It is important to cut through the simple oppositionism of economy versus ecology.
Pavan Sukhdev, head of the UNEP’s Green Economy Initiative, argues that the greening of economies is a new engine for growth, employment and the reduction of persistent poverty.
He has put numbers on it. It is possible to demonstrate that a wetlands outside Kampala is creating more value in water treatment for the city, than converting it to agricultural land. Pavan provides a powerful economic argument for preserving natural capital.
He is pretty funny, too. At the Opera House last week, he showed a slide of Mars to make the obvious point: “no biosphere…no economy”. He also presented a satellite photo of trawler fleets intensively clustered on the edges of a marine reserve of the Pacific US coast. “The fish don’t read the regulations”.
The Economics of Biodiversity (TEEB) reports are at:
A career banker, Pavan Sukhdev went on sabbatical from the Deutsche Bank for two years to develop this Initiative.