Obsession with growth is destroying nature, 150 countries warn

BRUSSELS — More than 150 countries including China, India and European Union members have signed off on a report that warns focusing on unchecked economic growth is contributing to the destruction of global biodiversity.

“Unsustainable economic activity and a focus on growth as measured by the gross domestic product, has been a driver of the decline of biodiversity … and stands in the way of transformative change,” warns a report by the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) published Monday.

IPBES is the leading intergovernmental body for assessing the state of biodiversity. Monday’s report follows three years of work, and was approved by government representatives at the IPBES summit that wrapped up in Manchester, U.K. on Sunday.

One eighth of the world’s estimated 8 million species of plants and animals are threatened with extinction, according to IPBES. Some 75 percent of the Earth’s land surface has already been significantly altered by human actions.

If that course doesn’t shift, the report warns, future prosperity is at risk. Markets are failing to adequately price or value biodiversity, such as filtration of pollutants, climate regulation and pollination.

“Businesses and other key actors can either lead the way towards a more sustainable global economy or ultimately risk extinction … both of species in nature, but potentially also their own,” said Matt Jones, one of three co-chairs of the assessment, in a statement.

‘Perverse incentives’

The authors slam “inadequate or perverse” business incentives, an “institutional environment with insufficient support, enforcement and compliance,” and business models that result in “ever-increasing material consumption” as key contributors to the global degradation of nature.

While the report highlights actions businesses can take, it acknowledges that industry can’t halt and reverse biodiversity loss alone and points to the importance of policy, legal and regulatory frameworks, along with capacity and knowledge.

The report lands as the European Union forges ahead with a deregulatory agenda focused on boosting the bloc’s competitiveness by relaxing environmental standards. The U.S. was not among the signatories of the report, having announced its intention to withdraw from IPBES and other international organizations it considers “wasteful, ineffective and harmful.”

Ahead of the report’s publication, IPBES chair David Obura told POLITICO that while “very vocal communities with a right-wing voice … pull away from the sort of joint solutions that we need,” science shows “that’s the wrong way to go and to resolve coming crises we will need better decisions that are evidence-based.”

“It’s an incredibly, incredibly worrying and in some ways frustrating time to see what is happening,” he said. All Obura can do, he added, is to “really promote the evidence coming through in our assessments and [ensure] that it’s in front of the policymakers for them to use, and I hope they will.”