DR. PETROS KOSMASLECTURER

VARNA FREE UNIVERSITY

ACADEMIC YEAR 2010 - 2011

LECTURE 7

GLOBALIZATIONand

ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

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Sustainable Development

Sustainable development (SD) is a pattern of resource use that aims to meet human needs while preserving the environment so that these needs can be met not only in the present, but also for generations to come.

Ecologists have pointed to “The Limits to Growth”* and presented the alternative of a “steady state economy” in order to address environmental concerns.

*The Limits to Growth is a 1972 book modeling the consequences of a rapidly growing world population

and finite resource supplies, commissioned by the Club of Rome.

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Sustainable development does not focus solely on environmental issues.

In 1987, the United Nations released the Brundland Report, which defines sustainable development as “development which meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.”

Scope and definitions

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The United Nations 2005 World Summit Outcome Document refers to the "interdependent and mutually reinforcing pillars" of sustainable development as economic development, social development, and environmental protection.

World Summit Outcome Document

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Agenda 21

Agenda 21 is an action plan of the UN related to SD and was an outcome of the UN Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) held in Rio de Janerio, Brazil, in 1992.

It is a comprehensive blueprint of action to be taken globally, nationally and locally by organizations of the UN, governments, and major groups in every area in which humans directly affect the environment.

There are 40 chapters in the Agenda 21, divided into four main sections.

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Agenda 21

There are 40 chapters in the Agenda 21, divided into four main sections.

Section I: Social and Economic Dimensions which deals with combating poverty, changing consumption patterns, promoting health, change population and sustainable settlement

Section II: Conservation and Management of Resources for Development Includes atmospheric protection, combating deforestation, protecting fragile environments, conservation of biological diversity (biodiversity), and control of pollution.

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Agenda 21

Section III: Strengthening the Role of Major Groups Includes the roles of children and youth, women, NGOs, local authorities, business and workers.

Section IV: Means of Implementation Implementation includes science, technology transfer, education, international institutions and financial mechanisms.

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Agenda 21

The implementation of Agenda 21 was intended to involve action at international, national, regional and local levels. Some national and state governments have legislated or advised that local authorities take steps to implement the plan locally, as recommended in Chapter 28 of the document. Such programmes are often known as 'Local Agenda 21' or 'LA21'

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The UN Division for Sustainable Development

SD is an eclectic concept, as a wide array of views fall under its umbrella:

The concept has included notions of weak sustainability, strong sustainability and deep ecology.

Different conceptions also reveal a strong tension between ecocentrism and anthropocentrism.

SD mantra enjoins current generations to take a systems approach to growth and development and to manage natural, produced, and social capital for the welfare of their own and future generations.

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Sustainability Metrics and Indices

Sustainable development indicators (SDI) have the potential to turn the generic concept of sustainability into action

A) The "Daly Rules"

Renewable resources such as fish, soil, and groundwater must be used no faster than the rate at which they regenerate.

Nonrenewable resources such as minerals and fossil fuels must be used no faster than renewable substitutes for them can be put into place.

Pollution and wastes must be emitted no faster than natural systems can absorb them, recycle them, or render them harmless

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B) The Natural Step/System Conditions of Sustainability

In the natural step framework, a sustainable society is one which does not systematically increase concentrations of substances extracted from the Earth's crust, or substances produced by society; that does not degrade the environment and in which people have the capacity to meet their needs worldwide. 

Sustainability Metrics and Indices

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C) Ecological Footprint Analysis

Ecological Footprint  analysis, based on the biological concept of carrying capacity, is an estimate of the amount of land area a human population, given prevailing technology, would need if the current resource consumption and pollution by the population is matched by the sustainable (renewable) resource production and waste assimilation by such a land area. 

Sustainability Metrics and Indices

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D) Anthropologists Cultural Approach

Though sustainable development has become a concept that biologists and ecologists have measured from an eco-system point of view and that the business community has measured from a perspective of energy and resource efficiencies and consumption, the discipline of anthropology is itself founded on the concept of sustainability of human groups within ecological systems.

Sustainability Metrics and Indices

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E) Global Reporting Initiative

In 1997 the GRI was started as a multi-stakeholder process and independent institution whose mission has been "to develop and disseminate globally applicable Sustainability Reporting Guidelines". The GRI uses ecological footprint analysis and became independent in 2002. It is an official collaborating centre of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and during the tenure of Kofi Annan, it cooperated with the UN Secretary-General’s Global Compact.

Sustainability Metrics and Indices

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E) Energy, Emergy and Sustainability Index (SI)

 In 1997, systems ecologists published their formulation of a quantitative sustainability index (SI) as a ratio of the emergy  (spelled with an "m", i.e. “embodied energy", not simply "energy") yield ratio (EYR) to the environmental loading ratio (ELR). Also called the sustainability index the "Emergy Sustainability Index" (ESI), "an index that accounts for yield, renewability, and environmental load. It is the incremental emergy yield compared to the environmental load".

Sustainability Metrics and Indices

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F) Life Cycle Assessment

LCA is a "composite measure of sustainability." It analyses the environmental performance of products and services through all phases of their life cycle: extracting and processing raw materials; manufacturing, transportation and distribution; use, re-use, maintenance; recycling, and final disposal.

Sustainability Metrics and Indices

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F) The Stern Review on the Economics of Climate Change

This report, on the economics of global climate change, estimated that 1% of GDP will now need to be invested to save 20% of GDP, because of failures to date by most global market sectors to integrate sustainability in the metrics they have governed with.

Sustainability Metrics and Indices

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F) Sustainable Livelihoods Approach

Another application of the term sustainability has been in the Sustainable Livelihoods Approach. Key concepts include the Sustainable Livelihoods (SL) Framework, a holistic way of understanding livelihoods, the SL principles. A wide range of information resources on Sustainable Livelihoods Approaches can be found at Livelihoods http://www.livelihoods.org

Sustainability Metrics and Indices

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F) UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) Types of Sustainability

The FAO has identified considerations for technical cooperation that affect three types of sustainability:

1)Institutional sustainability. Can a strengthened institutional structure continue to deliver the results of technical cooperation to end users?

Sustainability Metrics and Indices

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F) UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) Types of Sustainability

The FAO has identified considerations for technical cooperation that affect three types of sustainability:

2) Economic and financial sustainability. Can the results of technical cooperation continue to yield an economic benefit after the technical cooperation is withdrawn? 

Sustainability Metrics and Indices

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F) UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) Types of Sustainability

The FAO has identified considerations for technical cooperation that affect three types of sustainability:

3) Ecological sustainability. Are the benefits to be generated by the technical cooperation likely to lead to a deterioration in the physical environment, thus indirectly contributing to a fall in production, or well-being of the groups targeted and their society?

Sustainability Metrics and Indices

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Environmental Sustainability

Consumption of renewable

resources

State of environment

Sustainability

More than nature's ability

to replenish

Environmental degradation

Not sustainable

Equal to nature's ability

to replenish

Environmental equilibrium

Steady state economy

Less than nature's ability

to replenish

Environmental renewal

Environmentally sustainable

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The notion of capital in Sustainable Development

The sustainable development debate is based on the assumption that societies need to manage three types of capital (economic, social, and natural).

Market failureIf the degradation of natural and social capital has such

important consequence the question arises why action is not taken more systematically to alleviate it.

The business case for sustainable developmentThe most broadly accepted criterion for corporate

sustainability constitutes a firm’s efficient use of natural capital.

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WHY Sustainability ?

Continued population growth

Continued pollution growth

Failure of conventional regulations

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World population is increasing to unprecedented levels

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Population growth and povertyPopulation growth and poverty

First Millennium - 25 millionSecond Millennium - 6.1 billionForecast to reach 9.3 billion by 2050!!!!!!!

•1.2 billon people live below the poverty line on less than one dollar a day.

•Almost 3 billion - or nearly half the world's people - survive on less than 2 dollars a day.

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Life Expectancy at Birth

Country Life expectancy at birth (years) 2001

Norway 78.7

Iceland 79.6

Sweden 79.9

Australia 79.0

Netherlands 78.2

Burundi 40.4

Mali 48.4

Burkina Faso 45.8

Niger 45.6

Sierra Leone 34.5Human Development Index 2003ECO-1010

At the same time, millions of people worldwide are struggling to meet their

basic needs. 1.3 billion people live in

absolute poverty, with incomes less than $1/day (World Bank)

841 million people in developing countries suffer from basic protein-energy malnutrition

(UN Food and Agriculture Organization)

Nearly 1 billion people either cannot work or are employed in jobs where they cannot support their family

(International Labor Organization)

11.7%

2.3%

1.9%

1.4%

Richest Fifth

Poorest Fifth

(UNDP, Human Development Report 1992)

82.7%

Distribution of Total World Income

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