Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
7
Beyond the imperatives of
economic growth and 'business
as usual'
Aims
This chapter explores some key issues relating to modernity, capitalism and economic
growth, focusing on a range of arguments and opinions that see business and
development as both part of the problem and part of the solution. It will critically
consider the role of business in promoting sustainable development, addressing issues
relating to the financial valuation of nature, 'eco' or sustainability entrepreneurship,
corporate responsibility, localization and fair trade, growth and degrowth. A case
study of digital media companies, carbon footprints and corporate sustainability
ends the chapter.
The millennium ecosystem assessment
The demand for ecosystem services is now so great that trade-offs among services
have become the rule. A country can increase food supply by converting a forest
to agriculture, for example, but in so doing it decreases the supply of services
that may be of equal or greater importance, such as clean water, timber,
ecotourism destinations, or flood regulation and drought control. There are many
indications that human demands on ecosystems will grow still greater in the
coming decades. Current estimates of three billion more people and a quadrupling
of the world economy by 2050 imply a formidable increase in demand for and
consumption of biological and physical resources, as well as escalating impacts
on ecosystems and the services they provide.
(Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, 2005: 27)
Environmental scientists Gretchen Daily, Katherine Ellison and Walter Reid et al .
(Daily, 1997; Daily and Ellison, 2003; Reid et al ., 2006) have written extensively
about the dependence of the human economy on the planet's natural systems. In
1999/2000, Reid initiated the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MEA) - a massive
global study produced by 700 natural and social scientists and reviewed by 1,300
others from 95 countries. It examined the state of the Earth's natural resources, its
various ecosystems, and the 'services' these ecosystems provide in facilitating human
development and well-being. These services fall into four categories:
provisioning services such as food, water, timber and fibre;
regulating services that affect climate, floods, disease, wastes and water quality;
 
 
 
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