Birmingham Friends of the Earth Action Briefing Dec 98/Jan 99

UN Human Development Report

In its ninth annual Human Development report the United Nations concludes we live in a richer world, but with a lot of poorer people and focuses on many of the problems currently being addressed in FOE's book "Tomorrow's World" i.e. over consumption, pollution, waste, deforestation and over-fishing. These problems are "nudging humanity towards the outer limits of what the earth can stand".

It is over-consumption that is the root cause of many of our problems today. Indeed 'sustainability' could be described as the need to 'live off (the planet's) interest not its capital'. Not surprisingly the report states that 86% of expenditures for personal consumption i.e. goods, services and natural resources were made by just 20% of the world's population. On the other hand, the poorest 20% consume just 5%. Among the 4.4 billion people living in developing countries, almost three-fifths live in communities lacking basic sanitation, almost a third are without drinking water, a quarter do not have adequate housing and a fifth are without access to modern health services. The problems of debt repayments (see June/July Action Briefing) merely compound these problems.

The report states that in spite of rising living standards world wide, more than 1 billion people cannot meet even their most basic needs. 'Despite the fact that there has been this enormous surge in consumption not everybody has been invited to the party'.

"If the trends continue without change i.e. not redistributing from high-income to low-income consumers, not shifting from polluting to cleaner goods and production technologies .. not shifting priority from consumption for conspicuous display to meeting basic human needs, today's problems of consumption and human development will worsen".

Does FOE's visionary book Tomorrow's World have all the answers to these complex issues? Copies can be obtained from The Warehouse.

Paul Webb