Introduction George Martine and Daniel Schensul
Growing awareness that the impacts of climate change on human populations are imminent, as well as potentially devastating, has prodded some policymakers and most of the scientific community to call for more effective action. Deepening alarm at the scale of the development-environment quandary in the Anthropocene Era (Steffen et al, 2011) is typified in recent compelling statements by the world’s most influential multilateral leader, Ban Ki-Moon, the United Nations Secretary General. In words that would have been viewed as anathema by the development community not long ago, Ban Ki-Moon told a recent gathering of the world’s business and policymaking leaders in no uncertain terms that - “In the 21st century, supplies are running short and the global thermostat is running high. Climate change is showing us that the old model is more than obsolete. It has rendered it extremely dangerous. Over time, that model is a recipe for national disaster. It is a global suicide pact” (Ban Ki-Moon, 2011). A few short years ago, the UN’s Millennium Ecosystem Assessment warned that “human activity is putting such strain on the natural functions of Earth that the ability of the planet’s ecosystems to sustain future generations can no longer be taken for granted” (Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, 2005). The latest scientific evidence and recent extreme climate events now makes this early warning sound bland. It is already obvious that human demands on the planet have outstripped supply, biodiversity has declined globally, and rising levels of atmospheric CO2 are causing increased global temperatures, climate change and ocean acidification. As reflected in the authoritative work published by the Stockholm Resilience Center, the abusive utilization of the Earth’s material, energetic and biotic resources by the global economic system has already overstepped planetary boundaries in three domains (climate change, biological diversity and nitrogen input to the biosphere) and threatens to exceed them in at least six known additional areas (Rockstrom et al, 2009). Although efforts to change our civilization’s patterns of production and consumption in order to reduce the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere are ever more urgent, a flurry of extreme weather events has dramatically highlighted the need to respond more effectively to the threats already upon humankind. Mitigation is urgent, critical and irreplaceable, but even if known pathways were followed quickly and i n t ro d uct i o n
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