Wednesday, December 14, 2011

Reflections on green economy - panel discussion

What do you think about the relation between economy growth and the use of energy? Do you think there is a problem about our rate of consumption? ‘Go green’ is ok but governments never talk about change in consumption...

You talked about green economy. But from your experiences, do you see a real political commitment from local and national governments? Is there a change in thinking green?

These were questions raised in the chat of the panel discussion “Keeping up the local climate work in times of crisis”. What kind of crisis are we talking about? Economic crisis is apparent, but as Holger Robrecht pointed out we are actually experiencing a triple crisis: economic crisis is very much related and caused by the environmental crisis, and neither of these can be solved without addressing also people’s wellbeing and social justice.

The example from the City of Malmö was seen as an inspiration (see the keynote paper by the Mayor of Malmö here): the City of Malmö has gone through a deep structural crisis but has based its future strongly on principles of sustainable development and has found a totally new greener way of growth.

Even though the concept of green economy needs definition, the panel could agree on that the new green technology has an important role to play in the transition and can be seen as an opportunity to local government.

Integrated management system IMS was seen not as a tool for paperwork but more as a way of thinking and mobilizing local resources and actors. We don’t need only good planning but also evaluation of where we are and how are we reaching our goals regarding different aspects of sustainability.

No comments:

Post a Comment