Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
Sachs asks the key question of environmental justice: 'Who has the advantages
and who the disadvantages in the use of nature?' (2004: 24). However, perhaps the
ground is beginning to shift. The Human Development Report (UNDP, 2013) docu-
mented unprecedented and sustained expansion of human capabilities in the global
South. In terms of pure economic output, the economies of Brazil, China and India
are roughly equal to the combined GDP of France, Germany, Canada, Italy, the
United Kingdom and the United States. There is now a growing middle class in the
global South with expanding incomes and consumer expectations. The corollary of
this development is that with income growth there has been an associated deterioration
of key environmental indicators such as carbon dioxide emissions, water and soil
quality and forest cover. However, a relatively new phenomenon has also emerged
which has implications for both equity and sustainability. Land grabbing is seen by
many as a new form of economic imperialism with the rich, both new and old,
including state enterprises, Russian oligarchs and Wall Street speculators, acquiring
land in poorer areas particularly in Africa, to secure their own future food security
and turn a neat profit effectively at the expense of poorer communities and the
natural flora and fauna of those areas (Pearce, 2013). Two million square kilometres
of land was secured between 2000 and 2010, commodity prices have increased and
although some commentators have suggested that such land purchases represent a
welcome modernization of agriculture in underdeveloped regions, international bodies
as diverse as Oxfam and the World Bank have been alarmed at human rights
violations, population displacements, biodiversity loss and other negative ecological
impacts. As the Human Development Report,
Sustainability and Equity
, stated:
Recent international initiatives seek to provide a regulatory framework to spread
out the benefits and balance opportunities with risks. The challenge is to imple-
ment multilevel institutional arrangements, including effective local participation,
to promote sustainability and equity in this major change in land use.
(UNDP, 2011: 39)
Summary
Human beings are creatures who necessarily interact with each other socially and
also with the wider environment on which they depend for virtually everything. The
ways in which human beings have acted and interacted has led to ecological damage,
social inequality and a large number of injustices, in addition to the cultural and
material wealth and well-being that has made many civilizations rich and productive.
This chapter has shown that sustainable development requires all humans to connect
the social with the environmental, to see where these connections are going at local,
regional, national and global levels, and act accordingly. Through using physical
and social networks, through harnessing the opportunities new media technologies
offer, a great number of positive things can be achieved to right many of the wrongs
that are evident in so many places. Sometimes it is clear that a simple and specific
activity can bring people together, which make this connection between the social
and the environment, such as can be seen in the growing of local food in Detroit
and elsewhere. Everyone needs to eat and addressing fundamental human needs
while respecting natural ecologies is a prerequisite for development that is both just
and sustainable.
