DO - Use Africa’s Resources for Sustainable Economic Growth

This week’s post is not directly about waste, however there is a link.  I am writing about an article found in Liberia’s Daily Observer, entitled “Use Africa’sResources for Sustainable Economic Growth”.  It seems a few African countries met at the Summit for Sustainability inAfrica in Gaborone, Botswana at the end of May.  These ten countries adopted The Gaborone Declaration.  The Declaration seeks to improve and maintain sustainability, so as to allow human communities to continue to survive on the Earth, through biodiversity and ecosystem protection, lessening of environmental risks and scarcities.  This will contribute to the economic prosperity of future generations.  An additional goal of this declaration is to reinforce commitment to previous treaties, as natural resource extraction in Africa has been primarily focused on short-term economic gains.

Reasoning behind the declaration recognizes that because of the nature of natural resource exploitation, human well-being will be negatively affected if efforts are not made to reverse environmental degradation.  In Liberia’s case, natural resource extraction followed the urge to satisfy the economy, completely disregarding long-term environmental effects, leaving large craters throughout the landscape, much like other resource-rich African nations.

What is great about this declaration is that it does seek to reinforce previous commitments.  Since those same commitments were not met, however, I wonder how we can be sure this one will be met?  Particularly because of the fifty-seven countries on the continent, only ten attended this summit (or 18%).  Various reasons could have stopped these countries from attending, however the fact remains that they did not and by so doing (or not doing), the Declaration loses its strength.  Despite the small portion of nations adopting The Gaborone Declaration, there is a push for African countries make this vision a reality, exploiting resources sustainably, so as to last for the people.

How I would relate this to waste is the obvious of environment, but also that the goal to become sustainable is, for some, at the cost of increased personal consumption.  Many do not want to minimize their habits, instead preferring to increase their consumption with every day.  What we need to understand is that the more we consume, the less sustainably we live.  There is no way to increase our consumption, while still reducing our environmental footprint that I know of, though I would be interested in finding out how if any readers know of ways this can be done.  The reason I say this is that we really need to be self-aware when we make decisions and we need to stop making decisions blindly, however small the decision, and consuming is a decision.  Rather than finding ways to materialize our lives, maybe we should try thinking about whether consumption really does enhance our lives.  If it does, what are the costs of our consumption habits and are they really worth it.  This may seem like a tangent, but remember: our consumption habits directly affect resource extraction.

Guy Debord said this week’s quote:

Young people everywhere have been allowed to choose between love and a garbage disposal unit. Everywhere they have chosen the garbage disposal unit.