Paradigm Shift for Environment
Performance to Sustainability
- UNESCAP executive secretary forecasts environmentally sustainable
production and consumption patterns

The fifth Ministerial Conference on Environment and Development in Asia and the Pacific, 2005 (MCED 2005) has initiated the need for a paradigm shift of production and consumption in Asia and the Pacific from "growth first, clean up later" to environmentally sustainable development, Kim Hak-su, United Nations Under-Secretary-General and Executive Secretary of UNESCAP, said.
"The past MCED conferences had taken up such global issues as climate change, biodiversity and marine coastal pollutions, but MCED 2005 has dealt with environmentally sustainable economic growth or "Green Growth" how to balance rapid economic growth and the environment in Asia and the Pacific", he said in an exclusive interview with NewsWorld on March 29. MCED 2005 adopted the Seoul Initiative on Green Growth as participating ministers from 52 countries wrapped up a two-day ministerial conference.
Many reports have been issued concerning the fifth year of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). Green Growth is aimed at combining the first one of the MDGS - beating poverty- and the seven one of the MDGS - achieving economic growth -, and the Asia and the Pacific has a target of reducing to half its portion of the world's poor people, now standing at 67 percent.
The problem is that Asia, emerging as a global economic center with global industrialization, is facing mounting pressure on natural resources beyond environmental carrying capacity, and the region is now capable of making economic growth, but a rapid economic stride will be no longer impossible in the next generation, Kim said.
Take China for instance where skyrocketing demands for crude oil and raw materials, including copper, aluminum, cement, rubber and cement, have caused price hikes hindering rapid economic growth. The pressing question on the environment is about how environmentally-friendly production can be made production with clean energy and renewable energy and employing natural resources saving method instead of reducing fossil fuels. Kim forecast that the region has a room to raise its portion of clean and renewable energy uses from the current 8 percent by turning more to hydroelectric, wind, and solar power.
Even Korea has performed well in terms of environmental performance, but it ranks 122nd among the 148 countries in terms of environmental sustainability. Under the current situation, Korea cannot continue to make a rapid economic growth, Kim said. Koreans use of electricity is three or four times that of Germans and use of water for showering and other purposes is lavish,
Production patterns needs to be changed with clean energy, while consumption patterns will be made with the three Rs approach, said Kim, adding that the three Rs refer to reduce, reuse and recycle waste.
Taking for example farmers, who are engaged in organic farming, are not only bringing big profits to them not only can make money, but benefit the environment and health of consumers.
Kim said the environmental industry will be good business opportunities, saying that a environmental new paradigm of consumption and production will bring about a new industry and a new market for environmentally-friendly technology and industry, thus creating jobs and the favorable impact on the national economy.
"We cannot continue with a "grow first, clean up later" policy, We need a new paradigm, a balance of economic growth and green growth, Kim said at the opening ceremony of the Conference, Kim told delegates that while the region's recent spectacular economic growth has contributed to the reduction of poverty and social progress in many places, it has also placed increasingly high pressure on the region's environmental resources beyond its carrying capacity."
He congratulated the governments for their sincere efforts to improve environmental performance, which have resulted in improvements in urban air quality in some cities, slowed rates of forest loss, increased forest planting rates and considerably reduced the use of ozone-depleting substances.
"On the other hand we still observe with concern: declines in fishery resources; degradation of marine and coastal resources; loss of biodiversity and forests; land degradation and natural disasters", he said. Deterioration of these natural resources have continued to affect human health and livelihoods, and increased the vulnerability of many economies. nw