The original Earth Day took place on April 22, 1970, following on the heels of a teach-in on the environment, hosted by a handful of students and staff at the University of Michigan. Arthur J. Hanson, a former president of IISD, was one of them. Here, he reflects on how plans for a "relatively small event" exploded into a global movement.

I spent five days at the University of Michigan this March, celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Teach-in on the Environment that was held there from March 11 to 14, 1970.

At the time, I was studying for my PhD in ecology. The teach-in concept was cooked up by a small group and led by three of us—at first independently of Senator Gaylord Nelson and his idea of Earth Day, though we ultimately joined forces after a great deal of cross-communication. We mutually agreed that the University of Michigan event in mid-March would be the testing ground for the first Earth Day on April 22, 1970.

We had in mind a relatively small event, perhaps a thousand people. Given the times in the United States, we envisioned patterning it after the recent teach-ins on the Vietnam War.

To our surprise, it became one of the largest events in the history of the university, involving the whole town of Ann Arbor, popular celebrities of the day such as Gordon Lightfoot and the cast of the musical Hair, and some 150 events spread over a week. By some estimates, 50,000 people participated. There were more than 13,000 attendees at the kick-off event, and we had to turn people away.

The inaugural Earth Day: "Four solid days of soul-searching"

Our theme was “Give Earth a Chance,” which saw great publicity across the nation. We attracted to the event all the major TV networks and reporters from all the big papers, including the New York Times, which described the event as “one of the most extra ordinary ‘happenings’ ever to hit the great American heartland: Four solid days of soul‐searching, by thousands of people, young and old, about ecological exigencies confronting the human race.”

Newsweek magazine ran an article with a picture of our button, and we were inundated with orders for buttons from groups across the country planning for Earth Day.

Our event was a huge success and launched subsequent teach-ins and community gatherings on a scale never seen before in the United States or perhaps anywhere.

The triumvirate of leaders included an undergrad student, Doug Scott; a Canadian PhD student, David Allan; and me. Doug and David were co-chairs and I was the finance chair, among other responsibilities (we raised about half a million dollars in today’s value plus untold amounts of in-kind contributions).

Preparations took six months, and we worked with an incredible team of hundreds of volunteers, a steering group of about 13 people—many of whom were from the community of Ann Arbor, including university professors and students—and expertise drawn from sources around the continent. We had the full support of the senior administration, from the U of M president down.

Many stories can be told, but what I discovered personally was the magnitude of what can be accomplished by a small group of people in the right place at the right time. We were riding a wave and, it seemed, could achieve the impossible. This was an experience never to be forgotten and, in some ways, never to be repeated. It helped shape the lives and careers not only of the three of us who started it but also of many others, as we discovered at the 50th anniversary celebration. For me, it changed my career goal from scientist to interpreter of science for new directions in public policy.

Many stories can be told, but what I discovered personally was the magnitude of what can be accomplished by a small group of people in the right place at the right time. We were riding a wave and, it seemed, could achieve the impossible.

We had some funds left over after the event and wanted the teach-in to leave a legacy for the City of Ann Arbor. So we invested these funds to start a non-governmental organization, for which I was one of five people who signed the inception papers and turned over the seed funds. We patterned this organization, The Ecology Center, after one started the year before in Berkeley, California. It took off from ENACT (Environmental Action Now!), the registered student organization we set up for the original teach-in.

Earth Day, ENACT, and The Ecology Center

The Ecology Center was an almost immediate success and became deeply involved in recycling initiatives. Since that time, it has undertaken many good efforts, not only in the city but elsewhere in Michigan and other places. Over the years, the Ecology Center has raised more than USD 200 million and has an annual budget of about USD 8 million. All from a starting investment of only USD 10,000. 

In 1970–71, Dave Allan and I co-authored a book with articles by various speakers from the teach-in with the not-very-inspired title Recycle This Book. It is now out of print, but when I look at some of the articles, it seems they could have been written yesterday.

Adam Rome, now at Buffalo University, wrote a very thoughtful book in 2013 called The Genius of Earth Day: How a 1970 Teach-in Unexpectedly Made the First Green Generation. It starts with the University of Michigan event and runs through the beginning of the second decade of this century. He paints a picture that suggests a freshness to the U of M event that was hard to replicate later, despite the great success of some subsequent Earth Day events.

Matthew Lassiter, a history professor at the University of Michigan working with his students, university archivists, and others, is keeping alive the 1970 event and asking what has changed since then. He recently helped prepare an article on the U of M teach-in for the Smithsonian Magazine, which includes a half-hour video made at the time in 1970.

One event that happened during the teach-in that seems to be fascinating for many people is the trial of an automobile, leading to its execution on the University Quad. Brave, considering that, at the time, Detroit was the leading car manufacturer in the world.

We talk about “flattening the curve” to control the pandemic, but it is “bending the curve” for the environment that must happen to bring about harmony between people and nature.

The biggest difference between 1970 and today is our ability to communicate globally about everything. I have celebrated Earth Day in various parts of the world—Indonesia, China, and of course, Canada. Back in 1970, we were thrilled just to have a film crew show up from Japan. At that time, we talked about the Great Lakes dying; now, we talk about global warming, climate change, and the worldwide environmental crisis.

Until the COVID-19 pandemic came along, 2020 was expected to be the Super Year of the Environment. It is urgent that even as we “virtually” celebrate Earth Day 2020, we should make the coming years a Super Decade of the Environment. We talk about “flattening the curve” to control the pandemic, but it is “bending the curve” for the environment that must happen to bring about harmony between people and nature.

National Geographic magazine recently put out a special issue devoted to Earth Day 2070. They made it a flip issue, half devoted to a grim future and half to an optimistic view of what can be expected by Earth Day’s centennial birthday. For the sake of our children and our grandchildren, I hope reality will be the latter.

Speaking of children, it bears mentioning that, six years after the very first Earth Day, our daughter was born—on April 22, 1976. So we now have two excellent reasons to honour that day in our family!

Arthur J. Hanson is an Officer of the Order of Canada and a Distinguished Fellow with IISD following his term as President and CEO from 1991-98. For more information on the origins of Earth Day, see the Environmental Justice HistoryLab site.

As communities across Canada grapple with the deadly and damaging effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, we have a rare window right now into how important it is to prepare for a crisis.

Preparedness is the kind of thing you often think about only when it’s too late. Other, more immediate priorities always seem to steal our attention. But we are seeing up close what a difference advanced planning can make: it has been heartbreaking to see healthcare workers scrambling to find protective gear and equipment, including masks that cost less than a dollar.

As a nation, Canada can learn from this and do a better job of being prepared for the next shocks, especially the ones we know are coming from climate change: more severe floods, droughts, heatwaves, and hurricanes.

What types of advance planning matter most in Canada?

First, we need to know what’s coming and what’s at stake. We should act now to pull together accessible data and identify climate risk priorities across the country so that we have a roadmap in hand, one we can use to accelerate efforts to prepare ourselves. Many communities still need to better understand and analyze their risks and the investments they should be making. A 2019 study about preparedness in Manitoba municipalities showed that very few of them had brought climate change into their development plans.

Second, clear communication is essential. As we’ve seen during the COVID-19 crisis, people need to make quick and informed decisions to protect themselves and their loved ones. Taken early enough, these decisions can help prevent a crisis from escalating. But getting people to understand a threat and change their behaviours means communicating complex information—which can be riddled with uncertainty—in clear, timely, and accurate ways. It also means being coordinated and integrated; we must ensure cities, provinces, and the federal government have complementary messaging throughout the crisis.

Communications during a crisis must be coordinated and integrated to be effective; we must ensure cities, provinces, and the federal government have complementary messaging.

Looking ahead to climate impacts, we should act now to link our disaster risk reduction community—government departments like Public Safety and humanitarian organizations like the Canadian Red Cross—directly to the new Canadian Centres for Climate Services being set up across the country to better communicate with Canadian communities.

Third, we need to act. This pandemic has made it clear how important it is to continuously invest in protection against possible crisis scenarios. We’ve seen how not replacing expired stockpiles of medical masks has proven dangerous. There are various lists of priority infrastructure investments that Canada should address immediately to get prepared. Some are small and can be done quickly at home—such as installing backwater valves in new home construction to help avoid basement flooding. Some, like protections against seawater rise, are large enough to help with economic stimulus efforts. At the very least, all infrastructure projects should continue to be subject to the federal climate lens.

Infrastructure investments should also include nature-based solutions, where sustainably managing our landscapes helps us prevent future damage. Launching a massive effort to plant two billion trees or restore wetlands has the added benefit of replenishing the natural world that is so important to our physical and mental health in times of crisis.

Taking these steps requires collaboration. The final critical lesson we have learned over the past few weeks is how important strong social networks are in times of stress. Exchanging strategies for homeschooling, talking to loved ones in care homes, giving children a number to call if staying home is more dangerous than going to school—these have all been key to helping us do our part. And social distancing has shown us how critical, even life-saving, reliable Internet access is, reinforcing the need to address rural broadband issues and close the digital divide.

Sustainably managing our landscapes helps prevent further damage. Launching a massive effort to plant two billion trees or restore wetlands has the added benefit of replenishing the natural world that is so important to our physical and mental health in times of crisis.

Networks can also be useful in advance of a shock. In fact, they can be used to plan for one. For years, networks like C40 Cities have been sharing experiences and best practices for adapting to a hotter future. International networks of developing countries hardest hit by climate change are using innovative peer learning to make sure they mount effective defences. Inspired by an example in Vanuatu shared through a global climate adaptation network, Madagascar set up a specific national committee to coordinate it’s planning. And Grenada, informed by experiences in Albania, decided to involve the private sector and community organizations in their preparations for climate shocks. We should be investing in these preventative networks and opportunities for shared learning across Canada now.

If there’s one thing to take away from the events of the last month, it's that sometimes, to avoid the worst, we need to act in ways that seem disproportionate to our current reality. Let’s make sure the hard lessons we’re learning during this global pandemic don’t go to waste when the next crisis hits.

This article originally appeared in The National Observer on April 23, 2020.

In times of unprecedented crisis, government leadership means being bold. But as Canada and its provinces prepare to roll out record-breaking emergency responses to help the newly jobless and throw lifelines to drowning sectors, it’s becoming clear that not all support is created equal.

Alberta Premier Jason Kenney announced Tuesday that unemployment could rise to at least 25%, or upwards of 500,000 workers. To bolster Alberta’s economy, he called for the federal government to commit at least CAD 20 billion to CAD 30 billion in liquidity for oil and gas producers. This came on the heels of the province’s announcement last week of almost CAD 8 billion in equity infusion and loan guarantees for the Keystone XL oil pipeline. There have also been calls for the feds to purchase oil and gas sector accounts receivable at a discount. For its part, the federal government is finalizing the specifics of their promised emergency response package for the sector.

As Canada and its provinces prepare to roll out record-breaking emergency responses to help the newly jobless and throw lifelines to drowning sectors, it’s becoming clear that not all support is created equal.

There’s no question that people across Alberta need urgent help. In the accommodation and food service sector alone, nearly 100,000 workers have already lost their jobs, and similar numbers seem likely in retail trade. The oil and gas sectors have seen thousands of layoffs and postponed labour as the province’s companies limit production and shelve all plans for expansion, upgrades, and maintenance.

Two Key Features When It Comes to a Strategic Response

Is injecting tens of billions of dollars into oil and gas corporations the right kind of help? As well as addressing immediate needs, the strategic emergency response should have two critical features:

1. It should address the root causes of the crisis and reduce vulnerability to future crises.
2. It should take advantage of the dynamism that crisis creates to build back better and achieve important public policy goals that may have been harder to reach in more settled times.

Would the proposed assistance address the root causes of the crisis? Alberta’s economic crisis started well before COVID-19 and is rooted in overdependence on inherently cyclical commodities: oil and gas. But rather than pursue diversification that could shelter Albertans from the pain of future shocks, these sorts of investments double down on the status quo, hitching the wagon firmly to volatility and uncertainty.

There will be future shocks, whether it’s another 2008-style financial crisis, a climate-induced crisis such as the 2016 Fort Mac fires, or—dare we say it—another COVID-19-style pandemic. Placing heavy bets on the oil and gas sector nearly guarantees we will be here again, with similar social and economic pain for people across the province.

Placing heavy bets on the oil and gas sector nearly guarantees we will be here again, with similar social and economic pain for people across the province.

Bets like these assume the oil and gas sectors will return to business as usual after COVID-19, that demand will be strong for decades in spite of increasing climate change mitigation efforts, that pipelines will be built despite sustained opposition or political delays, and that major producers like Saudi Arabia, Russia, and perhaps the U.S. can reverse course, defy history, and cobble together some sort of supply-limiting deal that makes the sector profitable for high-cost producers.

An Underlying Problem Isn't Being Addressed

Even if all those assumptions prove right and the bet pays off, that success doesn’t address the underlying problem of overdependence—it aggravates it.

Would the proposed assistance take advantage of the opportunity to build Alberta back better? We know that, whether through market forces or government policies, Canada’s oil and gas sector will eventually decline, hopefully, to be replaced by more diversified and sustainable economic drivers. As the head of the International Energy Agency, the UN Secretary-General, and others have recently argued, our response to the current crisis must accelerate this urgently needed transition. If Alberta is to rebuild its damaged house after this unprecedented crisis, why not build a stronger house?

For Alberta and the federal government, this should mean investing tens of billions of dollars in sectors that can bring long-term prosperity for Alberta’s workers and families, such as hydrogen, health sciences, renewable energy, clean transport, sustainable agriculture, innovation in oil and gas well reclamation, and prevention of fugitive methane emissions, building on the province’s world-class institutions and infrastructure and the strengths of its people. It’s frustrating to watch Alberta charge full steam away from that course, committing billions to support the Keystone XL pipeline after using austerity as a rationale to axe popular investment tax credits for high-tech entrepreneurs, and laying off tens of thousands of education workers—the foundation for future prosperity.

The coming economic downturn will swallow up the unprecedented torrents of financial support we’re assembling and still call for more. But let’s remember that this spending can be a historical force for positive change to ensure that when we come out the other end, our society is more equitable, sustainable, and resilient—ready for whatever the future might throw at us.

As governments around the world earmark billions of dollars in unprecedented stimulus packages and ask whether it will be enough to avoid a long and difficult recession, another important question comes to mind: how can we ensure these stimulus packages include targets on environmental performance, social cohesion, and economic governance? 

In the short-term, it is correct to target stimulus spending on emergency responses, healthcare, food security, jobs, and keeping small businesses alive, as the humanitarian aspects of the pandemic are and will continue to be devastating. But as countries start to flatten the curve, not using this large injection of public spending to trigger better sustainability performance is a missed opportunity.    

Trying to spend a lot of money quickly doesn’t leave much time for rigorous analysis of wise spending.  Policy-makers and central banks have little space for systemic thinking on how to prioritize or where more spending can optimize value-for-money for society as a whole. Thankfully, evidence to this effect already exists. Our work on Sustainable Asset Valuation (SAVi) has shown that investments in sustainable infrastructure can increase labour income, productivity, and GDP.

Performance targets are useful, as they allow for human ingenuity and invite companies built around maximizing profits to be innovative in how they achieve the required performance. Passing a share of the performance challenge to those receiving public support may increase the likelihood that the post-COVID-19 recovery phase will benefit people and the planet alike.

What might such targets look like in practice? Here are a few suggestions:

• Tie cash injections into airlines, shipping, and cruise lines to carbon targets.
• As countries set up national health funds, target secondary health care services for lower-income communities and improve the handling of medical waste within national boundaries.
• Require the automotive sector to step up sustainable mobility.
• Ask banks to increase lending to green and sustainable enterprises through green and sustainability-linked loans.
• Mandate public agencies to ensure spending on infrastructure is tied to sustainable design, energy efficiency, waste reduction, and green technological innovation.
• Aim direct payments to farmers at performance on clean water and increased biodiversity.
• Prohibit all market participants from using stimulus money to buy bonds issued by fossil fuel firms.

Reducing the immediate impact of disrupted supply chains and job losses is critical, especially as the pandemic begins to spread in lower-income countries and the full cost of the human and social catastrophe begins to reveal itself. In the long run, stimulus spending, the likes of which the world has never seen, will only make a difference if sustainable development is put front and centre.

In other words, as the initial crisis ebbs and the focus moves to propping up consumption, providing low-cost credit, and bailing out strategic industries, there must be no compromise on sustainability. Letting this emergency funding be used to trade off on climate, biodiversity, jobs, education, healthcare, and cybersecurity will be a grave mistake. 

COVID-19 has hit hard, fast and everywhere. It is, above all, a public health crisis and addressing it as such is today’s most critical challenge. But already the links to other crises are emerging, and none is as urgent as the pending hunger crisis.

Just over 10 years ago, global food security suffered a huge shock when prices of staples like wheat, rice, and maize entered a prolonged period of high and volatile prices. On the heels of the food price crisis came the 2008 financial crisis and a global recession. Meanwhile, the slower-acting but no less devastating effects of climate change continued unabated, associated with more frequent and intense floods, droughts, and extreme weather events. The combined effects of conflict, climate change, and economic recession have led to a steady rise in hunger worldwide over the past three years, after decades of abatement.

For most of the world, there is no public provision for lost income, and for far too many, each day’s income is needed for that day’s food.

Last year, a global economic slowdown was one of the main reasons an additional 20 million people were added to the hunger count. Hunger rose not because there was a shortage of food, but because people couldn’t afford to buy it.

The economic shutdown currently being imposed to fight coronavirus is unprecedented. India, home to the largest number of people affected by hunger (around 190 million people) has already shut down half its economy. Sub-Saharan Africa, with the highest proportion of people affected by hunger (20 percent of the population) is starting to shut down too.

The loss of income for billions of people could be the most devastating effect of the COVID-19 crisis. Over one million people filed for unemployment benefits in Canada last week alone. For most of the world, however, there is no public provision for lost income, and for far too many, each day’s income is needed for that day’s food.

Not all countries can afford the kinds of stimulus packages and safety nets coming into play in the rich world. In the United States, the government has allocated USD 2 trillion for the crisis—the equivalent of 10 percent of national GDP. The prime minister of Ethiopia, Abiy Ahmed, said in a letter to the Financial Times last week that African countries “lack the wherewithal to make similarly meaningful interventions.” He called for a strategy that is “global in design and application…global action guided by a sense of global solidarity.”

In short, we need a global stimulus package to fight a COVID-19 hunger crisis.

A global stimulus package must first and foremost provide social protection for the millions of people in low- and middle-income countries who have lost their income. Since the food supply is not currently in jeopardy, and as long as access to food markets is maintained, protection should be in the form of basic cash transfers or minimum income payments. School feeding programs must also be maintained even as schools are shut down, to continue the provision of nutritious meals to children.

School feeding programs must also be maintained even as schools are shut down, to continue the provision of nutritious meals to children.

Second, the package should support the public budgets of low-income countries that are dependent on food imports to make up shortfalls in the supply of basic foods. These net-food importing countries rely on foreign exchange earnings to pay for imports that are essential to the national food supply. With the economic shutdown, many countries may no longer earn sufficient foreign currency to pay for cereal imports.

Third, an effective global stimulus package also requires other countries to do no harm. That means curtailing export bans on food staples. For now, food supply chains are functioning and basic staples are well supplied. There is no immediate reason to fear shortages of basic staples. But restrictive trade measures, particularly export bans, destabilize markets and could exacerbate high and unstable prices as happened in 2007-08. The International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) is tracking these measures and already some countries have imposed bans.

Fourth, we need a new type of public investment in the global food system, not just a return to the status quo. This means investing in food systems that not only support stable and sufficient calorie supplies but also improved nutrition, micronutrient availability, and reverses the rise in obesity and non-communicable diseases.

We need a new type of public investment in the global food system, not just a return to the status quo.

It means both reducing greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture and building resilient rural communities that can cope with the effects of climate change. And it means improving the income and livelihoods of small-scale producers, reducing their vulnerability to global shocks and crises.

Saving lives is paramount in a pandemic. But as governments take an unprecedented role in economies around the world, it is timely to remember that human health depends not just on protection from a virus, but also access to a sufficient and nutritious diet. Our public response must be bold and encompassing to match the scale of the challenge facing us all.

This article originally appeared in foodtank; it has been reprinted with permission.

China and the UK must ensure all nations are involved in planning the delayed summits to protect biodiversity and to raise climate action.

This week, the 2020 UN climate change conference was postponed. Last week, the UN biodiversity conference was likewise put on hold. These decisions are disappointing: everyone expected 2020 to be an important year for environmental decision-making processes.

My colleagues and I recently wrote about our high hopes for 2020 to revive the momentum lost in 2019. But those hopes were penned weeks ago, before the deadly spread of coronavirus. The pandemic has disrupted everything.

These decisions to delay are the right ones, to protect public health and to ensure equity in environmental governance.

Gathering thousands of people from across the world into close quarters for two weeks during a pandemic before sending them back across the planet would risk lives.

Until coronavirus is under control, such Conferences of the Parties – COPs – risk becoming super-spreader events.

It is fair to worry these postponements mean delayed action on climate and biodiversity challenges. Some recent developments haven’t been encouraging.

The Paris Agreement is due for its first major review this year, but few countries have updated their 2015 pledges to turn aspiration to climate action. Norway and Japan are the only developed countries to put forward new pledges. The 2019 Madrid climate change conference left many worried about the future of climate action under the UN system.

Until coronavirus is under control, such Conferences of the Parties – COPs – risk becoming super-spreader events.

Biodiversity was to have a ‘super year’ in 2020. Delegates launched discussions on a post-2020 global biodiversity framework to follow up the 20 Aichi Biodiversity Targets. The working group negotiating these new targets squeezed in a meeting this year, pre-coronavirus.

While negotiators agreed the “zero draft” was a good start, it was clear much work remains to reach agreement on a new approach to protecting nature.

But there is movement on these issues in the midst of this crisis. The EU and other countries are already considering how their post-COVID responses can fuel a just transition to a low-carbon world.

China’s ban on consuming wild animals explicitly acknowledges our destruction of the natural world is partly what led to this pandemic.

We’re sharing stories of wildlife reclaiming streets and of cleaner waters and air, and people seem to have a new-found appreciation for nature. As the conferences reschedule, they can try to seize the momentum of these tangible changes.

The delayed summits means extra time to pre-resolve contentious issues

On the diplomatic side, there is extra time to pre-resolve potentially contentious issues in the post-2020 global biodiversity framework or to find traction for global climate action.

While the world is on various levels of lockdown, virtual discussions among diplomats can continue.

The incoming UK presidency for the climate summit can try to find a way to signal renewed momentum toward tangible climate action, in lieu of new pledges. The incoming Chinese COP president for the biodiversity summit can use this additional time to discuss difficult issues with interested parties and smooth the negotiations ahead.

Such efforts put considerable pressure on the incoming presidencies to ensure transparency.

Back room chats and informal one-on-ones are normal – this is diplomacy, after all – but there is usually a mechanism to keep all countries informed.

Transparency is now more crucial than ever: those who receive the Zoom invite have the key to global governance and those without are left on the margins. 

During the Paris climate change conference, the French presidency held daily meetings with every coalition and some individual countries during the day and convened large, open invitation meetings in the evening. These were in person.

The British and Chinese incoming COP presidencies will have to innovate with a virtual format. To uphold transparency, they must find a way to keep countries informed and, crucially, engaged. Transparency is now more crucial than ever: who receives the Zoom invite has the key to global governance and those without are left on the margins. 

A lack of transparency strongly contributes to a lack of equity in global environmental governance.

The powerful cannot make decisions for those with fewer resources to juggle a pandemic response and environmental action. When such inequities are apparent, negotiations break down.

When developing countries’ right to be involved is tossed aside, they can block the solutions powerful countries provide. We saw this at the Copenhagen climate change conference in 2009, when a few developing countries refused to adopt the Copenhagen Accord after being excluded from the discussions.

Developing countries may be on more equal footing with virtual summits

Postponing the 2020 climate and biodiversity conference means developing countries will have a say in global responses to climate and biodiversity crises.

The Coronavirus pandemic has yet to spread in some developing countries: they will face the onslaught later, when some of the meetings were originally to convene. International flights are already becoming rare and expensive.

Going ahead with these meetings would have excluded many voices, putting the legitimacy of any decisions on shaky ground.

Global environmental governance is for all. Some countries have greater responsibilities for the problems and others disproportionately experience the negative effects of ecosystem degradation and climate change. All must be part of the solution, or solutions will be fundamentally unsound.

This article originally appeared in Climate Home News. It has been reprinted with permission.

COVID-19 has changed everything. But if we take the right steps and trust science, a lot of good can happen.

This year was supposed to be a turning point. The window to ramp up climate ambition, protect nature, and drive down emissions was open like never before.

Now, the spread of the coronavirus disease has changed everything, including the international environmental agenda.

The arcane world of face-to-face negotiations has largely ground to a halt. The timid signals of private financing finally turning green have been overwhelmed by the worst global economic meltdown in more than 30 years. The kinds of public meetings and demonstrations that gave Greta Thunberg and millions of others a voice are now banned. The attention of political leaders has now—rightly—shifted to saving lives from the global pandemic.

And yet there are ways in which, if we get it right, this crisis could not only reinforce the 2020 environmental agenda but give it a badly needed boost.

Scientists are in the spotlight—let's keep them here

First, science and the opinions of experts are suddenly being given their true value. Politicians and business leaders are yielding the microphone and the formulation of policy advice to chief health officials. In the face of national emergencies, few are playing politics anymore with people’s lives, and those who do are being treated with well-deserved derision. We can hope that, once COVID-19 subsides, those scientists who warned of the public health, economic, and ecological consequences of global warming and the rapid loss of the planet’s biodiversity will be heeded.

We have the chance to turn a new round of stimulus spending “green” by focusing funds on actions that create employment, advance a just transition, address climate and biodiversity priorities, and help achieve the Sustainable Development Goals.

Second, we have the chance to turn a new round of stimulus spending “green” by focusing funds on actions that create employment, advance a just transition, address climate and biodiversity priorities, and help achieve the Sustainable Development Goals.

The time for strategic spending toward a low-carbon future is now

It has long been said that meeting these public policy priorities would take an injection of trillions of dollars in public funding. Now that we are injecting trillions, we have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to ensure we fund the transition to a sustainable future while relaunching the economy. A significant proportion of this emergency funding ought to focus on a new generation of green investments, from expanding net-zero carbon energy and transport systems to increasing and funding protected areas and forging green food systems.

The third lesson is that we can redesign a global trading system that works within the natural order. It is likely that the virus—like so many zoonotic diseases—jumped from animal to man as a result of disturbed natural ecosystems and wildlife trade. The announcement by China and the European Union that they would shut down trade in wild animal species is long overdue. Yet the global pandemic will need to trigger even broader rethinking and a shift in priorities, so trade policy spends as much time mapping risks and halting trade in products and services that put millions at risk as pulling down barriers to trade. This could include restricting trade in carbon-intensive goods, plastics, waste, and other materials. The Amazonian forest fires of 2019 were ecological smoking guns for many global supply chains, including palm oil, timber, beef, and soy.

We can redesign a global trading system that works within the natural order

The pandemic also demonstrates that people and their individual and community actions matter. Rather than leaving mitigation and containment responses to others—other communities, other experts, other countries—families and communities have a direct way to help “flatten the curve.”

The role of concerned citizens can no longer be ignored

This lesson lies at the heart of sustainability. Our future will be determined by the flights and trips we avoid, the household consumer goods we choose to purchase, the green electricity we use, and the zero waste actions we adopt. That will drive real change at scale.

A final lesson is about risk. This pandemic has shown that, when faced with immediate and acute health risks, people will respond. Yet, while many jurisdictions and cities declared a climate emergency, there is little evidence that responses looked much different from business-as-usual.

Perhaps now it will be different. With COP 26 delayed until early 2021 and postponements or cancelations of many other meetings and negotiations, the real test won’t be new agreements, new goals, new promises. The real test will be the actions of concerned people who trust science and want to do their share. 

The COVID-19 pandemic is first and foremost a humanitarian crisis. Efforts to contain the virus and support those directly impacted are of utmost importance. At IISD, that means our first focus has been on the health and safety of our staff and our own effort to flatten the curve.

As leaders, it is also our responsibility to look ahead and assess how the pandemic and the global recovery from it will impact the future of sustainable development.

Our views are shaped by IISD’s threefold mission to advance a stable climate, sustainable resource development, and fair economies. From this perspective, three themes are emerging:

1. Resilience is essential. It has been heartbreaking to see lives risked due to global shortages of critical medical and safety equipment, including masks worth less than a dollar. This lack of planning and preparation for the outbreak has starkly demonstrated the importance of resilience: the ability for human systems to anticipate, cope, and adapt. Resilience is also critical to how the world responds to climate change, where further temperature increases are now nearly certain. Our communities and institutions must succeed in planning for and adapting to climate change or risk further heartbreak and tragedy.
    
2. Stimulus must be sustainable. Governments around the world are racing to implement economic stimulus and support packages to keep individuals, businesses, and economies afloat.  While supporting their urgent implementation, we must ensure that these measures pave the way to a more sustainable economy and do not lock us further into a high-carbon future. Periods of high unemployment and low interest rates are the right time for new low-carbon investments and infrastructure, including the kind required to support the transition to clean energy.
    
3. Inequality is magnified. The COVID-19 pandemic is an unprecedented global shock that magnifies the impact of inequality, hitting the poor the hardest. In developed countries, frontline workers in the service economy are among the most exposed to the virus and the least able to absorb its financial impact. And the hardest hit will be the poor in developing countries, where already-struggling workers will not have the benefit of social safety nets and stimulus packages. The G7 and G20 must immediately help these countries to finance the flattening of the pandemic curve. Longer term, we must redouble efforts to foster sustainable economic systems, including fair trade and investment.

All three of these themes are closely connected to IISD’s work on climate, sustainable resource development, and fair economies. In addition, their scale and complexity demand that we continue to act together to achieve sustainable development. Expect to hear more from our expert staff and associates on each of these and other emerging topics in the coming weeks.

In the meantime, I sincerely hope you and yours are safe in this challenging and uncertain time. Together, we can navigate this crisis and build a better, more sustainable world.

How else will sustainability be shaped, and how should IISD and others respond? Join the conversation on Twitter at @IISD_news and @IISD_Pres.

Canadians are facing many struggles right now: an unprecedented economic slowdown due to COVID-19, a global oil price shock, and the still-urgent challenge of transitioning to a low-carbon future. We know the federal government is stepping in to support the oil and gas sector, and more stimulus decisions will play out over the next few months. The way this help is provided could make or break the ability of communities to prosper in the long run, something that is especially the case for the tricky issue of orphaned oil and gas wells in Alberta.

Of the province’s 300,000 or more un-reclaimed oil and gas wells, about half are inactive, and around 3,500 are so-called “orphans.” These wells require proper decommissioning to prevent harm to the surrounding environment and those who call it home. But if the company that owns a well declares bankruptcy and walks away, who pays for this decommissioning?

A Growing List of Unpaid Bills is Hurting Albertans

The growing list of unpaid bills by oil and gas companies is already harming Albertan communities. Companies haven’t paid $20 million in compensation to landowners since 2010, and 2019 alone saw $173 million in unpaid municipal taxes. But costs for orphan well cleanup are by far the highest.

The Alberta Energy Regulator has privately estimated the cost of cleaning oil and gas wells at a staggering $100 billion, but the actual amount to clean up Alberta’s oil patch could be much higher. And while Alberta’s Orphan Well Association is supposed to take over managing these wells, they’re having serious trouble keeping up.

Now, with the effects of COVID-19 and oil price drops creating new challenges, the impacts on communities could worsen significantly.

With the effects of COVID-19 and oil price drops, the impacts on communities could worsen significantly. The math is frightening.

The math is frightening, yet it seems increasingly likely that these rising costs will be passed on to taxpayers rather than the companies who are responsible. And making taxpayers pay for cleanup adds insult to injury: inactive and depleted wells already pose a massive and unfair burden to communities’ health and well-being, including the farmers and ranchers who are now stuck with these wells on their land. Leaks from inactive and depleted wells can contaminate the soil and water used to grow food, accumulate in nearby areas, and pose dangerous health risks.

At IISD, we have documented the sizable subsidies provided to the oil and gas industry by both the Albertan and federal governments. Directing even more public money toward cleanup of inactive and depleted wells could constitute a significant new fossil fuel subsidy.

More importantly, it wouldn’t solve the problem that got us here.

Caught Between a Rock and a Hard Place

Right now, communities in Alberta are caught between a rock and a hard place. Targeted support from the federal government could help address environmental issues and inject economic and job activity in the province. But support needs to come with a firm commitment to assist communities with energy transition and economic development issues first as our economic landscape shifts.

Directing more public money toward cleanup of inactive and depleted wells could constitute a significant new fossil fuel subsidy. And it wouldn't solve the problem that got us here.

Government has the power to stimulate the economy in the short term and put in place policies to ensure Canadian communities thrive in the long term. When it comes to inactive and depleted wells, here’s how Canada could do this:

Ensure industry remains responsible for cleanup. Short-term targeted support could help kickstart well reclamation, but it is critical that Canadian governments do not become the long-term funders of the cleanup. Ultimately, the oil and gas industry should be funding cleanup, so mechanisms need to be set up now to ensure this is possible well into the future. It’s also important that the laws that govern the Orphan Well Association be followed, which will save taxpayers’ money, reduce the need for loans to the association, and accelerate cleanup.

Support measures for well cleanup should be community-focused and not take the form of entrenched fossil fuel production subsidies. There are already proposals to do this, which ultimately would not solve the problem over the long term. On the contrary, using flow-through shares or similar tax instruments for well reclamation means higher subsidies going to companies with no guarantee that communities will benefit.

It is critical that the oil and gas industry—not Canadian governments—become long-term funders of the cleanup.

The Redwater decision makes it clear that governments have the power to uphold the “polluter-pays principle,” even if a company goes bankrupt. It is possible to do this by looking back at the former owners of the well (or the directors or shareholders of the bankrupted company) to ensure that liabilities are addressed. But it’s important to note that many inactive wells are held by large and financially successful companies. In these cases, the companies should foot the bill.

Create a stronger inactive well regime. Governments must find a way to make sure we never end up in this situation again. If federal and provincial support is provided, it must come with a more effective inactive well regime, following best practices from other jurisdictions such as mandatory timelines for well remediation, more stringent up-front security bond requirements before drilling, tightened liability rules, and the monitoring of bankruptcy courts to prevent liabilities being left to government.

Alberta is currently updating its system for environmental oil & gas liabilities, but it looks unlikely the update will result in the kind of rules that are needed. The framework for dealing with inactive wells must be fixed to prevent the current situation from worsening exponentially. And when developing and improving policies, governments should be consulting with affected communities.

Guarantee tangible benefits for Albertan workers and communities. Any federal and provincial assistance for inactive and depleted wells should have a clear link to reclamation and create opportunities for Albertans. There is significant potential for oil well reclamation to open up new jobs. Old well sites could be used for renewable power installations, including solar and geothermal, which could help farmers earn additional income.

There is significant potential for oil well reclamation to open up new jobs.

Canada should commit to policies and programs that advance just transition principles. With the ongoing shuttering of several oil and gas companies, clear strategies are needed to help those who have historically relied on the industry. Reclamation jobs are only a small part of the picture, and not everyone will be able to benefit from cleanup work. Canada should be proactive in prioritizing and supporting communities impacted by transition across the country, for example, by introducing a progressive and expansive Just Transition Act and by listening to what communities need at a local level.

It’s clear that the way inactive and depleted wells are being managed is not working for communities or the environment. The good news is that addressing well cleanup now can help put people to work while at the same time getting local economies back on track. Let’s do it in a way that ensures industry stays accountable so that communities and taxpayers aren’t on the hook in the long run.

This article originally appeared on the World Economic Forum website, The Agenda.

Throughout history, the movement of people has helped disease travel quickly around the world. From the 1918 influenza pandemic which infected 500 million people due to the mass movement of demobilized troops at the end of the First World War, through to modern day viruses like COVID-19, which has spread rapidly due to the accessibility of global travel.

The good news is that in today’s age of information, our global connectivity gives us a strong advantage in fighting infectious disease. We can analyze masses of data across different parts of the world to identify outbreaks and use advanced machine learning models to predict future movement across geographies. The challenge is that collating relevant data and standardizing it at a global level is a complicated task.

Quick diagnostics result in better data

Companies around the world are investing in developing new testing kits that can test for COVID-19 in just 15 minutes, significantly quicker than the regular nasal swabs that are being used, which can take 24 hours to process. New tests will be able to test passengers with symptoms as they arrive at an airport, before findings are then shared with local health authorities in real time through cloud-enabled connectivity.

At airport immigration counters, biometric authentication offers real-time tracking of populations by integrating facial recognition with thermal imaging. Contactless biometrics systems have the added benefit of reducing contact over shared surfaces or finger scanners.

We have seen a stream of reports published on the impact of COVID-19, but much of the data provided lacks granularity.

Quicker diagnosis means swifter quarantine, helping to prevent a virus from spreading through an airport or into a new country. Rapid diagnostics also deliver quicker access to valuable data that could help make pre-emptive containment measures even more effective.

Extracting the best data for policymakers

But when it comes to standardizing good quality, health-related data on a global level and extracting relevant insights to policymakers in time, we face two key challenges.

First, collecting the type of data that is most useful for tracking disease. We have seen a stream of reports published on the impact of COVID-19, but much of the data provided lacks granularity.

In addition to mortality rates, we need to better understand the demographics of those that have been affected. The more information we have regarding which age groups and pre-existing conditions are most at risk, the more accurately we can decide where to focus containment efforts or deploy medical supplies.

We also need to identify the type of broader datasets that could help indicate when another virus might spread. This could mean monitoring the health of communities that regularly interact with animals in case another type of coronavirus was to jump from animals to humans; or tracking other indicators such as unusual health patterns, to stop any other new diseases in their tracks.

In many parts of the world, data does not flow easily from hospitals into the public realm, or across borders. Global data standards have yet to be developed and this creates gaps in datasets and delays in how data can be used.

Second, we need to find ways to standardize different sources of data. Coordinating diagnostic capabilities and information-sharing formats between hospitals and the public sector is not easy, unless the country in question has a centralized patient record system.

Taiwan’s big data approach to healthcare has served it well in this context. The state has been able to link medical records on the national health insurance database with customs and immigration records to identify and test people who had recently travelled from China, sought medical care, or showed signs of severe respiratory illness.

But in many parts of the world, data does not flow easily from hospitals into the public realm, or across borders. Global data standards have yet to be developed and this creates gaps in datasets and delays in how data can be used to shape global health efforts.

Better interconnectivity across national data systems

One way to improve the speed at which data is standardized could be to encourage better interconnectivity across national data systems through more homogenous data standards.

This would require a great deal of collaboration between various stakeholders and could be challenging to promote across borders. Which country decides which best practice data collection standards to use? And how realistic is it for low-income countries with limited budgets to upgrade their processes to align with those in the developed world?

Another solution is to use artificial intelligence to process the huge amount of data already available online from public health organizations, population databases and transport records. Automated disease surveillance platforms are already enabling us to track and recognize the spread of disease globally through a combination of machine learning and natural language processing and were able to report the spread of COVID-19 faster than the World Health Organization and the US Centers for Disease Cotrol and Prevention (CDC). Other AI models hope to forecast how climate change and human activity may impact our risk of contracting new zoonotic diseases from animals.

Linking clinical and travel data with personal data collected from social media, such as family history and lifestyle habits, would make it possible to deliver even more detailed predictions related to individual risk profiles and healthcare outcomes.

Some artificial intelligence models hope to forecast how climate change and human activity may impact our risk of contracting new zoonotic diseases from animals.

Critics of surveillance technology may be quick to point out the threats to civil liberties that such systems pose. Monitoring the global movement of people and personal health history is a new frontier for machine learning and will be subject to the same regulatory checks that other artificial intelligence platforms have faced.

COVID-19 has clearly demonstrated the economic cost of remaining on the defensive during an infectious disease outbreak and highlighted the importance of investing in identifying the next pandemic before it emerges. Ultimately, this will rely on cross-sector collaboration and the ability to coalesce private sector innovation into policy through cooperation and a steady flow of information.