“To truly reach a sustainable economy, the world is going to need to model commercial systems on natural systems.” – Eban Goodstein, the director at Bard College for Environmental Policy in New York.
Think about it for just a few seconds; there is nothing man-made that is sustainable. Yes, I said it, nothing. From the sophisticate aeroplanes that cost billions of dollars to manufacture, to the streamlined and modernised speed monsters that cost millions of dollars, none have a natural life-cycle.
Nature over the years has been a vast source of deep understanding and meaning for our lives and improving the use of natural resources. How do we create a more sustainable future? What are the lessons we have missed and where do we find them? Many business executives around the world are asking these questions of themselves, in their boardrooms and on the golf course.
Goodstein explains it perfectly illustrating how nature produces no pollution, it never relies on a non-sustainable energy source and it operates no systems that grow too fast or that created industry bubbles. Nature has no less than thousands of years’ experience, with a perfected system whereby all of its eco-system citizens are fed, have a living location and provided with adequate energy and clean water. In all fairness, consider that the South American rainforests have existed for thousands of years and the hidden tribes there have never recorded a form of cancer. Yet there are natural remedies that the forest provides that capitalism makes billions of dollars from, as if originally created by man.
Business has only one conclusion to draw from this, “The key to ensuring sustainable human life on earth will come from adopting insights from these proven systems.”
Today the term Biomimicry means, “Extracting technologies from nature.” This is a well-established practice in the architecture and engineering circles. Advances in technology have discovered and created paint for exterior walls modelled on the surface of butterfly wings, enabling the ability to self-clean using rainwater. Architects have studied and used termite mounds to understand and design buildings with adequate ventilation. This goes further to designing heating and ventilation conditioning units.
Amy Larkin, founder of Nature Means Business and author of “Environmental Debt: The Hidden Costs of a Changing Global Economy,” explains that we need to harmonize the laws of business with the laws of nature. “The financial and environmental world is as connected as your mind and body and until we make this connection we are in a course for collision with the laws of nature,” Larkin explained. “Today we are less and less connected to nature in how we think, spend money … conduct business, consume food, and consume products. All of these measurements are done wrong,” Larkin also suggested, “One of these great doors to go through to help discover new ways to both conduct business and how you measure, what you value in what you count.”
Many companies whether big or small, today are all paying the price for over extrapolation on natures resources. Consider the bark of a tree. The bark is the protective layer that covers the trunk of the tree throughout its life. But that is not the only role it plays. Bark also keeps infections from the rest of its surrounding out and protects the chemical balance of the fibre of the tree as it grows. Further, this many other animals use tress as their means of transport. These actions have wear and tear and bark thus protects the intricacies of the life transpiring beneath the bark covering.
The lessons from nature’s systems of applied economics and resource management are far more difficult to apply. For one, competition is only compromised when alien plants are brought into eco-systems and compromise the genetic-economic make-up of the eco-system.
Monopolies do not exist in nature. Goodstein points out that the closest example of monopolies in nature were invasive species introduced by human migration. “In nature as in economics, monopolies and centralised power choke out competition, increase consumption inequality and lead to predatory behaviour and the existence of unnecessary surplus. It is inefficient and unnatural.”
The effects of unnatural eco-systems are seen globally. China has the highest incidence of sustainable pollution that literally shuts down parts of the economy for days at a time. Los Angeles has the highest levels of pollution in the US and is visible from the sky, while the London has by far the highest levels of pollution in the UK. Surprisingly all three cities problems stem from the extensive use of car and yet all three cities has adequate infrastructure.
The global honcho’s for ocean research have recently forecast that all the oceans have at least a trillion pieces of plastic floating in them. Over and over we have witnessed the effects of plastic killing off natural living species in the ocean. One of the flowing questions that get asked year in and year out is can we stop the effects of global warming? To answer this question we have to go back to the root of all evil, that being – business.
The right question to ask is whether industrial nations can cut production in the absence of a sustainable, clean replacement for the energy needed and used. Again we come back to this fact – nothing man has created is sustainable. Even nuclear power has shelf-life, and is the most dangerous hazard to not only the earth but to mankind as well. Parallel to this thought, are there unnatural replicas for the current resources being used?
The reason these questions are so critical is because they beg simple analogies of what we currently use to pollute the earth. For example, we made ourselves very proud that we are moving to a paperless society. But this is not case at all. Till this day, deforestation continues to be a big issue in South America and compounding this fact is that technology requires energy. This energy will be used up leaving a polluting disposable commodity like their batteries and the plastic casing that require special disposing solutions.
Over time, money has taken man in the opposite direction to the natural sustainable solutions that exist in nature. The pertinent question remains, "is it too late to repair the damage?"
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