A Bit of Sweden Promotion

Thought I'd list some studies and surveys I've come across recently that give Sweden top grade in the various areas compared. You are allowed to be proud of your country, right!

• * Sweden among the world's best trade nations - Only Singapore, Hong Kong, Switzerland and Denmark score higher. Why? The answer is smooth border administration, efficient transportation and communication systems and a thriving business environment.
• * Northern Europe 'better' for SMEs - This includes Sweden among the top six or seven countries.
• * Stockholm, Europe's first green capital - The first "winner" of this new European award is Stockholm (for 2010). Stockholm is good at including environmental aspects in its city planning and have made much progress on problems such as air pollution, traffic, greenhouse gas emissions and waste management. (Although this work has been slowed down since the current local government came into power, in my view.)
• * Sweden promotes climate-smart food - Climate-smart food is the topic for one of the conferences held under the Swedish Presidency of the EU. Sweden has sent out guidelines for climate-friendly food choices - basically advice to reduce one's meat and rice consumption -, the first of their kind, for reactions and inspiration from other EU countries. According to Swedish statistics, Swedes eat an average of ten kilos per person more meat annually than ten years ago (making it 65 kilos a year). Ten kilos! That's a big change in only ten years! Did you know that one kilo of beef contributes up to 15-25 kilos of greenhouse gases - which is ten times more than the carbon footprint of the equivalent amount of chicken?! Think about this next time you go shopping! I'm not asking you to become a vegetarian - I'm not either - but I try to limit the amount of meat (any kind) I eat. A piece of meat gives you protein for four days so it's not like you have to eat meat every day.
• * Sweden most innovative country in the EU - Sweden is one of the "innovation leaders" together with Finland, Germany, Denmark and the UK (in that order). Sweden is especially strong when it comes to human resources, investments in R&D and measures to promote innovation in companies. Something that could still improve is commercialising discoveries and innovations, a general problem for Europe.
• * Sweden most sustainable society - The results is based on 2 indicators including air and water quality, health, renewable energy use, gender equality and education.

Global Talk with Miliband

British Foreign Secretary David Miliband was in Sweden yesterday, a visit that I helped to set up. The Minister of course met with his Swedish opposite number, Foreign Minister Carl Bildt, and the Leader of the Opposition, Social Democrat Mona Sahlin, but he also took part in two interactive sessions, one at a local upper secondary school specialising in globalisation and sustainable development and one at Fryshuset, a social project centre.

At the upper secondary school he discussed globalisation and climate change with pupils in year 2 (17-year-olds). The whole event was webcasted and you can hear both Miliband's short introductory speech and the Q&A session between him and the students. (If you look carefully you might spot me at the back of the room towards the door!)

In his speech Miliband said that globalisation has benefited - especially countries such as Sweden and the UK - substantially. Trade has made us richer, cultural exchange has given us a much more dynamic society, and co-operation with other states makes our countries stronger and more influential.

But it has also brought a new type of uncertainty within both the economy and politics that forces states to act in a new way. Issues that belonged to domestic politics have now become "foreign policy". Environmental issues reflects this phenomenon very well. Earlier the problems were local, e.g. the smog in London caused by industrialisation. Today there are global problems that must be solved with global solutions. The environment is a very important issue also on the agenda of foreign ministers.

Miliband said - and this is one of the most interesting points - that climate change is not just or mainly an environmental problem. Environmental problems is a symptom while the problems are those of conflicts (over resources) and forced migration. These are issues that have consequences for other countries since large groups are forced to migrate. In that way climate change is strongly linked to both economic issues and foreign policy.

Another interesting point Miliband made is that it is important to see that the solutions (i.e. reducing carbon emissions) are not strictly technical. It is about ethics and values. The technology exists but the problem is who should pay, who should bear the burden.

Also, if you take it down to the individual level, Miliband said that we all have an individual responsibility to reduce our personal carbon footprint. But governments have to make it easy for people to raise their awareness and change their behaviour, for example by regulating against fossil-high cars and low-efficient lightbulbs.

I will post the link to the Fryshuset event once it is up.

The World Is a Sick, Sick Place

I read in Financial Times the other day that the World Food Programme, the UN's organ to fight starvation in the world, has difficulty to balance its budget. One reason is that the price of grains is increasing, as a result of increased demand for bio-fuels in the developed world. Crops that earlier have gone to starving people in countries such as Chad and Etiophia now go to changeover the western world's transport to environmentally friendly.

I.e. the West is now going to burn what others want to eat.

The changeover from oil dependance to other fuels is of course important, but are we going to do it at the expense of efforts to alleviate starvation? There must be some way to reconcile the work to reduce poverty and starvation and the work for a better environment!

The Ecological Clock

Three days ago, on 9 October, it was the Day of the Ecological Debt. For 20 years, the British organisation New Economics Foundation has kept count of our consumption of natural resources and every year they select an "overshoot day", on which we start overdrawing our natural supplies. What is scary is that this day enter earlier and earlier every year. In 1987 it was on 19 December; in 1995 21 November; but today, 2006, it was 9 October.

The ecological debt keeps on ticking, year after year. From 9 October we are living beyond the earth's means. Humanity has already consumed its quota of resources that can be renewed during this year, and we're draining on the ecological capital, and on the future of our children and children's children. To put it differently, it takes a year and three months to re-create what we have already consumed during the year. What's worse is that it is those who are least responsible for the consumption who suffer the most.