Prospectus of
The Global Issues Project
A Project initiated by
and supported by
Canadian Pugwash Group and
Canadian Association for the Club of Rome
Synopsis
Rapidly growing demand, resulting from rising global population, rising per-capita consumption, and the spread of harmful or inappropriate technologies, is causing an upward trend in the use of resources and stresses on environmental sinks. At the same time, supplies of some renewable resources are decreasing, supplies of some non-renewables are coming to an end, and pollution is accelerating. The Global Issues Project is designed to study these trends, to try to understand when possible shortages might occur, to explain inter-relationships between vital factors, and to consider strategies that might help humankind to manage its way through the anticipated shortages.
The issues
There are serious threats to global stability arising from rapid consumption of key resources. The symptoms are climate change, increasingly violent weather patterns, melting glaciers, shortages of water, depletion of fisheries, disappearance of forests, and impending food and agriculture crises. The existence of these alarming developments is well supported by scientific findings. Relative to the usual horizon for planning processes in society, these issues are very long-term and are interdependent. While governments, organizations, and corporations are taking small and positive corrective steps, there remains a large gap between actual and required actions in order to protect resources for future generations.
There are two fundamental concerns:
- rising demands for several of the resources are expected to exceed global supplies within the next forty years, and
- all of the crucial global issues are interdependent so that failure of one resource or one cultural process has immediate implications for several other global issues and would bring about serious additional ecological damage.
Our collective concern is the failure of governments at all levels to consider the crucial global issues that threaten the life-supporting resources on Earth and on the need for society’s opinion makers to start looking at long-term issues that threaten global security.
A group of Canadian modelers have revisited the Club of Rome's (CoR's) Limits to Growth work of the 1970s, and have developed a state-of-the-art, integrated assessment model called the "Global Systems Simulator" (GSS). The business-as-usual scenarios produced by the GSS have been consistent with the alarming conclusions reached by the CoR studies 30 years ago.
The Global Issues Project seeks to build a critical mass of key people who are educated about, and interested in, these crucial Issues. The project will provide participants with a good grasp of the Big Picture as it relates to the position of humankind within the supporting structure of the biosphere, and thus enable them to act in their own spheres of influence.
How to achieve a critical mass of knowledge
For most people, it is difficult to obtain a good grasp of the Big Picture. Day-to-day events proceed more or less routinely — food arrives from nearby farms or from orchards halfway around the globe — and life goes on. Most people, especially in North America, are oblivious to clear evidence of excess use of global resources, especially non-renewable resources, to climate change, or to wastage in general — to name only a few factors.
There is growing evidence that the Earth is overstrained by an expanding population and an increasing per-capita consumption. In addition to over-consumption, we are also faced with the so-called “sinks” becoming over-loaded; water and air is becoming polluted and the search for landfill sites to take the waste from our larger cities is already a political nightmare. The increasing use of energy-intensive technologies, such as the automobile, adds greatly to the stresses. Therefore, we humans should review our stewardship of planet Earth, our only home.
Some people point to expected innovative techno-fixes as the solution to such problems. However, Ronald Wright in his book, A Short History of Progress, argues that all innovations since those developed by the early hunter-gatherers have assisted humankind in harvesting nature’s resources. For example, the over-harvesting of many ocean fisheries has already depleted stocks of many species in ways that currently appear irreversible.
We propose a process by which opinion makers can explore the factors that could contribute to a possible collapse and, using Simulation that is already available to us, test strategies that might make such a collapse avoidable.
Unless the present usage pattern is controlled, global resources and environmental sinks that seem to be stretched well beyond sustainability are:
- food and agriculture,
- forests,
- water,
- oceans and fisheries,
- energy.
The other factors or issues that can lead to possible collapse are:
- population,
- climate change,
- disease,
- waste and pollution,
- war and military consumption and waste,
- inappropriate technologies and inappropriate myths,
- faulty social structures.
What we can do toward a successful outcome
Our plan is to explore the Big Picture by studying the crucial global issues one at a time, as individual components of a conceptual global model. We are proposing a comprehensive series of Roundtables, starting with the issues where urgency and importance combine to make action essential. The presentations, discussions groups, and workshops will be designed to attract opinion makers, particularly those within the media; the education system; the business community; non-governmental organizations; the planning communities in the public sector; and politicians at all levels of government.
The Global Systems Simulator
The Roundtables will explore strategies for dealing with supply/demand tensions using the Global Systems Simulator in much the same way that a computerized Flight Simulator is used to teach aircraft pilots.
Basic resources, such as oil or forests, can be tabulated with regard to both supply and demand. The GSS is a highly aggregated model of the global physical economy; the data cover the 54-year period from 1950 to 2004; these data are used to calibrate the history of usage of global resources by humankind. The Global Systems Simulator looks not only at supply and demand information but also at the interconnections with other resources such as energy and agricultural supplies. The probable supply of a resource, such as oil, can be estimated and projected into the future. Similarly, the consumption of a resource can be calculated (based on population and per capita usage) and usage trends compared to the supply curves.
Our plan for Roundtables
Our plan for each Roundtable:
- to bring together experts on the focal issue to exchange views with other experts and with concerned individuals,
- to stimulate discussion by circulating survey papers prior to the Roundtable,
- to acquire the most up-to-date information from these experts,
- to consider the role of the focal issue, or resource, in relation to other important issues,
- to explore adaptation strategies using the Global Systems Simulator with a view to controlling demand for resources so that well-being of future generations will be secure,
- to make recommendations for action to decision makers in government and in civil society, and
- to publish the discoveries from each Roundtable in a format designed to assist the general public to become familiar with the crucial Global Issues facing humankind.
The first international Roundtable was held in September 2006, with forests as the focus. The participants examined the ecological role of global forests, considered their preservation in the face of accelerating demand for wood, and explored the inter-relationships between forests and the other crucial issues. The Faculty of Forestry at the University of Toronto collaborated in the organization of the Roundtable and participated actively in the event.
The format of the Roundtables will include scientific presentations, workshops, and discussion groups held, ideally, in retreat settings. A profile of the participants to be invited to each Roundtable is as follows:
- Experts on the focal issue, both Canadian and International,
- Government officials (Federal and Provincial) responsible for the focal issue,
- A partner from WhatIf? Technologies (modeling and simulation group),
- Leaders of grass roots organizations dedicated to the main issue,
- Leaders in the industries related to the main issue,
- Other government officials or leading politicians from affected countries,
- Scholars from Canadian and International universities in divers fields,
- Media representatives,
Resources required for the Global Issues Project
The project received approval from the Board of Directors of Science for Peace and was awarded start-up funding. It has subsequently received similar approval from the Canadian Pugwash Group. The financial participation of additional donors and grantors is now being sought, to complete the funding requirements for additional Roundtables.
Future Planning, Output, and Follow-up from the Roundtables
For each Roundtable, the Planning Group will appoint a Follow-up Committee to supervise the preparation of the full report and to manage the distribution of the report and related materials. It is anticipated that a Follow-up Committee will be active for a period of about six months after the completion of each Roundtable. Its responsibility will be to contact appropriate government departments, relevant industries, interested media outlets, and concerned NGOs. The Follow-up Committee will be expected to explore the need for a possible further Roundtable on the same issue and to consider communications with similar groups in other countries, and to identify needs for new research and propose and encourage such research.
Contacts:
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Derek Paul 416-532-6440 farp@sympatico.ca
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Ken MacKay 519-822-4174 kmackay@uoguelph.ca
Participating Groups:
Science for Peace (SfP) is a charitable corporation founded in 1981 which brings together professors, graduate students and first degree students who are concerned about peace, justice and making an environmentally sustainable future. SfP has NGO status at the United Nations.
The Canadian Pugwash Group (CPG) brings together influential scientists and scholars to focus on the promotion of change to advance the cause of peace; the group is concerned with all causes of global insecurity, including the problems of nuclear war.
The Canadian Association for the Club of Rome (CACOR) promotes study and discussion on the nature of world problems.
WhatIf? Technologies is a private company providing technology and services for strategic planning and scenario analysis, including specifically foresight through interactive modelling and simulation.
Individual members of the Planning Committee for the Global Issues Project
- Adele Buckley, aerospace engineering, PhD, DSc; Chairperson, CPG; member, SfP; Vice-President, Technology and Research, Ontario Centre for Energy Technology Advancement
- Helmut Burkhardt, physics, Dr.rer.nat.; Board member, SfP; Chairman of Board, Council on Global Issues (CGI); member, CPG
- James Goring, educator, MSc.; member SfP and CACOR
- Robert Hoffman, economics, MSc.; partner, WhatIf? Technologies; member, CACOR
- Kenneth MacKay, agriculture, PhD; member, CACOR and SfP
- John D. McRuer, environmental strategy, MSc.; member, SfP and CACOR
- Derek Paul, physics, PhD; Executive member, SfP; member and former Executive member, CPG; Board member, CGI; Fellow, World Innovation Foundation
- Barbara Zimmerman, forestry, PhD; member of Conservation International
Individual Members of the Advisory Group for the Global Issues Project
- Bob Fletcher, agriculture, PhD; former Executive Director of the Nat. Adv. Comm. on Water Resources; past chairman of CACOR
- Bert McInnis, physics, PhD; partner, WhatIf? Technologies