Sustainable Development for a Stable Future - Essay Example

Sustainable Development for a Stable Future Sustainable Development for a Stable Future In the last decade or so, the environmental concerns of what was once a clear minority group of people have spread to a larger part of the human population and fact become manifested into government legislation in a move to conserve the earth. The leaders of the movement have claimed human responsibility for a rise in natural disasters like hurricanes and floods, but also in factors like pollution, degradation of natural habitats and health issues all over the world. Despite irrefutable evidence that human society is having a negative effect on the environment, people are continuing with the causal behaviour because they see no alternative and do not wish to tear down society as they know it. The only solution, it seems, for putting a stop to environmentally degrading practises is for businesses and organisations to make fundamental changes in how they are put together and operated. When new businesses come into existence, it is largely under the principles of established businesses and therefore unsustainable and environmentally harmful ideals are fostered at the initial period. If attitudes were to change at the fundamental structures of business, people could set up organisations that nurtured and conserved the environment instead of using it up for profit. The former is what has been termed sustainable development. The idea has been difficult to promote to society, since it seems to involve a complete change of ideals when it comes to business and daily life; regardless of this hesitation, can sustainable development be the way towards a healthy environmental future world wide As pointed out in Conformity and Conflict, Easter Island has been shown as a microcosm of the entire world; resources used up completely and the human society made impossible and then extinct (Spradley et al 2000 pp.118-126). The difference is glaringly obvious: the inhabitants of earth have no viable options when it comes to relocating, whereas the Easter Islanders were able to abandon the island and inhabit outlying lands. Diamond explains how the society of Easter Island was built up quickly and then brought to an almost immediate halt as the people living there used up virtually every resource that was available to them. Where the island had been rich in plant and animal life when humans initially settled there, a mere few hundred years of unsustainable development left the rich lands barren of all life sustaining resources and now sits bare with the skeleton of human society for all to witness. How does this factor into today's society Diamond explains that Easter Island can be used as an example to the rest of the world because the people there acted in exactly the same way as we are now, all over the world: they did not respect the balance of life and overstepped their boundaries as one species and one small part of an ecosystem. Easter Islanders will have noticed their food and other natural supplies dwindling, however they certainly didn't manage to rectify the situation in time for their own survival. The ethnographer notes that these isolated Polynesians "grew bananas, taro, sweet potatoes, sugarcane, and paper mulberry" while their only domesticated animal being the chicken (Ibid.). Extensive use of fishing hooks, Polynesian style tools and above all their amazing stone statues and carvings goes to show that the island must have supported several thousand inhabitants at its peak. Diamond asked, "what happened to those settlers" Linguists and archaeologists are in agreement that the society flourished from around A.D. 400 to after the 1500's, after the resources had run out. Archaeologists have found that during the prosperous years of the Easter Island culture, sustainable development was not on the agenda despite the fact that the society was obviously structured and quite complex and capable of many things. For the erection of the tell tale Easter Island stones, researchers estimate the greatest population of the island at anywhere from 7000 to an impressive 20 000. As well as their various crops, Easter Islanders relied on the various land birds and small mammals that covered the island; these are all but gone from the now barren landscape that hosts mainly grasses and small shrubs. Archaeological evidence shows the presence of such edible animals, yet upon discovery by explorers in the latter half of the second millennium the island held host to no such luxuries; as a result the population dwindled. This, as researchers have pointed out, can certainly be taken as a warning for the entire world. Easter Islanders might have been prosperous for a time, but an ignorance of their perilous situation meant that in the end, they were doomed to fall victim to their own misuse of natural resources. Every one of us, no matter how disconnected from nature itself, does rely on such natural resources: even packaged foods were once grown in somebody's field or raised on a ranch or chicken coop. In fact, it is this feeling of disconnection with our food that might be the fundamental error of most societies of the world today, leading us down exactly the same path as our Easter Island kin. In the ruins of what was once the Soviet Union, we can see more effects of unsustainable human development. De Blij and Muller explain how the rapid technological and industrial advancement of Soviet Union countries like the Ukraine were in fact just as degrading to the environment in many regions as it was to human standards of living in many others (De Blij and Muller 2002 p.101). Study of these industrial sites, like the coal mine beside the Ukraine's Mius River, show that the landscape has been polluted to an unorthodox degree; both the land and the water systems nearby have succumbed to mere uncleaned waste and chemical pollutants that have permanently changed the balance of the landscape. When the Soviet Union was expanding and boasting its political might, the rest of the world was unaware of how this fundamental economic change had really affected the land itself. Now, after the ideological iron curtain has been drawn back and we are allowed to see inside what was once a great and formidable Union, scientists and researchers are appalled by the conditions that ruling Soviet Union politicians allowed to be made common. Pollutants from mines and the many industrial factories throughout the redundant Union were not in fact the reason that the Soviet Union collapsed, however they are certainly a symptom of a purely unsustainable way of life. Now, years after the Soviet Union was brought down and this degrading form of industrialism has ceased (at least to the degree it once had been), environmentalists are still very concerned that although we as a species have plenty of examples from which to learn about the disasters of unsustainable development, we are not actively pursuing any other way of life. Like on Easter Island and within the Soviet Union, many societies on earth are insistent that they develop in other ways; with military might, economically, intellectually. The fact is that people have trouble grasping the real magnitude of the situation and instead are content to focus their energies on the introverted lives they understand much better than global threats. While society looks the other way, countries all over the world are contributing massively to global warming as their factories and vehicles emit carbon in high quantities. Meteorologists and other scientists strive to prove to the masses that this is indeed having an adverse effect on the weather of our planet; hurricanes and flooding statistics have risen and are expected to keep doing so because of carbon pollution and the gradual heating of the planet. Noted environmentalist David Suzuki has always been one of the first to speak up about the need for governments to take a firmer hand and cut down on such pollutants and environmental degradation related to businesses and industry, however he has also noticed the power of individual companies to make these necessary changes for a sustainable way of life. Suzuki says that what people tend to think of as necessary industries are some of the worst offenders when it comes to our environment: "building highways to allow cars to bring people closer together, dams and power plants to get them lights at night, housing tracts, convention centres and shopping malls to serve their needs - have also brought a lot of harm: global warming, habitat destruction, toxic waste and resource depletion" (Suzuki 2002 p.9). Suzuki, like most people, accepts the fact that without such technological advancements humankind would not enjoy the luxuries that it does today; he does not advocate the mindless continuation of such a way of life however. With the same scientific technologies and understanding that have allowed us to progress to such a level, is it not possible to keep these technologies that no one would willingly give up and change our societal infrastructure Many assume that within the framework of Capitalism that we are working under, such a change is not possible, however Suzuki has realised to his happy surprise that this is not the case. With a detailed synopsis of his travels around the world, the environmentalist noticed all the different ways in which various human societies were becoming self-sustaining and prosperous because of real, sustainable development. Suzuki relates the case of Judy Wicks, the owner and operator of a Philadelphia caf called the White Dog Caf. Wicks has started her business with sustainable ideals and is sure to use only the best of local and organic produce on her menu, shunning genetically modified strains of common plants. She knows that by using products like these, she is building her business on a stable foundation; organic and non-genetically modified food products are not adding to pollution and therefore are not making soil unusable or promoting use of more chemicals in pest control that is necessary with genetically modified produce. With these fundamental environmental ideals, Wicks and others like her are an active part of sustainable development within a society that appears on the outside to be doing very little in this vein. Aside from this basic business rule, she uses the White Dog Caf to host regular environmental talks with the public and her customers, plus the annual eco-tour that she says includes visits to sustainable farms, homes and other organisations in the area. She admits that although it is her intention to provide food that is healthy, tasty and environmentally sustainable, her customers aren't always aware of this agenda and they tend to turn up at lunchtime purely because of the well planned menu. Suzuki also marks the sustainable development occurring currently in India, although strangely it is a return to traditional farming techniques that this is the case. The last few decades have seen much Western influence in Indian affairs, and this is certainly the case when it comes to farming. Where the age old method of Indian terraced farming involved a complicated method of irrigation and cooperation with neighbouring farmers to achieve results, the Western method was to introduce genetically modified crops to those same ancient terraces because they believed it would deliver more end product for the same input. Unfortunately, this early use of genetically modified grains was not the success its creators or its implementers had hoped. While yields were indeed higher the first year, these shot down in successive years as the crops proved tasty to indigenous pests. To battle these pests, scientists were constantly changing the genetic formula of the grains, and where at first these seeds were meant to benefit the poor of India, farmers found that they could not afford the expensive modified grains that must be bought each and every planting season, since modified grains do not reproduce as do natural ones. After years of these modern methods, India is now finally returning to the traditional farming methods on its terraces, as farmers realise that this seemingly tedious method is more beneficial in the long term. The return to such methods is another example of sustainable development. Basically, scientists are correct when they point out how modern technologies and industry has made our world polluted and unsustainable. Unfortunately, it is clear that the average citizen has little means to change this system, and little direct motivation to do so either. Clearly, the responsibility and hope for sustainable development is in the hands of business owners, farmers, and everyone who is really in control of production, as the ideals they are built upon will be perpetuated in the future. These shrewd and environmentally aware people are able to reach financial success while happily failing to pollute and distress our delicately balanced planet. As always, the future of our society is in the hands of entrepreneurs, and because of this, sustainable development is the only real option for environmental health. References Spradley, J, and McCurdy, D, 2000, Conformity and Conflict, Pearson, Canada. De Blij, H, and Muller, P, 2002, Geography; Realms, Regions and Concepts, Wiley, USA. Suzuki, D, and Dressel, H, 2002, Good News for a Change, Greystone Books, Canada. Read More