Skip to content
Greenknight
  • Home
  • Services
    • Resource efficiency
    • Strategy
    • Stakeholder alignment
    • Materiality & risk
    • Audit and review
    • UN SDGs
    • Engaging people
    • Supply chain
    • Consortium building
    • Conferences and Events
    • Chairing and facilitation
  • About
    • Associate organisations
    • Publications
  • Contacts
  • Blog
  • Testimonials

2018 And All That

The turn of another year, in the Western calendar at least, and it’s the traditional time to take stock of the last 12 months and look ahead to the next 12. In the aftermath of the festive season food and drink consumption has, inevitably, surged together with the usual swathe gifts of limited utility (or perhaps even popularity). Readers who are also on LinkedIn may well have seen posts enumerating all sorts of figures relating to some of the waste associated with Christmas. Whatever the accuracy of the numbers quoted, it doesn’t take the little grey cells of Hercule Poirot to see that wrapping paper and other trappings of seasonal gifts that go straight into the bin may not be the best use of resources. Add to that the vast number of delivery vans zipping around the highways and by-ways filled with online purchases, and the carbon impact becomes greater still.

That is not to be a Scrooge (or maybe a Grinch for younger readers) as it’s not all dark clouds; there are undeniably many social positives to be had at this time of year and LinkedIn also featured many posts highlighting initiatives helping some of the less fortunate members of society. And that leads us to the inevitable compromises that arise from the need to balance environmental, social and economic considerations. If we use less wrapping paper and send fewer cards, what becomes of the people who work in wrapping paper factories and card shops? As I noted in the previous post (see ‘COP out?’) the goal of achieving an environmental positive in France caused a significant response about the social and economic consequences and their inequity from the perspective of at least some members of French society.

So, what to do? Little did I know when I mentioned the book ‘How Bad Are Bananas’ in the same post that Radio 4 would be running a series this week called ‘New Year Solutions’ examining how ordinary citizens can change their actions to reduce their individual climate change impact which would also mention the book. We must always be alert to the unintended consequences, but that is no excuse for inaction and is all the more reason for governmental engagement so that interventions can be systemic rather than scatter-gun. Let’s hope that COP25 does a better job than this year’s Conference of the Parties of stepping up to the challenge. It is due to be hosted in November by a state in Latin America or the Caribbean and it was expected that Brazil would do the honours. Under its new president, however, the offer to host has been withdrawn.

The World Economic Forum’s annual Davos meeting is only a few weeks away and it will be instructive to see where climate change features in their global risk report. ‘Failure of Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation’ has appeared in the top 5 likelihood list twice and the top 5 impact list four times in the past 5 years. Going further back, the wording was simpler, referring rather to ‘Rising Greenhouse Gas Emissions’ and ‘Climate Change’, which might be interpreted as an admission that the battle to control emissions and avert a climate crisis is slowly being lost. There is good news in amongst the bad, some of which I mentioned in ‘Cop out?’, but it is far from enough. We all need to encourage our politicians to take more assertive action and to make good on the fine words they speak. Whatever your view of the UK departing the EU, the fact that there is cross-party collaboration in Westminster on at least one aspect of the debate – the People’s Vote – just might be a sign that politics can also be pre-competitive on other big issues of the day.

COP out?
Deeply Dippy

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Ethical Corp newsfeed

  • Society Watch: Drive to make ecocide an international crime gains momentum

    Ecocide is an emotive word. First used to describe the human and environmental devastation caused by the use of the defoliant Agent Orange during the Vietnam War, it became the subject of regular discussions at the United Nations throughout the 1970s. In 1998, the destruction of the environment was proposed as an international crime against peace, but ultimately wasn’t adopted as part of the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) Rome Statute, which includes genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and the crime of aggression.Image: Channels: Climate and EnergyNatural CapitalTags: Stop ecocide internationalInternational Criminal CourtRome statuteEU Environmental Crime Directive

GreenBiz newsfeed

  • Building the Circular Buildings Revolution
    on April 20, 2023 at 7:15 am

    Join GreenBiz for our conversation covering the approaches building product manufacturers are using to make products more circular and keep materials in play after their first use. The idea of buildings as material banks is not new, but deserves examination as it hasn’t taken hold at the scale we would expect.

Theme by Colorlib Powered by WordPress
This website uses cookies to improve your experience. We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish.Accept Read More
Privacy & Cookies Policy

Privacy Overview

This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may affect your browsing experience.
Necessary
Always Enabled
Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.
Non-necessary
Any cookies that may not be particularly necessary for the website to function and is used specifically to collect user personal data via analytics, ads, other embedded contents are termed as non-necessary cookies. It is mandatory to procure user consent prior to running these cookies on your website.
SAVE & ACCEPT