Survival: One Health, One Planet, One Future

George R. Lueddeke

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2018
• ISBN:
  9780429814013
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Economics
• Subtopic: Sustainable Development
• Index: Economics

Planet Earth has been here for over 4.5 billion years but in just two human generations we have managed to place our only 'home' at great risk. Many lessons from history have not yet been learned and new lessons may prove equally, if not more, difficult to take on board as we head deeper into the twenty-first century.

This book highlights two of our greatest social problems: changing the way we relate to the planet and to one another, and confronting how we use technology (dataism) for the benefit of both humankind and the planet. Covering a wide range of key topics, including environmental degradation, modern life, capitalism, robotics, financing of war (vs peace) and the pressing need to re-orient society towards a sustainable future, the book contends that lifelong learning for sustainability is key to our survival. The author argues that One Health - recognising the fundamental interconnections between people, animals, plants, the environment - needs to inform the UN-2030 Sustainable Development Goals and that working towards the adoption of a new mindset is essential. We need to replace our current view of limitless resources, exploitation, competition and conflict with one that respects the sanctity of life and strives towards well-being for all, shared prosperity and social stability.

Clearly written, evidence based and transdisciplinary - and including contributions from the World Bank, InterAction Council, Chatham House, UNESCO, World Economic Forum, the Tripartite One Health collaboration (UN Food and Agriculture Organization, World Organisation for Animal Health and World Health Organization), One Health Commission and more - this book cuts across sociopolitical, economic and environmental lines. It will be of great interest to practitioners, academics, policy-makers, students, nongovernment agencies and the public at large in both developed and developing nations.

Part I

Safeguarding the health and well-being of people and planet

1 Threats to the health and sustainability of populations

From rural to urban life

Ensuring the future sustainability of life on Earth is becoming much more problematical as threats such as climate change, the loss of biological diversity, water scarcity and food insecurity are growing at unprecedented rates and scale. The convergence of these and other risks are being exacerbated considerably as the global population shifts from largely agrarian to urban societies.

As shown in Figure 1.1, the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs graphs illustrate that the most urbanised regions include Northern America (82 per cent living in urban areas in 2014), Latin America and the Caribbean (80 per cent in urban areas), and Europe (73 per cent in urban areas). In contrast, Africa and Asia remain mostly rural, with 40 per cent and 48 per cent of their respective populations living in urban areas.¹

It is estimated that by 2050 more than 70 per cent of the world’s population – about 9.3 billion (compared with around 7.6 billion today) will be city-dwellers.² City population increases will be greatest in Africa, the Middle East, India, China and southeast Asia, including increases in the number of megacities with total populations of over 10 million people, such as Tokyo and Mumbai.³ Currently, there are 25 megacities across the world and this will rise to 35 by 2025 with some of the fastest growth occurring in Dhaka (population increase of around 53 per cent), Beijing (expanding by 44 per cent), New Delhi (population rising by 43 per cent) and Tokyo (population increasing from 37 million to 39 million).³

The African continent

In 1980, only 28 per cent of Africans lived in urban areas; today, approximately 40 per cent have settled in towns and cities. In total, the region’s population reached 1 billion in 2009 and joined India and China as the third most populated region of the world.⁴

Figure 1.2 compares today’s population in Africa’s largest cities to expected growth by 2025 and shows that many large cities, such as Dakar, Kinshasa and Luanda, will almost double in size 2025⁵ Overall, Africa’s population is expected to grow by more than 500 million people in the next few decades and a further 500 million by 2050, with 60 per cent of its population living in cities, compared to 1950 when the continent had fewer than 500,000 urban dwellers.

Figure 1.1 Urban and rural population as proportion of total population, by major areas, 1950–2050.

Source: World urbanization prospects. Department of Economic and Social Affairs, © 2014 United Nations. Reprinted with the permission of the United Nations.

By 2100 it is predicted that Africa’s population will be between 9 and 13 billion. Given that currently about 70 per cent of Africa’s urban population live in slum conditions, the challenge to already ‘overstretched and under-resourced municipal authorities to provide water, electricity and social services, not to mention governance and security’⁵ will continue to be immense and will place additional pressure on governments to find ways of managing accelerating rural–urban migration (largely unregulated) in a way that ensures equity.

Figure 1.2 Growth of Africa’s largest cities.

Source: Frontier Strategy Group, Capturing Africa’s transformative urban growth (2011).

The Americas

While overall urban population densities in the Americas will remain generally stable to 2050, averaging around 80 per cent, several cities will experience significant growth by 2025, including Mexico City (20 to 25 million – 25 per cent growth), New York (20 to 24 million – 20 per cent growth), Los Angeles (13 to 16 million – 23 per cent growth), Rio de Janeiro (12 to 14 million –17 per cent growth) and Sao Paulo (20 to 23 million –15 per cent growth).⁶

In the US, with a population of around 327 million in 2018 (4.28 per cent of the world’s population, increasing by around 2 million annually),⁷ ‘Nearly one in seven Americans lives in the metropolitan areas of the country’s three largest cities: New York, Los Angeles and Chicago.’⁸ Adding ‘metro Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston, Philadelphia, Washington, Miami, Atlanta and Boston to that group (totaling the country’s 10 most populous metros) … nearly one in three Americans lives in these few spots’.⁸ Rural areas have seen population declines, ‘neither attracting new residents nor producing many of their own’ with an ageing population in ‘non-metro America’.⁸

Similarly, in Canada (population about 37 million⁷), the largest cities, including Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver, ‘are expanding fastest on the fringes in spite of government efforts to contain growth and encourage density’.⁹ The ‘urban spread’ is towards Canada’s West as ‘The five fastest-growing cities – Calgary, Edmonton, Saskatoon, Regina and Lethbridge – are all in Alberta or Saskatchewan’.⁹

The McKinsey Global Institute claims:

More urbanized than any other region in the developing world, with 80 percent of its relatively young population (total about 428 m, including the Caribbean), Latin America is feeling the strain in terms of delivering basic services to their inhabitants.¹⁰

It is anticipated that the total population of Latin America will increase by about 4 million per year and that the number living in cities will rise to about 85 per cent by 2025. The 198 largest cities – defined as having populations of 200,000 or more – contribute more than 60 per cent of GDP but many ‘are grappling with traffic gridlock, housing shortages, and other symptoms of diseconomies of scale’.¹⁰ One of the major challenges facing the region’s top 10 cities is ‘to significantly enhance the productivity and number of jobs they generate in the formal economy and boost the efficiency of their operations and management’.¹⁰

Without decisive action by political and business leaders, it is possible that

By the second half of this century, Latin America’s demographic profile will look more like Europe’s, with a shrinking proportion of economically active young having to provide for a growing fraction of older people. The risk is that the region could grow old before it becomes rich if cities do not fulfill their potential.¹⁰

Statistics by the United Nations (UN) ‘show that the Caribbean (c.70 m) is one of the most highly urbanised regions in the world, with 66.2 percent of its population living in urban settlements – a proportion almost twice as high as those for Africa and Asia (39%)’.¹¹ However, ‘Since urbanization and urban planning are not viewed as crucial issues, the consequence has been ineffective land use, culminating in the avoidable loss of valuable lands which could be used for other pressing environmental and social interventions.’¹¹

According to Stacey Thomas at the University of the West Indies in Trinidad,¹¹ ‘The multitude of pressing problems that confront the region – such as informal settlements, environmental degradation, resource exhaustion, and underdeveloped infrastructure – necessitate immediate attention by planners.’ However, advocating ‘any type of sustainable urban form, compact or otherwise’ is difficult given ‘limited supporting documentation and a general lack of research on urban areas’.¹¹ It is clear that ‘urbanization and urban planning are not viewed as crucial issues’.¹¹ As a consequence, there has been ‘ineffective land use, culminating in the avoidable loss of valuable lands which could be used for other pressing environmental and social interventions’.¹¹

China: managing expanding populations

Unlike the estimated lower population growth in the Americas, China’s population – about 1.5 billion in 2018, increasing by about 6 milli...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• List of figures
• List of tables
• List of boxes
• Foreword
• Preface: averting apocalypse in the twenty-first century
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction: the state of planet Earth: time to ‘stop and think’!
• PART I: Safeguarding the health and well-being of people and planet
• PART II: Reflections on a changing world order
• PART III: Creating a ‘more just, sustainable and peaceful world’
• Epilogue: Homo Deus or Homo Humilem? The choice is ours
• About the author
• Index