High time that we all start taking our responsibility
It is unimaginable to realize how much damage our blind consumer attitude, irresponsible financial profit (1 x WIN) business management and corrupt governance has done to us as humankind and our planet. In Sustainocracy we introduce an open space where shared responsibility for our core natural values makes the difference. We use UNITED (government, citizens, business, science and education), 4 x WIN entrepreneurship and the Transformation Economy. But if we keep neglecting the invitation we face disaster after disaster. Now we are getting gradually into a situation that irresponsible people can be prosecuted. But why do we have to go to such length to save our lives from the greedy or tunnel visioned? This can be avoided when we join the right level of shared responsability.
Positive signs are there but we have a long way to go, we run out of time, and some issues seem hard to tackle without a world crisis first.
River in Indonesia
This river is so heavily polluted that it is health hazard for everyone. Industries that supply fashion to the Western world dump irresponsibly their waste. People and government do too. As if we are blindly leaving nature to solve our mess. Taking responsibility requires the involvement of everyone.
Las Vegas inhundation
Las Vegas is a popular gambling city in America. It has grown so intensely in the desert that it is facing serious problems. This weekend, for the second time, it was hit by huge rainfall. That is not the only issue. The nearby colorado river and lake that provides water to the city is drying our at a rapid pace.
Chinese possible economic collapse
The banking crisis in 2008 was a show of desastrous financial opportunism that backfired, leaving the entire world in a deep crisis. The way the crisis was tackled, using enormous capital injections into the financial world instead of the real economy of care and innovation, was equally monstrously wrong. China is facing the same now, possibly dragging the rest of the world into a new financial black hole. High time to leave this capitalist mentality, even consider it a crime against humanity.
European rivers dry up
The enormous heatwave this year again shows its impact on the European rivers. These rivers are important infrastructures for logistics, but also key ecological elements for balancing our living habitat, providing drinking water and irrigation for agriculture. Especially the way we manipulated our landscapes for single crop production uses up lots of water that with other, more nature based techniques would not be necessary. We create our own problems that are impossible to solve if we don´t address the root cause: our lack of responsibility for our core natural values. We are not working WITH nature, we are taking abuse of it and this hits us back like this.
Our trash
Our irresponsible consumption lifestyle produces uncanning amounts of trash. In many cities this is burned, producing the illusion of green energy at the expense of all the natural resources put into the original production. In other places the trash is dumped in landfills. Despite some energy deliverables the pollution impact is huge. Also diseases spread by birds are a serious issue. Some landfills have even become the “home” of poverty that does some “treasure hunting” among the waste of others.
Our throw away clothes
We may throw away our used clothes, hoping that the textile is being reused as a resource, reducing the amount of cotton or synthetic fibres needed from nature. Truth is that it is being shipped to Africa, sold to the reuse market and the surpluses (up to 90%) dumped on huge landfills. Fashion industries overproduce worldwide, pollution with their factories as we have seen in the first video (Indonesia) while misusing the locals as cheap human resources. The pollution then continuous at the end of the usage cycle in Africa. The overall destruction of our habitat, our health and safety for the future, in the entire chain has reached criminal proportions. The only way to change this is to dismantle the chain and leverage it to a circular, regenerative approach in which ALL stakeholders (consumers, entreprises, government) take their responsibility together. Sustainocracy can be the sollution but needs to be supported by a new legislation covering our basic responsibilities, like expressed in the declaration of our governing principles.
Cities discover nature again for their sustainability challenges
With gratitud to all those videomakers that show us cities around the world and the way they deal with their sustainability priorities, explaining also their motives and progress. Sharing these stories and innovations may inspire other cities to do the same.
We will recognize some of the essential core values of Sustainocracy however still explained from a sustainable (re)positioning of the city in question. It is only a matter of time for the human and city sustainability issues to get interwoven at level 4 to cover the entire spectrum of the shared responsibilities.
Tucson / Arizona – North America
Observe how a citizen took “illegal steps” to break the side walks of the roads for water management and restoring green oasis in his neighborhood. Now it is not illegal anymore. We can even see the innovation back in the greening plans of New York in the next video. The core value here is of course water. It shows the responsibility of the population and their usage of water for their lawns, pools, etc. It is also interesting to see how young families choose to move to urban spaces that are closer to their own family values of health and safety at affordable prices. If cities want to remain attractive for residents then these are points of attention.
New York
Inspiration from nature and working together with nature is saving New York gradually from severe problems caused by heavy rain fall and storms. This huge city of nearly 9 million people and 66 million yearly visitors needs to invest heavily on its sustainability issues.
Singapore
This video produced by Singapore itself is showing the sustainability challenges a city has when it wants to attend its many functions, which are not all seen from a sustainable human perspective. The limited space of the Singapore island stimulates creativity. Good to see the self sustaining steps in local food too. Remarkable is the passion of the people leading these transformations. It shows guts, great teamwork and clear understanding of their mission.
Mexico city
One of the most inspiring and disturbing images in this video is the one about the ancient Tenochtitlan, as the city was called upon it foundation in 1325 by the Aztecs. Inspiring, because it shows its fully regenerative, sustainocratic functioning back then. Disturbing, because with all our “modernization” since the Spanish occupation, all this disappeared and needs to be reinvented.
Food forests, a solution for exterme drought
It is disturbing to see that we need severe global climate crises to bring common sense to our food system. Today a Dutch paper headed: Food forest is the solution for the extreme drought. Amazing that for decades we have cut half the world´s tree population for single crop food, biofuel, animal food production. All for the sake of a political financial dominance, creating world dependence or deadly poverty where there was regional food resilience before. It is causing massive climate disturbance, water shortages alternating with servere and devastating floods, hunger in the world, destruction of natural habitats and food supplies for local people. And now suddenly “food forests are THE solution“! Shame on global greed.
One of the most active countries in restoring their tree population is China. Their approach has been as industrial as their economy. On the other hand it shows commitment and a huge amount of lessons to learn.
In our online OSFD discussion this month, about re-storing our food resilience, we dealt with our natural right to be self sufficient as communities. This is only possible if our habitats are not destroyed by the industrial capitalist monsters of single crop productivity. It will not be long before such practices will be fought in court and it is only a matter of time until they are criminalized. Again, it is absurde that we need to go to court to defend our right to live in harmony with our planet.
Our FRE2SH cooperative approach is to bring all stakeholders (citizens, farmers, government, science) to the table together. The mission is to restore our regional resilience by working together with the laws of nature for our food, water, health and safety. We leverage food to the level of shared responsibility instead of a commercial and speculative commodity.
Sustainocracy, the new democracy 