While we must focus on zero environmental everything and radically reducing consumption in developed countries – production waste, water, carbon-based energy etc. simultaneously we must work to eradicate the scourge of poverty in developing countries which means, ironically, a lot more not less consumption.
Poverty is morally repugnant and unacceptable. It is also one of the greatest sustainability challenges of this century. People working to just get by rarely have the time, energy or income to spare for solving pressing community and environmental issues cursing their efforts to live life to its fullest potential.
Imagine releasing the power of millions of Rigoberta Menchu Tums and Neslon Mandelas from the grips of poverty. The benefit, as my friend Jesse Fripp recently noted in a Sustainable Century podcast, is “exponential self-actualization.”
Folks, rich and poor, in developing countries have spoken. 13 of their top 16 development priorities voiced by 1.4M developing country residents surveyed by the UN are poverty alleviation related. The first environment issue ranked 11th.
This doesn’t mean the environment is not important to developing country folk, it is, but people know resolving poverty is the fastest way to fixing the environment.
What does this mean for your company? Not more philanthropy that is for sure, more sustainability shared value creation, definitively.
see http://vote.myworld2015.org/ for more information on what folks want!