Local communities and governments, environmental activists, civil society, and even private businesses are taking the lead in devising and implementing solutions to major environmental problems.

And they are beginning to put the world on a more sustainable path, says the 20th State of the World report, released in Washington last Thursday by WorldWatch Institute.

"What is often called the impossible revolution is already happening," said WorldWatch President Christopher Flavin. '"The question is whether we have the political will to scale up these efforts to the global level", where progress in recent years has been disappointing at best.

Last summer's World Summit for Sustainable Development (WSSD) in Johannesburg described in the report as ''something between a modest step sideways and a small step backwards'' was particularly dismaying due to major conflicts between developing countries and the industrialised world on financial and trade issues and doubts about the commitment of the US to multilateral institutions.

But even WSSD had its positive side: the participation of more than 8,000 non-governmental organisations (NGOs), most from poor countries, and hundreds of corporate and labour union leader a sign of growing "global issues networks", which can better address the scale and complexity of many problems with which traditional nation-states or governmental processes can no longer cope well.

No sugar-coating

The new report does not try to sugar-coat the major challenges faced by the world, many of which have become more intractable in recent years as governments and industry have failed to change course.

Among these is the continued pumping of ever-increasing amounts of carbon dioxide into the earth's atmosphere, warming the global climate at an unprecedented rate with enormous consequences, including the increased frequency and violence of extreme weather conditions.

As well, some 5,500 children die each day from diseases linked to polluted food, air and water, while malaria alone kills 7,000 people every day, affecting prospects for human development even more profoundly than the HIV/AIDS epidemic.

Bird extinctions are also running at some 50 times the natural rate due to the loss of habitat and other consequences of human activity.

While such news makes grim reading, the new report emphasises positive developments that make it clear that humans can make a difference when they choose to do so.

"The question is where societies choose to put their creative efforts," said Flavin. "If we can build spacecraft powered by clean fuel cells, we can build cars that run the same way. If we can mine copper and other metals from the earth, we can mine them from landfills and abandoned buildings. And if we can protect tourists from contracting malaria, we can do it for people who live with the threat every day."

Sectoral adavancements

The report says recent advances in various sectors deserve more attention.

The growth by more than 30 percent annually over the past five years in the use of renewable energy sources solar and wind power in countries such as Germany, Japan and Spain is a result of "a powerful combination of public demand, private investment and public-policy change".

In Denmark, for example, wind power now makes up 18 percent of all electrical energy produced, while new incentives for investing in wind power are transforming the energy picture in Texas.

In materials use, the rapid spread of "take-back" laws, particularly in Europe and Asia, is one of a series of measures that have produced "tremendous progress" in the recycling and re-use of materials.

The Netherlands, for example, has achieved an 86 percent recycling rate for cars, while Denmark has banned aluminium cans in favour of re-usable glass bottles.

In agriculture, organic farming has grown by leaps and bounds, particularly in Europe where three percent of total food production is now organic, a 15-fold increase since 1990.

In health, the World Health Organisation's Global Polio Eradication Initiative has reduced polio cases from some 350,000 in 1988 to 480 in 2001. On the malaria front, new, more targeted, mosquito-eradication programmes have reduced reliance on DDT and other dangerous chemicals in many communities.

In transportation, progress in making new technologies, such as hybrid-electric and diesel-fuelled cars and even hydrogen fuel cells, commercially viable has been faster than expected. At the same time, "car-sharing" programmes designed to increase the use of mass transit, have enlisted 125,000 families in Europe and the US, while "car-free" days are now a staple of cities in 14 countries.

California defied the US government by imposing the world's first mandatory limits on greenhouse gas emissions from cars.

Building blocks

In urban neighbourhoods around the world, micro loans are transforming the lives of people as poor as the waste pickers of the Payatas landfill near Manila, while innovative recycling and composting programmes in Egypt, Argentina, and Brazil are providing poor urban-dwellers with more income, better community services and even fresher food.

These kinds of innovations offer the basic building blocks for practising sustainable development around the world, said WorldWatch research director Gary Gardner.

The most successful initiatives, he said, shared four basic principles that should guide future efforts:

  • "Do no harm", in the sense that planners should always look to using methods that have the least impact on the virgin environment, such as reusing materials, instead of mining them;

  • "Be wary of simplistic solutions, silver-bullet solutions" to complex problems that may require a tailored or multi-layered approach;

  • Focus on creating the appropriate policy environment; and

  • "Build coalitions" in support of those policies, including, for example, religious congregations interested in ethical-consumption practices.
    • IPS