The environmental crisis is also an economic and social crisis. And we may not be prepared to face it, because we have kept our eyes shut for too long. This is the argument made in a report by the Ippr.
It was in the 1990s that Bill Nordhaus, a professor at Yale University, developed the first quantitative model capable of describing the effects of climate change on the economy (and vice versa). A quarter of a century later, his studies were awarded the most prestigious recognition they could aspire to, the 2018 Nobel Prize in Economics, yet it cannot be said that they won many converts. Even today, the conditions of the planet we live on are conspicuously absent from economists' sophisticated computational models. The Ippr (Institute for Public Policy Research), a progressive British think tank, has sought to fill this gap by publishing, in February, a report that cross-references data drawn from dozens of studies by universities, supranational organisations, governments and NGOs. The title chosen? "This is a crisis".
Mainstream political debates have failed to recognise that human impact on the environment has reached a critical stage, potentially undermining the conditions that make socioeconomic stability possible. Human-induced environmental changes are occurring at an unprecedented rate and scale, and the window of opportunity to avert catastrophic consequences for societies around the world is rapidly closing. These consequences include economic instability, large-scale forced migration, conflict, famine, and the potential collapse of social and economic systems. The fact that, historically, environmental considerations have been ignored across most areas of policy has been a catastrophic mistake.
So begins the report, which is divided into three chapters: the first "runs the numbers" on the environmental crisis, the second explains the potential consequences for society and the economy, and the third suggests the most urgent changes needed.
Very often, when discussing the negative impact of human activity on the planet, the fact that natural systems are interdependent is underestimated. This means that each one constantly influences the others, generating a cascade effect whose final tally, in most cases, is far greater than the simple sum of its parts.
The Ipcc, among other things, posits that a 2 degree Celsius rise in average global temperatures above pre-industrial levels could transform the ecosystem of 13 per cent of the earth's land surface, causing the extinction of several species. Already today, the global population of vertebrates has fallen by 60 per cent compared to the 1970s; 30 per cent of arable land has become unproductive due to erosion; topsoil is being lost at a rate 10 to 40 times faster than it is regenerated by nature.
The consequences for our economic and social systems, the report warns, will be far more severe than we have always imagined. This is because it is impossible to predict with certainty how some of the phenomena we are already experiencing will develop.
Some examples? Compared to 2000, in 2017 as many as 157 million more people personally experienced an exceptional heatwave, which compromised their health and caused 153 billion working hours to evaporate. Floods account for 15 per cent of deaths caused by natural disasters, destroying homes and property, which in turn has long-term impacts on the physical and psychological health of the communities affected. Worldwide, extreme weather events caused estimated economic losses of 326 billion dollars in 2017, three times the figure for 2016. Climate change is estimated to cause 400,000 deaths every year, a figure that could rise to 700,000 by 2030.
Even the progress made in the fight against world hunger could be jeopardised by the environmental crisis. Today, more than 75 per cent of global food supplies depend on just five animal species and 12 plant species — an extremely fragile balance. So much so that the FAO, in a recent report, stressed that our food security could be undermined by the loss of biodiversity (that is, all those plants and animals, insects included, that provide food, feed, fuel and fibre, as well as ecosystem services). This is happening precisely as the global population multiplies and, again according to the FAO, needs to be fed by increasing food production by 60 per cent by 2050 — which will require 120 per cent more water and 42 per cent more land, and could drive greenhouse gas emissions up by 77 per cent.
"A new, complex and destabilised risk landscape is emerging, encompassing the risk of collapse of all major economic and social systems, at local level and, potentially, at global level too," concludes the Ippr. And "it is not clear whether societies around the world are prepared to manage it."
