Take advantage of the opportunity created by the pandemic in greening the economy

Photo: Charly Triballeau Agence France-Presse
A factory of transformation of solar energy in Japan

New voices are urging governments and companies to take advantage of the opportunity offered by the pandemic of sars coronavirus to engage more resolutely in favour of an economic recovery more in harmony with nature in order to save lives, create jobs and produce more wealth in Canada, as elsewhere in the world.

The fulfilment by Canada of its promises of reductions of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and could save more than 100,000 lives and create 1.3 million new sustainable jobs between 2030 and 2050, concludes a report released Tuesday by a coalition of 17 associations of health professionals, quebec and canada.

“At this precise time, we have the opportunity to build a Canada, Quebec, better, healthier and more prosperous,” summed up one of their spokesman, the p.-d. g. of the Association of canadian and quebec of physicians for the environment (ACQME), Robin Edger.

For the moment unlikely, the breach by Canada of carbon neutrality for 2050 would contribute to slow down the increase of extreme weather events, heat waves, atmospheric pollution and their attendant cardiovascular and respiratory diseases, asthma, diabetes, cancer, appearance of insect vectors of diseases and other health problems mental and physical.

In the end, the only improvement of the quality of the air would avoid of 5700 and 11 100 premature deaths per year, for a total of more than 112 000 lives have been saved between 2030 and 2050, and savings in health costs from 30 to 100 billion per year.

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Good for the economy

The economy could not be more wrong, the total number of jobs in Canada way, in the meantime, the equivalent of 19.5 million to 23.6 million, including 1.3 million more in the economic sectors, ” clean “, that is, 500 000 better that if the current trend continued.

But to do this, we should not only double, as planned, investments in the clean economy (22 billion in 2020 to $ 44 billion in 2050), but the quadruple (91 billion), according to the ACQME.

It also puts forward 25 recommendations, ranging from the establishment of a legislative framework explicit decarbonisation of the economy and the expansion of green spaces, passing by the achievement of zero emission of GHG by 10 years for the production of electricity and transportation and by 2050 for road vehicles and buildings.

400 million jobs

This call of health care professionals in Canada for a green stimulus to the economy adds to several other outputs of the same kind, in recent weeks, including the united Nations and the international monetary Fund.

The Davos economic Forum should also attach his voice, this Wednesday, with a report on the mirror, for its part, the creation of nearly 400 million jobs by 2030 and to more than 10 000 billion US $opportunities for additional business in the world if governments and corporations are taking advantage of the necessary measures of economic recovery to finally show more listens to the limitations and possibilities of nature.

Humans will not be able to, for example, continue to impoverish the soils and contribute to climate disruption by taking 75 % of their food from only 12 plant species and five animal species, whereas little is known about substitutes for plants that require 99 % less water, and 97% less land, and emit 96 % fewer greenhouse gases than the production of beef, or that technology “precision farming” exist and would allow for an efficiency improvement of 40 % and the return on investment of 10 %.

“We need to use the crisis caused by the pandemic coronavirus as an opportunity to reset the relationship of humanity with nature,” says the president of Costa Rica, Carlos Alavarado Quesada, quoted in a press release.

“Enterprises have a critical role to play in the environmental management of our planet “, noted the deputy secretary general of the UN, Inger Andderson.

“They have the technology, innovation and the financing necessary to effect the changes we need “.