Environmental Sustainability
(Note: This reflection paper was written in the fourth quarter of 2017 as part of an Integral Human Development course)
In this “age of acceleration”[1], environmental sustainability concerns have come to take on ever-increasing significance. Environmental sustainability involves handing over to coming generations “a stock of resources no less than we inherited”[2]. This responsibility should not be relegated to the background as we thrive towards achieving economic goals. The implication of continued degradation of the environment is that economic goals become harder to achieve as the earth progressively loses its ability to provide resources and its overall ability to sustain life.
According to the Center for Biological Diversity (2013), dozens of species become extinct every day. About 20,000 plant and animal species are at risk of extinction due to human activities that result in habitat loss and global warming[3]. The loss of these species is the loss of a vital part of the earth, a part that like other parts deserves a right to exist. It is also the loss of ecosystem services, medicinal values and other benefits these species provide. As members of the earth gifted with reason, humans have the responsibility to ensure that the finite resources of the earth are properly managed. Coming generations should not be deprived access to benefits earth provides because of our self-centeredness and lack of foresight. Meeting current needs without sacrificing the ability of future generations to meet their own needs requires conscientious thinking, balancing environmental and economic considerations of actions by individuals, organizations and countries.
Since every human action has an impact on the environment. Negative impacts should be mitigated by positive actions, such as carbon sequestration, which build resilience into earth’s system. Economic goals of increased production and rising per capita consumption should be updated with environmental considerations. Since the environment plays a supporting role in achieving economic goals through the provision of resources — such as fertile soils, minerals, water bodies, forests, there is the need to pay attention to the way we put pressure on the environment by curtailing population growth, minimizing use of resources, and using environment friendly options. These decisions are important on the micro-level as they are on the macro-level. Individuals, organizations and countries need to choose environment friendly options, commit to sustainable practices such as waste reduction, reuse, recycling, use of low carbon emitting technology options and so on.
As part of Corporate Social Responsibility and ethical leadership, organizations should ensure that they clean-up the wastes being generated by their business activities. More than 90 percent of the nation’s waters and fish are contaminated with pesticides. Toxic chemicals released into the environment increase cancer rates, cause reproductive problems and contribute to a wide range of other health problems[4]. Not only are plants and animals getting extinct, our lack of commitment to environmental stewardship and sustainability is putting us at risk of a fragile earth.
When resources are mismanaged and become scarce, struggle for available resources is inevitable. Scarcity and the struggle for existing resources have always been a leading cause of conflict and this remains till this day, as individuals fight to gain control over depleting resources and global commons. These conflicts lead to more scarcity as resources and regions become devastated by these conflicts, others become burdened by the influx of individuals fleeing these conflicts. The poorer and weaker individuals bear the brunt of the negative consequences of these wars as most lose their source of livelihoods and are displaced. In the last four decades, the size of lake Chad and its resources has continued to diminish due to environmental degradation and lack of coordination of the use of the lake by Cameroun, Chad, Niger and Nigeria, resulting into conflict between and among fishermen, pastoralists, farmers and sometimes state security agents, and the tendency for conflicts to degenerate into large scale intra-ethnic, intra-state and interstate conflicts[5].
To be pro-earth, is to be pro-poor, it’s to be pro-peace, it’s to be pro-development. It is to be pro-man. Our collective urgency of action is required to prevent further environmental degradation, resource conflicts and a future faced with the dilemma of less resources.
References
[1] Friedman T. L, Thank you for being late: An Optimist’s guide to thriving in an age of accelerations. Farrar, Stroux and Giroux. November, 2016
[2] World Commission in Environment and Development (WCED) (1987) Our Common Future: The Report of the World Commission on Environment and Development, Oxford University Press, Oxford
[3] http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/programs/environmental_health/
[4] Carvalho F. P., Pesticides, environment, and food safety. Food and Energy security. Volume 6, Issue 2, May 2017.
[5] Onuoha C. O., Environmental Degradation, Livelihood and Conflicts the Implications of the Diminishing Water Resources of Lake Chad for North-Eastern Nigeria. African Journal of Conflict Resolution. Vol 8, No 2 (2008)