Exploding the UN "green economy" myth -- by AttacTV

A 6 min animation about the takeover of nature by financial markets and the real alternatives proposed by civil society. An initiative of SOMO, European Attac Network, Food&Water Europe, Friends of Earth, Amis de la Terre, Carbon Trade Watch, WEED, Ecologistas en Acción, Aitec and Campagna per la riforma della Banca Mondiale. Produced by La Antena and AttacTV,.

- english : https://vimeo.com/43398910

- en français : https://vimeo.com/44103161

- español & Deutsch version soon.

Global Environmental Governance -- by Maria Ivanova and Joe Ageyo

Quest for Symphony is a 16 minute video on the past, present, and future of global environmental governance. Key participants at the 25th UNEP Governing Council/Global Ministerial Environment Forum in Nairobi, Kenya in February 2009 make a powerful argument for strengthening UNEP mandate and resources.
See also the half hour Way Ahead video in which 5 previous UNEP directors describe their vision: Maurice Strong, Mostafa Tolba, Elizabeth Dowdeswell, Klaus Töpfer, and Achim Steiner; and the text of Steiner's 18 May 2010 speech to the Rio+20 Prepcom, in which he says the "environmental pillar" of UN work is very weak compared to economic development and social (human rights, MDGs) pillars; "developing countries... depend directly on the environment for their livelihoods and their means of living. These countries with the most at stake in terms of environmental sustainability are the very countries that have become disenfranchised within the system because the costs of participating have become so overwhelming." Therefore GEG must be strengthened. See also the CSD thread in QEWnet Forum.

Climate change: a last chance to act - UNEP

Rapport PNUE/GIEC: voir le resumé en français par Louis-Gilles Francoeur, 'Changements climatiques: le pire est en train de se produire', Le Devoir 25 sep 09.

A dust storm from the outback blankets Sydney; Australian drought continues: photos by Tim Wimborne / Reuters 23 Sep 09. See also Brigid Walsh's Dustwatch Report and Australian Water Network.

Worst-case climate scenarios are already happening, according to the UNEP United Nations Environmental Program. New scientific data*, released as the G20 meet in Pittsburgh, show tipping points -- both in speed and size -- are coming much faster than previously predicted by the IPCC and may soon be irreversible. UNEP says, "It may still be [scientifically] possible to avoid the most catastrophic impacts of climate change. However, this will only happen if there is immediate, cohesive and decisive action to both cut emissions and assist vulnerable countries adapt."

Among the danger signs: GHG emissions are rising faster than ever. Warming will increase above 2-3°C, the tipping point for the complete melting of polar ice and Himalyan glaciers. Sea level will rise 2 meters or more by 2100. Ocean acidification is occurring, killing coral reef life as well as removing a major CO2 sink -- and on the California coast it is decades earlier than predicted.

If the trends continue, major climate systems will change: the monsoons of India, West Africa, and the rain system of the Amazon; with severe and irreversible drought in the US Southwest, Australia, the Mediterranean, Mid-East and Central Asia; elsewhere, irrigation and hydro power would fall sharply. Remaining "biodiversity hotspots" (reservoirs of species replenishment) would disappear. Failure of deep-ocean currents, or massive CO2 + methane release from melting permafrost, could then drive the process into the catastrophic 4-6°C range.

* Data are in UNEP's new Climate Science Compendium. See also UNEP Green New Deal update for the G20 summit Sep 2009, with details of current "green stimulus" plans of major countries; download its other publications. Nature Sep 09 has an article signed by 28 scientists warning that we are exceeding earth's capacity. Dust storms are spreading disease, says the UK Observer 27 Sep 09.

Philippine Quakers have just emailed for help after flash floods in Manila and 25 provinces in which at least 246 Filipinos died. Suburbs and villages are without food, water or power. Typhoon Ketsana is now about to hit Thailand. Activists at the UNFCCC meeting in Bangkok blame climate change.

Environmental networking: groups and strategies

Click on the illustration for the full document.

This is an attempt to map many recent trends. I welcome your comments and criticism. Feel free to share the document with others. It may help to clarify discussions about cooperation or joint action with other civil society or faith groups. If you want to find which category a group is in, open the doc in a word processor, CTRL+F and insert the name to search. The web links in the document and "further reading" will lead you to details about that group.

For a review of current Copenhagen negotiations and US climate policy, see my previous post, which includes updates.

Emplois verts et New Deal mondial - Achim Steiner du PNUE

photo: Green Jobs Conference.org
Depuis octobre 2008 Achim Steiner du PNUE (Programme des Nations Unies pour l'environnement) prône un New Deal vert. Il en révèle progressivement les détails, durant les réunions des G20 et G8, étapes essentielles vers le traité de Copenhague prévue pour décembre 2009, qui déterminera le régime post-Kyoto depuis 2012.

Les coûts sont bien moins que les pertes prévues si l'on continue la pollution de l'air, des eaux et de la terre: 1% du produit intérieur brut (PIB) mondial* soit environ 750 milliards de dollars echelonnés sur une décennie, dans cinq secteurs différents: la création de bâtiments efficaces en énergie, l'énergie renouvelable, le transport durable, l'eau douce et l'infrastructure écologique, et l'agriculture durable.

Le Secrétaire général de l'ONU, Ban Ki-moon, disait au G20 que le sauvetage de l'économie mondiale ne doit pas laisser de côté l'agenda du développement et la nécessité de protéger les plus vulnérables. Cette position est soutenue à la fois par des économistes notables tels Nicholas Stern, Joseph Stiglitz, Jeffrey Sachs, et sur le plan moral par plusieurs groupes religieux autour du monde (ex: Uppsala, ARC); le pape Benedict XVI vient de prendre position pour faire pression sur le sommet G8 en juillet 2009. Pour la première fois, Ban Ki-Moon y dénonce vertement la manque de volonté des pays industrialises.

Le rapport du PNUE (PDF en anglais) décrit les multiples bénéfices économiques, environnementaux et sociaux d'un investissement substantiel pris sur le plan de relance de l'économie de 3.000 milliards de dollars. Voici ses cinq volets:

1. Améliorer l'efficacité énergétique des nouveaux comme des anciens bâtiments. La construction est en effet responsable de 30 à 40% des émissions de gaz à effet de serre. 100 milliards investis sur quatre ans dans ce domaine aux Etats-Unis devraient générer deux millions d'emplois, selon le rapport. Dans le monde, cela pourrait créer ou rendre plus verts 110 millions d'emplois.

2. Investir dans l'énergie renouvelable. Il faudra quelque 45 milliards de dollars d'ici à 2025 pour répondre aux besoins énergétiques tout en luttant contre le changement climatique. Si l'on investissait 630 milliards de dollars d'ici à 2030 on créerait 20 millions d'emplois supplémentaires dont deux millions dans l'énergie éolienne, 6,3 millions dans le solaire et 12 millions dans les biocarburants.

3. Le transport durable est une nécessité alors que la flotte mondiale de voitures doit tripler d'ici à 2050, à 90% dans des pays qui ne font pas partie de l'OCDE (Organisation pour la coopération et le développement économique). Le Groupe d'experts intergouvernemental sur l'évolution du climat (IPCC) recommande d'améliorer le rendement énergétique de 50%. L'accélération des investissements dans les technologies hybrides pourrait créer 4 millions d'emplois dans le monde et 19 millions dans la vente et la réparation. Mais il faut aussi investir dans le train à grande vitesse. Ainsi un investissement de 10 ans aux Etats-Unis pourrait créer 250.000 emplois.

4. L'infrastructure écologique et hydrologique: investir 15 milliards de dollars pour réaliser un des Objectifs du Millénaire pour le développement (OMD, MDG en anglais), celui de diminuer de moitié le nombre de personnes qui n'ont pas d'accès durable à l'eau potable et à l'assainissement, pourrait générer des bénéfices mondiaux de 38 milliards de dollars dont 15 milliards rien qu'en Afrique sub-saharienne.

5. L'agriculture durable permettra non seulement de réduire la pauvreté mais aussi améliorer la sécurité alimentaire, réduire la pression sur les écosystèmes et le climat. L'agriculture bio est en plein essor et les ventes de produits organiques s'élèvaient à 46 milliards de dollars en 2007.

En mai Steiner s'est dit époustouflé par la politique de stimule des pays riches. Depuis une décennie le PNUE est en attente de $5 milliards pour développer les énergies vertes afin de réduire les impacts environnementaux, maintenant on voit $20 milliards accordés pour sauver un seul fabricant d'autos: Global-Changes.com 7 mai 09. [Le stimule américain à lui seul pourrait se chiffrer dans le $700 milliards.]

-- NB: les cinq points du PNUE ci-dessus sont tirés du communiqué du 19 mars 09 du Centre d'actualités de l'ONU. Pour mises à jour voir de récents rapports en français du PNUE et son site Pour une économie verte. Une critique pertinente du plan Steiner, Les mécanismes internationaux du marché du carbone... vient d'être publiée par le prestigieux Institut international du développement durable. Sa version anglaise est International Carbon Market Mechanisms in a Post-2012 Climate Change Agreement (IISD, May 2009). See also UNEP Green Economy Initiative website and recent reports.

--

*1% du PNB: voir le propos de la Chine et du G77, regroupement des pays en développement, comparé aux engagements minimes ou fictifs des pays riches pour Copenhague. EurActiv du 15 avr 2007 dresse un dossier des enjeux économiques, tout en notant l'opposition féroce des sacerdoces du capitalisme sauvage; dont des critique sévères dans Libération 30 juin 09 par Geneviève Azam, économiste à l’université de Toulouse-II et membre du conseil scientifique d’Attac; et par une foulée d'activistes québécois dans une lettre collective au Devoir 10 juin 09.

A real green revolution is needed – Achim Steiner of UNEP

Starving poor led food riots in at least 33 countries in 2008; the under-funded FAO warns they are happening again this year.

The United Nations Environmental Program (UNEP) Nairobi meeting from 16-20 February aims at solving world environmental, financial, food and energy crises by creating a Green Economy.

“We need a Green Revolution in a Green Economy but one with a capital G”, says UN Under-Secretary-General and UNEP Executive Director Achim Steiner. “We need to deal with not only the way the world produces food but the way it is distributed, sold and consumed, and we need a revolution that can boost yields by working with rather than against nature. Over half of the food produced today is lost, wasted or discarded as a result of inefficiency in the human-managed food chain. There is evidence within the report that the world could feed the entire projected population growth alone by becoming more efficient while also ensuring the survival of wild animals, birds and fish on this planet. Simply ratcheting up the fertilizer and pesticide-led production methods of the 20th Century is unlikely to address the challenge. It will increasingly undermine the critical natural inputs and nature-based services for agriculture such as healthy and productive soils, the water and nutrient recycling of forests, and pollinators such as bees and bats.”

UNEP's just-released report The Environmental Food Crisis: The environment’s role in averting future food crises states:

• food prices may increase by 30-50 per cent within the next few decades, due to drought, biofuels, high oil prices, low grain stocks and commodity speculation
• the food supply of the poor has already been hit by rich countries' overfishing and ethanol subsidies
• global warming threatens 25% of world food production
• meat consumption is rising rapidly, depleting grain stocks, deforesting the tropics, and chasing the poor off the land
• “green” biofuels should be produced from food wastes, switchgrass, straw and even nutshells
• 30 million tonnes of “trash fish” and “bycatch” are dumped annually. These could be used to increase fish farming and aquaculture production, without increasing pressure on wild fish stocks.

Climate change is a key threat to feeding earth's 9 billion people by 2050 -- yet another reason, says UNEP, that “Governments at the UNFCCC negotiation in Copenhagen in 300 days’ time must agree on a deep and decisive new global deal.” UNEP proposes mechanisms to

• control global food prices
• set up an international micro-finance fund for small-scale farmer productivity in developing countries.
• end rich counties' agricultural subsidies and dumping
• develop second generation biofuels based on wastes rather than on primary crops
• mitigation measures to adapt to extreme rainfall and drought on continents such as Africa
• aid to diversified and organic farming [see below - Ed.]
• enhance the “nature-based” inputs and “environmental services”: natural pollinators, water supplies, genetic diversity.

Organic farm in Africa: courtesy of Urban Sprout blog.

UNEP cites wasteful business-as-usual practices:

• US losses and food waste are estimated at 40-50%
• US markets are not working: while food banks go empty, ~25% of freshfruits and vegetables are lost between the field and the table
• food waste is half of Australia landfill
• 30% of food purchased in the UK is not eaten
• 30% of fish landed in Africa is lost, discarded, or spoiled
• similar losses elsewhere in developing countries
• 20-40% of the potential harvest in developing countries is lost to pests and pathogens
• this will increase with global warming
• also, rotting food gives off methane, one of the worst greenhouse gases
• land degradation will reduce African yields by another 1-8 per cent
• need for regional R&D in agriculture: only 13% of global investment is in Africa, versus 33%+ in Latin America and 40%+ in Asia. What should be done? for example, Nigeria is researching use of solar dryers to preserve the onion crop
• a threat to irrigation for 50% of Asia’s cereal production, Himalaya glaciers are receding
  
• water scarcity may reduce future world crop yields by ~12 %
  
• croplands are swallowed up by urban sprawl
• Sub-Saharan Africa population will grow from o.77 to over 1.7 billion by 2050
• the phony “Green Revolution”: artificial fertilizers, pesticides, increased water use and cutting down of forests, will result in massive decline in biodiversity.
• 80 per cent of all endangered species are threatened by agricultural expansion; Europe has lost over 50 per cent of its farmland birds; similar impacts are felt in N America

Organic farming in Africa

A UNEP / UNCTAD study of 114 small-scale farms in 24 African countries found:

• organic farming doubled yields, reaching more than 125% in east Africa
• this outperformed both traditional methods, and chemical-intensive conventional farming
• environmental benefits: improved soil fertility, water retention, drought resistance
• organic markets will continue to grow from $23 billion in 2002 to $70 billion in 2012
• improved local education and community cooperation.

Similar studies have been made by FAO and IAASTD. Here is an example from Addis Ababa, Ethiopia -- TenaKebena video of a small-scale community agriculture and reclamation project.

See also 8 other UNEP videos and graphics on climate change impacts; Sustainable Land Use Forum Jan 2009 in Ethiopia; IDRC study Cities Feeding People (1994) on urban agriculture; City Farmer links; Sidewalk Sprouts blog; FAO – GIEWS Global Information and Early Warning System; Miguel Altieri, Small farms as a planetary ecological asset: five reasons...; corporate funding of African organic farms; previous posts tagged food.
Photo by John Morgan: urban agriculture project in Havana.