Understanding Sustainability Issues

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It’s impossible to separate the issue of environmental sustainability from those of social and economic development. Without proper environmental management, our world’s fragile climate patterns and eco-systems will collapse. Even relatively minor changes in average global temperatures can result in major changes to climate and weather patterns, affecting the livelihoods of millions of people.

There are many critical environmental issues, often inter-related, which are central to developing (and monitoring) appropriate and effective sustainability objectives:

1. Climate Change. Climate change is occurring because of global warming – and human intervention is causing global warming to happen at an accelerated rate, with potentially catastrophic consequences.
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2. Agriculture and Food Production. Global warming and climate change have contributed to worldwide food shortages and rising food prices, as crops fail and production decreases. At the same time, unsustainable farming practices and poor management of agricultural land have contributed to the world’s greenhouse gas emissions.
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3. Disease. Climatic variations affect the incidence and distribution of many kinds of diseases – for example, heat waves can contribute to respiratory problems and heart failure; extreme weather such as floods are often followed by outbreaks of cholera and typhoid.
    
4. Fresh Water. Growing populations and sustained droughts are squeezing the
   world’s water resources – in South Africa, water quality is further deteriorating due to pollution. 
    
5. Wetlands. Although these patches of marsh and bog are often overlooked, wetlands play a critical role in protecting our ecosystems – acting as natural filters to improve water quality, and slowing the flow of water during periods of flooding. 
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6. Land degradation, deforestation and desertification. Desertification and land degradation have a profound effect upon populations of countries. If not combated, they lead to lower agricultural yields, poverty and ultimately, starvation. Many millions of people around the globe have had to move off their land because they can no longer survive on it.
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7. Ozone Depletion. The Montreal Protocol was adopted in 1987, phasing out the production of substances believed to contribute to ozone depletion. After ozone levels reached a record low in the mid Nineties, scientists are recording small but significant improvements in levels of atmospheric ozone.
    
8. Acid Rain. Electricity generation, factory pollutants and motor vehicle exhaust emissions contain chemical compounds that react with the atmosphere, creating what is known as acid rain. This rain, with its high acidic content, raises the acidity of bodies of water and soil and kills off vegetation and micro-organisms.
    
9. The Oceans. Two-thirds of the world's population live within 60 kilometres of the coast, and almost half of the world's cities are sited in and around the tide-washed river mouths known as 'estuaries'. Climate change and over-exploitation of the ocean's resources have resulted in rising sea levels, declining fish stocks and valuable oceanic eco-systems - such as coral reefs - threatened with extinction
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10. Population Growth. As the earth’s population grows, so too does the demand on the earth’s resources. More people equals more food, more water and more energy. This translates into more space, more consumer goods, more waste... The United Nations Population Division has projected that the world’s population will surpass 9 billion in 2050 – the world’s current population is estimated to be around 6.6 billion people.
     
11. Poverty. The World Bank defines extreme poverty as living on less than US$1 per day and moderate poverty as less than US$2 a day. Until all people on earth are able to enjoy at least a basic standard of living, many of the environmental issues will not be solved, because poverty-stricken people will do anything to survive.
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12. Biodiversity and conservation. Many environmental campaigns are viewed in isolation without understanding their relevance in the context of the ecosystem in which they exist. Saving a single plant or animal species is not the solution. We need to protect the whole ecosystem within which they live. Biodiversity measures the relative diversity among organisms present in different ecosystems.
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13. Spotlights Enormous Economic and Human Benefits from Boosting Funding for Forests Investing an additional US$40 billion a year in the forestry sector could halve deforestation rates by 2030, increase rates of tree planting by around 140 per cent by 2050, and catalyze the creation of millions of new jobs according to a report by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP). 
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