A fresh approach to protecting planetary health would deliver stronger economies, fewer deaths, and less poverty, the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) said on Tuesday as it released its most assessment of environmental pressures facing the world. The Global Environment Outlook, which has input from 287 multi-disciplinary scientists from 82 countries and stretches to well over 1,000 pages, lays out a simple choice: continue down the road to a future devastated by climate change, dwindling nature, degraded land, and polluted air, or change direction to secure a healthy planet, healthy people, and healthy economies, said UNEP Executive Director Inger Andersen.
The report makes a case for interconnected whole-of-society and whole-of-government approaches to transform economy and finance, materials and waste, energy, food, and the environment. That path starts with moving beyond gross domestic product as a measure of economic wellbeing and instead using inclusive indicators that also track the health of human and natural capital. It continues with a transition to circular economy models, rapid decarbonization of the energy system, a shift toward sustainable diets and reduced waste, improved agricultural practices, and expanding protected areas while restoring degraded ecosystems—all backed by behavioral, social, and cultural shifts that include Indigenous and local knowledge.
The report lays out two pathways to transformation: a behavior-focused pathway driven by lifestyle, behavioral, and value changes, where social awareness of environmental crises drives a shift in worldview; and a technology-focused pathway relying on innovation and technological solutions in an urbanized world with significant global trade and technological spillover. According to UNEP, the state of the environment will dramatically worsen if the world continues powering economies under a business-as-usual pathway. Without action, global mean temperature rise is likely to exceed 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels in the early 2030s, exceed 2°C by the 2040s, and keep climbing. Climate change would cut 4 percent off annual global GDP by 2050 and 20 percent by the end of the century.
If changes are made, they have the potential to avoid nine million pollution-related premature deaths, lift 200 million people out of undernourishment, and move 150 million people out of extreme poverty by 2050. The agency called on countries to follow the whole-of-society and whole-of-government approaches laid out in the report to achieve a sustainable future.
“This sounds like, and indeed is, a massive undertaking. But there is no technical reason why it cannot be done,” Andersen said.
