Representatives from more than 150 nations gathered in Rio de Janeiro the week of June 21 for Rio+20, also known as United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development. There's lots of talk. We've been hearing about the green economy, the business opportunities of including the environment in financial transactions, the need for technological innovation to overcome major ecological challenges, the financial mechanisms needed to spur innovation and proper corporate behaviour to move toward a sustainable future.
We heard it all before in 1992, when Agenda 21, a massive blueprint for a sustainable future, was adopted and soon after spurned by most rich nations because it cost too much (0.7 per cent of annual national GDP).
Once again, delegates have arrived with expense accounts and fancy hotel accommodations to discuss yet another statement, building on the failed statements of the past while the world confronts a biosphere even more severely damaged by millions of acres of destroyed forests, two billion more people, and atmospheric carbon concentrations nearing tipping-point levels. In 1992, 1,700 senior scientists from around the world and more than half of all Nobel prize winners alive at the time released a document called World Scientists' Warning to Humanity, which stated, "No more than one or a few decades remain before the chance to avert the threats we now confront will be lost and the prospects for humanity immeasurably diminished."
Despite the urgency of the plea, the international community has failed to respond adequately. Humans have reached, or perhaps exceeded critical tipping points in disrupting some of Earth's great cycles (carbon, nitrogen, water) and have torn at ecosystem and species diversity that are the key to cleansing and replenishing the atmosphere, water and soil.
Meanwhile, as in 1992, civil society represented by youth, indigenous people, the poor and disenfranchised, environmentalists, and social justice and peace activists are clamouring to be heard halfway across the city from Riocentro where official delegates are meeting. It's as if the two groups were from different planets. They appear to be incapable of speaking to or hearing each other. I remember Germany's father of renewable energy, the late economist and politician Hermann Scheer, saying that the obstacles to sustainability are not technological, economic or social but psychological. Here in Rio he is being proven correct. We see the world through lenses of values and beliefs that determine the way we act.
The official delegates at Riocentro operate from a worldview in which humans are at the centre of everything and the biosphere is a resource to be exploited as we wish, except now with more environmental responsibility. National boundaries and economic priorities, both of which are human constructs that can and should be changed, underlie and drive all the debates over the wording of the final documents. In contrast, the civil society attendees see that the biosphere is our home. It is the source of our atmosphere, water, food and soil. It is a complex web of life of which we are a part. These people argue that our actions must be predicated on the need to protect these sacred elements while working for a more equitable and just world. Sadly, delegates at Riocentro cannot possibly incorporate the demands of civil society because of this fundamental clash in values and perspective.
In all the political posturing and lobbying by corporations, there is simply no comprehension of what the real crisis is: We humans have become so numerous and technologically powerful, so impatiently demanding and servile to a destructive global economy built on a corporate agenda, that we are undermining the life support systems of Earth.
I'm in Rio as official babysitter for my daughter Severn, who galvanized a global audience through a YouTube posting of a speech she gave in Rio in 1992 when she was 12. Now, 20 years later, Severn is a mother and has returned to Rio to reprise her message. None of the major political leaders who attended the conference in 1992 (Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney, U.S. President George Bush Sr.) are here. In other words, politicians come, mouth grand words and sign watered-down documents and treaties, but are not around to take responsibility for their implementation.
Listen to Environment Minister Peter Kent's rationalization of Canada's outrageous attempts to monkey-wrench the entire process and you will hear a complete failure to comprehend the concerns of civil society. It's just blah, blah, blah, blah.
Andy Zaltzman: What We Have Learned This Week: Hosni Mubarak is a Natural-Born Opinion-Splitter
So, what we need to change is the economic system, then. Along with its values and norms. What can we have instead that would not be predatory and competitive and overexploit the planet?
Hmm.....what about a Resource Based Economy?
Of course, it is extremely difficult to imagine a world without money, intellectual property and no country borders. But this is to me the only thing that could change all this to something positive. Read more here: http://www.theresourcebasedeconomy.com/ and here: http://www.thevenusproject.com/
Instead they cast derogatory comments about anyone who won't fall in line.
Suzuki should study some dispute resolution principles and find a way to move forward if he is earnest.
Saying Suzuki needs to change his tune in the face of this astonishing hypocrisy is not even worth characterizing. It speaks for itself.
You can't do it and you won't cooperate with those who can so you theorize and spout off like Shakespeare.
What a dreadfully inadequate response.
Disgusted in BC and waiting for the NDP. Nationally they just bumped past the PCs. There's hope. Iggy's blowing the Liberal vote and Jack's death dealt a huge blow to Progressives. We have to get back in the game.
Or perhaps they'll just force us out of our high-and-dry, ordinary three-bedroomers at gunpoint. Who knows?
Ban Ki-moon calls to end hunger everywhere. His vision: a FutureWeWant without hunger; food and nutrition security for everyone.
The VISION is RESILIENT FOOD SYSTEMS AND THE HUMAN RIGHT TO FOOD FOR EVERYONE.
The MISSION:
to boost economic growth
to reduce poverty
to safeguard the environment
This will result in peace and stability according to Ban Ki-moon.
FIVE OBJECTIVES for Zero Hunger Challenge.
100% access to enough nutritious food to all people the whole year round.
Zero stunting of children due to inadequate nutrition; no more malnutrition in pregnancies and in childhood.
Sustainable Food Systems everywhere.
Opportunities for small-holder farmers, specially women who produced most of the world’s food to be empowered, to double production and income.
Zero Waste of food, cut losses of food after production, stop waste of food. Learn how to be a responsible consumer.
What is necessary for the World Wide Project are KeyResultAreas and PerformanceIndicators. What are the Key Result Areas and the Performance Indicators to measure success and failure of the Zero Hunger Challenge.
Can governments, business, civil society commit to the Vision. Put it into Action. Put money where your mouth is?
Media now take it's place for many what you don't know you don't care about?
I grew up with my nose in ponds and playing in quicksand perhaps what they miss is the access?
This from the Ryan Seacrest of the environmental protest world - famous for being famous.
Please stick with your CBC high school science shows and collecting money from American companies and leave the real serious environmental issues to those people who actually went to school and have environmental science degrees. Thank you
Few coming out of today's diploma mills can hold a candle to any of these men.
Poor David Suzuki, like Rodney Dangerfied , he just "can't get no respect"
It is time to create a plan designed by scientists to have the best outcome for the planet's energy future, in terms of creating the most energy with the least toxic side-effects. Then, invite those who are interested to sign on to implement it. Such a plan could include sections that would put a carbon tax on trade with any country that was not a signatory. This would kick-start action for countries that wish to take positive steps and encourage those who do not to reconsider their position.
No amount of concern or factual argument makes any impression at all. Harper's crew simply don't have what it takes to understand their own actions!
The childless shall inherit this earth.
By choice, because I care.
It’s a Brave New World, not that I read that book, for those who see it. If you want to call me, “obnoxious”, that’s your prerogative. But remember, equalization will come. All our fair share must be paid, forward. Didn’t see that movie either.