Beating unemployment with sustainable life
- Written by Jack Soifer
At least in most of Europe the current crisis is not only a financial or economic, it’s also a structural crisis.
Globalisation has been good for very large cartels which decide sales conditions, product and price and only apparently compete in marketing. Governments do not have the power to confront them in order to protect the consumers or the SMEs which in cartels buy their raw materials, such as steel, cement, fuel, telecom. These firms wish no change; their profits hardly shrink.
It’s in a crisis when we have the opportunity to introduce improvements. We have it right now, it’s time to act!
Since the Environmental Summit in Rio de Janeiro, 1992, governments have been talking about fair development. Not much happened in 20 years. We still use a wealth of crude oil, endangering our planet. We still spoil natural resources, as if they would last forever; coming generations will have to find substitutes for them.
Automation made it possible to make more goods with less manpower. Instead of importing fewer luxury items and keeping fair pensions for an aging population so they can continue to consume essential goods, we follow this parole of globalisation and let SMEs, which keep our population employed, go bankrupt.
Sustainable construction uses most of local materials, made by more manpower and less capital, in medium-sized plants. Sustainable are low buildings, which don’t use expensive and power-spoiling lifts, or steel and much less cement. They use plenty of locally available insulation materials, in order to save energy. Local materials result in less freight, less crude.
Sustainable transportation integrates all kind of means, from walking or biking to the nearest bus stop then with train-tram or tram downtown. Although using plenty of steel, each wagon takes the equivalent people to 60-90 cars, and saves materials and energy. What’s best is the installation, operation and maintenance of public transportation which employ locals. It normally uses biogas from sludge or electricity from waves or wind power.
Sustainable development means changing our life styles, from consuming what TV and the foreign advertising bureaus push for, using the most advanced neural-emotional research, to the basics which our grandparents talked about. And they were happy, had time to enjoy life with friends, to enjoy their unspoiled environment, no security problems, no stress, just a great time.
Most regulating agencies don’t do what they are supposed to, guarantee free competition and the best for the populations. The food industry uses plenty of poison to prolong the shelf time for most foodstuff. Most new drugs no longer cure us and strengthen our own body functions, but weaken them and make us dependent on pills the rest of our lives.
We do have technology to avoid those fallacies and develop a sustainable environment and life. This is what most of the people wish, not a dozen corporations.
It’s up to governments to use this crisis to start governing again, for employment and the welfare of the people in the EU. You can tell politicians, write to editors, insulate your home, use the bike, change from drugs to herbs. YES WE CAN – TOGETHER!
By Jack Sofier
International consultant, author of Entrepreneuring Sustainable Tourism, The Future of Tourism and Como Sair da Crise
