Sustaining Environment
From Cradle to Cradle
For the past 30 years environment has been
the subject of a multitude of conferences, debates conventions,
seminars, declaration and protocols. Yet we seem to be getting
nowhere. The threat of global
warming, depletion of the ozone layer, contamination of fresh
water supplies, flood of toxic pollutants and declining biodiversity
is catastrophic. Action can not be delayed.
World Environment Foundation is launching
the Indian Sustainability Movement on 5th June followed by the
4th World Congress on Environment Management at Palampur from
7 - 9 June 2002 which aims to generate a mass movement for change
in life styles and reorganize patterns of production and consumption
that would mimic biological processes and result in zero waste.
An important prerequisite to sustainable
development is adoption of good governance practices based on
transparency, accountability, equity, integrity and responsibility.
The Theme of the Congress therefore is 'Sustainability Through
Good Governance'. My belief is that there are enough good people
in the world and sufficiently strong public opinion to generate
money to seed sustainable development strategies in developing
countries. The biggest stumbling block to improving environment
is poor governance. It is estimated that of the $ 33 billion
of international aid for environment and welfare only 18% reaches
the right people. In India itself, the government spends as
much as Rs. 30,000 crore a year on rural development and poverty
alleviation but only a small proportion of the same reaches
those who need it. We need to make the aid more accountable
and the process of disbarment more transparent.
Our governance systems are also responsible
for wasteful subsidies, which damage the environment without
helping the economic well being. Subsidies kill competition
and help only the inefficient. A recent study by the International
Institute for Sustainable Development estimates that global
society spends almost $ 1500 billion a year to subsidize activities
that cause significant environmental damage. These subsidies
foster in-efficiency through perpetuation of lock-in of old
technologies and prevent innovation.
Corruption is another serious impediment
for Sustainable Development. Tens of billions of dollars exchange
hands in graft and kickbacks worldwide. This results in production
of wrong goods and services and increasing the existing burden
of the poor who are at the receiving end in all such cases.
Good governance practices can ensure better market framework
conditions by encouraging freedom of competition. The public
policy should focus on the targets, the desired end results
rather than specifying the means of achieving the result. This
cripples creativity and inhibits businesses to use their innovative
ability to reach the target in a most cost-effective manner.
Governance structures should be such that they support the entrepreneurial
action, and risk-taking or innovation.
For sustainable development to happen we
need an explosion of eco-innovation. Eco-innovation is defined
as the outstanding implementation of ideas, which meet future
needs. We need to challenge, stimulate and harness the phenomenal
ingenuity and creativity of our people to conceive and deliver
products that require less material, are less energy intensive,
have less toxicity, and which can be reused, recycled and valourised
in a way that eliminates waste. Eco innovators imagine and implement
smarter, lighter, more sustainable means of providing service
while enhancing customer value. Eco innovation can make skillful
use of technology available today to match needs and wants more
closely at a substantially reduced environmental burden, thus,
helping us to meet not only factor four but factor ten improvements.
Business has to realize that the markets
of 21st century will be driven by the aspirations of sustainability.
Irresistible forces of population growth and indiscriminate
use of natural resources for ostentatious consumption have already
broken the fragility of our planetary systems. The only solution
lies in radical shift in our thinking. Incrementalism is not
an option. We need a 180 degree shift from current industrial
paradigm and change to an economic order which moves from cradle
to cradle in a closed loop manner and completely eliminates
waste.
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