands. As polar explorer Robert Swan once said, “The greatest threat to our planet is the belief that someone else will save it.”
Institutions •
Comments Off on Ethical Team Joins PRCA
Ethical Team – Delivering ‘Purpose Beyond Profit’ is a boutique public relations and marketing consultancy able to create high-impact strategies around key moments based on deep insights, unique subject matter expertise and innovation. Focusing on key areas such as media relations, social media, cause and issue-based branding and marketing, corporate responsibility, non-profit marketing and corporate communications – the consultancy is positioned to help clients achieve both business and societal outcomes. A heart-led business.
Activism, Campaigning •
Comments Off on The glamorisation of toy weapons – counter-productive symbolism?
It’s quite disturbing this Christmas to witness our high streets glamorising weapons of violence in the lead up to the celebration of Christmas Day itself. A day, which is meant to symbolise peace, and goodwill to all men, and women. Especially post the Paris 2015 atrocities. In the advent of a heightened paranoia around terrorism repeating itself in some other unsuspecting town or city, you would hope that both retailers, and parents would show some sort of leadership around this issue. I was prompted to write this after recently seeing one high street retailer’s front window, stacked high with replica toy machine guns. Whilst most toy guns might bear little resemblance to the real McCoy, many are close identical replicas and, from a distance could prove quite threatening to a casual observer. With names like Shooting Play, Army Machine Gun and Rapid Firing Gun, are we not pretending that these toys are doing anything other than re-enacting death and destruction in a play format? Do these sorts of toys not reinforce and familiarise children with a destruction led, conflict narrative, normalising war and weapons, which is also regularly reinforced through popular entertainment, films, TV and video games?
Whilst gun culture in the UK is not remotely as prevalent as the US where there have been 294 mass shootings so far in 2015 we need to look at society and how our values are communicated as there appears to be no less promotion of guns and symbols of conflict in the retail arena, even though there’s a noticeable rise in knife and gun crime among the young in most urban environments. Certainly to cite the US again for decades, the most dangerous piece of machinery was an automobile. But now, it’s a gun.
It’s also interesting when ones does a search on Google for ‘children’s toy guns’ one finds an array of AK47’s, military assault and hand guns replicas popping up.
As the current programme on Channel 4 called “The Secret Life of 4, 5 and 6 Year Olds” shows. This age is arguably the most crucial period in a child’s development as they cross the threshold from family life into the social arena of school, and the tools of social interaction these children are learning can lay the foundations for the relationships they will form right across their adult lives.
Klaus Dodd’s, Professor of Geopolitics at Royal Holloway, University of London is examining the historical and contemporary play with Action Man over the last 40 years. He believes that parental concern with weapons, which also loomed large in previous decades, masks an even bigger issue now.
“There is a kind of anxiety that expresses itself through war toys about Britain and its relationship with militarism. We are a country addicted to war. We are a highly militarised society and I think children and the relationship to toys is one aspect of that broader debate about what Britain is and represents.”
A generation ago or two, it wouldn’t be unusual to see kids running around their neighbourhood wielding toy guns as they played cowboys or cops and robbers. Myself included. But as school shootings have become frighteningly commonplace, playing with toy guns doesn’t seem that innocent anymore?
Many schools around the world have even implemented zero tolerance policies on guns, and in some cases, have gone as far as suspending children for pointing their fingers in the shape of a gun and pretending to shoot another student. Therefore, understandably some people feel that playing with toy guns sends the wrong message, making light of a deadly weapon — or worse, that toy guns increase aggression in children.
Playing with a toy gun can also have painful and even deadly consequences. There have been several incidences that involved children being shot accidentally.
It’s easy to see violence and aggression in society as a whole and in the media, through TV, video and the cinema. And then one hears a sweet, innocent child saying ‘bang bang’ and ‘I killed you,’. It’s not surprising in today’s increasingly violent culture not to worry that he/she could grow up to be violent.
In the same way that we go to the gym to train our bodies, we need to feed our minds, and those of younger generations and our good citizens of tomorrow. We need to do this with the appropriate symbolism through accessories and toys that promote goodwill, harmony and creativity as an antidote to extremism, violence and destruction. And there is no greater time to instil these values in society, than now, at Christmas, through play.
