Growth is good, allegedly

For as long as I remember, the nation’s level of growth has been announced, with some satisfaction if it is ‘good’, ie high, or with dismay if it is ‘low’. Growth is good, we have been led to believe, and we now take that ‘fact’ as read. But how much ‘growth’ can the planet take?

All over the world, virgin rainforests with their marvelous array of life forms are being replaced with grazing land for the cattle which will find their way into burgers, or palm oil plantations to satisfy the enormous demand for that product coming from all over the world, but particularly in east Asia. Meanwhile, the industrial expansion in India, China and elsewhere fills the atmosphere with greenhouse gases and other even nastier pollutants.

The IMF, in its infinite capitalist wisdom, has deemed 3% as the golden mean of growth to which the world should aspire. But as George Monbiot has pointed out, in ten years that means the world’s economy will have grown by 30%.  And with the Earth’s natural resources already under pressure as never before in human history, it isn’t hard to imagine how much worse that will be in ten years. Spaceship Earth, our only home, simply cannot take much more expansion. We need to re-think the whole concept of growth in the West, and realise that the brakes have to be put on before it is too late for all of us. There are a few countries, say, the 20 or 30 poorest, where an exception can be made, and they should be helped by the rich nations to expand without destroying their natural environments. The rest of us can easily afford to retrench and suspend the pernicious monster that is called ‘growth’. We can easily afford it. The Earth can’t afford for us not to.

OK, so what can we as individuals do to save the world? “I’m just one man, what difference can I make?” Is the oft-heard cry. God, do I hate it when I hear that. If we all took that line, nothing would ever change. But as it happens, there is something each of us can do, and once again it was George Monbiot who spelled it out:
1. Eat less meat and fish
2. Fly less.
Simples.