By Rear Admiral (rtd) Gary A. R. Best
Presidential Advisor on the Environment

THIS article is the first of three that would look briefly at environmental, financial and institutional sustainability. Today we start with environmental sustainability.

OVER the past two decades, the importance of the environment and the elements for sustainability were identified through two significant initiatives.

The first was the Bruntland Report (1987), which internationalized the meaning of sustainable development by defining it as “development that meets the need of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”. The Bruntland Report also highlighted the need to balance economic and environmental development.

The second initiative was the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (1992), commonly referred to as the ‘Earth Summit’ or ‘the Rio Conference’, which resulted in Agenda 21, a non-binding, voluntarily-implemented action plan with regard to sustainable development.

We contend here that sustainable development of the environment is necessary for the promised good life, and it is also a mandate given to us by the Articles (14, 25 & 36) of the Guyana Constitution.

According to Goodland (1996) and Hammond et Anor (1998), “Environmental sustainability means changing human activities so they no longer threaten the natural resource base and ecological systems upon which economic development, human health and social well-being depend”.

Environmental sustainability means maintaining natural capital. Natural capital includes soil, atmosphere, forests, water and wetlands, which provide a flow of useful goods or services to our citizens. However, this natural capital is no longer a free good, and has thus become a limited factor to attaining and maintaining environmental sustainability. Environmental sustainability contributes to the improvement of human welfare by protecting the sources of raw materials required, ensuring that emissions from waste are held within the assimilative capacity of the environment, and harvest rates for renewables are maintained within regeneration levels. We include here our forest and its services; animal and plant life; and all forms of aquatic life inland, inshore and offshore.

It is important also for the rates of non-renewable depletion to be equal to the rate at which renewable substitutes can be created. This is particularly relevant to the gold, bauxite and diamond industry. A key question in the context of non-renewables is “what renewable substitutes are contemplated for Guyana?”
Consideration on this point ought to include increased expansion of agriculture yields, reforestation, and increased production of fisheries. Guyana must therefore learn to live within the limitations of its own biosphere, and maintain its natural capital at sustainable levels.

Indeed, a significant challenge to policy formulation, as states transition to a more sustainable world, lies in the fact that economic activity is likely to result in environmental stress, while at the same time economic development is necessary for environmental sustainability. Reducing the gap between the rich and the poor would definitely contribute to environmental sustainability, since the poorer citizens tend to maximise unsustainable practices. Itinerant and medium scale mining are cases in point in the context of Guyana. The large mined out areas in Guyana bear testimony to the level of environmental stress on our natural capital. Surely, replanting can be considered as a substitute to the mined out resource. In addition, we should not believe that the ‘per capita type’ income of the developed world is needed for environmental sustainability in Guyana. What are needed are policies and actions that ensure the sustainable industrialization of our natural capital.

Against the backdrop of Brundtland’s definition of sustainable development, it seems to me that environmental sustainability now means that Guyana must move towards intragenerational sustainability for this generation in order to be successful at intergenerational sustainability for future generations. Of course, this aligns with citizens’ expectations of social cohesion, equity and equality. Therefore, environmental sustainability also requires enabling conditions that are not themselves part of environmental sustainability per se. These non-environment conditions include human resource development, inclusive democracy, empowerment of women, and increased literacy, as opposed to only economic and social inputs as traditionally conceived.

However, it is also important for Guyana, as it transitions to environmental sustainability, to continue its call on other developing and developed nations to reduce their high levels of ecological damage.

A greater challenge, however, lies in efforts at maintaining environmental sustainability while fostering the convergence of economic growth, greater national equity, and development. This challenge can be met by the private sector recognising its responsibility to shift its business practices towards environmentally sustainable targets. In this regard, I suggest that the Government of Guyana should press home the point that a key policy in development planning is the understanding that it is essential to combine industrial development and environmental sustainability, thereby facilitating its full assimilation into macroeconomic development; and that democratization depends on how environmental sustainability is interpreted by Government, its citizens, and the private sector in the development process.

The desired interpretation is for environmental sustainability to underpin economic development as we pursue the good life. (Comments can be sent to towardsagoodlife@gmail.com)

[box type=”shadow” align=”aligncenter” ]Mr Gary A. R. Best is a retired Rear Admiral and former Chief of Staff of the Guyana Defence Force. He is an attorney-at-law and is the Presidential Advisor on the Environment. He is a PhD. candidate at the University of the West Indies, and he holds a BSc in Nautical Science (Brazil) and Masters Degrees from the University of the West Indies and the University of London.  His research areas include climate change governance, climate change finance, international relations and environmental law.
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