Make climate action cool

“Making climate action cool”

Intervention at UNEP workshop on the

Trade and technology nexus to achieve

Agenda 2030 goals for developing countries

1.     As you may know, the Earth spins on its axis at 1600 kilometers per hour. Its orbital speed around the sun is of 108,000 kilometers per hour. Now, as some of you may know, last July NASA achieved the remarkable goal of putting a spacecraft in Jupiter’s orbit. By the name Juno, it launched from Earth on August 2011. In October 2013, it encountered Earth’s orbit again and used it as a slingshot to gain significant speed on its travel voyage towards Jupiter. Five years and 2.8 billion kilometers later, Juno slowed down to avoid crashing against Jupiter’s gravity forces and enter into orbit, which was achieved successfully. A remarkable fact is that the top speed it reached on this trajectory was 265,000 kilometers per hour, or more than twice the orbital speed of Earth around the sun. Another remarkable fact is that it traveled all this distance and reached this astounding speed using solar energy as predominant source. What NASA has done is commendable indeed: they have made aerospace science and exploration cool. If someone like me can share this story with you is because I was drawn into NASA’s social media outlets and explanations for the non-technical public. Bravo, NASA!

2.     I am from Costa Rica, and it is a country that has a very cool brand. We are a sought-after destination for ecological tourism, we generate 100% of our electricity from renewable sources, our economy has tripled in the last 30 years and in that same period of time our forest coverage has doubled, representing a unique case worldwide in the last 50 years. This can be considered a good example of regenerative development, where growth is both in financial and natural capital simultaneously. We have learned throughout the decades that there is a virtuous spiral between renewable energies, environmental conservation, forest coverage, biodiversity, ecological tourism, services, jobs, and wellbeing. This is a recipe we believe can be considered by countries with similar geographical location and climate, many of which face considerable developmental challenges. May I remind you about the billion people worldwide without access to electricity; the two billion people without access to drinkable water; the three billion people without access to three meals per day; and the four billion people without access to the Internet.

3.     Regarding Sustainable Development Goal 13a., related to the creation of a Green Climate Fund that hopes to raise US$100 billion/year to finance mitigation efforts in developing countries, it is a fact that globally we are spending US$1.5 trillion/year in military equipment. Only a 6% reduction in this expenditure would provide all the cash required by the Fund. Let’s choose our battles wisely!

4.     One of the most important lessons learned from the Paris Agreement is a successful mindset that positively affected the attitudes and behaviors of key participants in the process. This included optimism to always expect a brighter future; imagination to create an innovative agreement; vision to have a broader, more long-term approach; strategic thinking to prioritize actions with key stakeholders; and the ability to design a critical path to take the necessary steps to make it work.

5.     Regarding the Environmental Goods Agreement (EGA) currently under negotiation at the World Trade Organization (WTO), it is an agreement whose aim is partially assisting climate change mitigation and adaptation, partially improving insertion into Global Value Chains (GVC), and also fostering innovation. Costa Rica can share the success story of the Information Technology Agreement (ITA) signed in 1996, which allowed the country to attract an important investment like the manufacturing plant of INTEL, which at its peak of production was exporting from Costa Rica 99% of all server microprocessors used worldwide. This created a high-tech cluster that triggered the development of multiple small and medium enterprises (SMEs) that engaged in GVCs through innovation and high competitiveness. INTEL decided in 2014 to transfer its manufacturing plant from Costa Rica to Asia and decided to leave in Costa Rica an innovation lab. This means that Costa Rica has moved, in 20 years, from agricultural production to high-tech manufacturing to high-tech innovation, creating enormous value for the company, its suppliers and the world in general. The most important aspect of this success story is that education has been at the core of it, from school preparedness to the ability to develop public-private partnerships with higher education institutions to adapt to the needs of foreign multinationals, to being able to develop world-class talent to operate at the highest level of performance.

6.     Another important topic related to trade and climate action taking place at the WTO is the leadership of the group of Friends of Fossil Fuels Subsidy Reform which seeks the elimination of these subsidies that, according to the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, amount to US$500 billion/year. Furthermore, they have calculated the social cost of these subsidies at US$4 trillion/year. Reducing them would immediately create incentives for renewable energies by proving fossil energy not cost competitive without such subsidies.

7.     Clean technology offers the possibility to address different needs through different solutions. For example, geothermal energy should be prioritized wherever there is an accessible volcano. Solutions should grow organically from there. Is it towards clean tech manufacturing clusters or towards agriculture or towards ecological tourism? It will depend on each case. It is important to consider a different paradigm when thinking about clean tech. For example, an electric car is a great solution to a particular problem of carbon emissions, but better than an electric car is an electric bus that can provide massive, public and clean transportation.

8.     Innovation requires that we identify the constraints within which we must innovate. For example, why do researchers work on the vaccine of a disease they are not suffering? They have the constraints and they look for potential developments that will advance the knowledge and science and technology frontiers organically in a variety of directions depending on the findings and additional constraints incorporated along the way.

9.     Humanity has put a satellite on Jupiter’s orbit powered with renewable energy. We have the challenge to make climate action cool. Millennials know what is cool, not only because they are young and in every generation it is the youth who determine what is cool and what is not, but because millennials are not motivated by money or power or glory, but by purpose. We are not rocket scientists but is this the best we can do to make climate action cool? If we don’t do it, then who? And if we don’t do it now, then when? Thank you. 

Only real win-win scenario

Image capture from www.worldometers.info on December 31st, 2015, at 18:00 GMT.

Another year has passed with a gigantic human footprint on the planet, unfortunately a very negative one. Yet, there are reasons to revitalize optimism in the wake of 2016. By some accounts, 2015 saw a worldwide reduction in carbon emissions in relation to economic growth, which would confirm a tendency already suggested in 2014, when emissions remained constant even though the global economy grew. But that’s not the point. The point is that we are still pouring 35 billion metric tons of a highly toxic gas that will remain in the atmosphere for centuries, as a result of aggregate human activity in all corners of the planet. [To put this figure in perspective, a metric ton of carbon fills up a sphere that is 10 meters in diameter and if we would enter in it, we would die in less than 10 minutes.]

At this stage of the XXI Century, no one can deny, question or pretend to ignore the effect civilization has on the atmosphere, precisely the bubble that holds the conditions to support life on Earth, the only planet in the known universe of which we have scientific proof that life exists.

It is urgent for our generation, as it starts to take the lead worldwide in high-impact, public and private decision-making, to place, atop our list of strategic priorities, innovation and design to reinvent all human endeavors and channel them towards a new paradigm of regenerative development. It suggests to create and distribute wealth while recovering natural capital, which is the source of all inputs and raw materials used in agricultural, industrial and digital production and provision of services, and, at the same time, enables the flourishing and coexistence of all life forms that precisely enrich and feed back into that very capital. This is the only real win-win scenario there is.

I am not suggesting abandoning capitalism, consumerism or hedonism. Each person must be individually responsible for his or her ideologies, ideals and values. It is, nevertheless, absolutely mandatory, to unconditionally comply with the ethical maxim of sustainability, so that all life forms fit in the planet forever. There is no business on a dead planet and we have no plan(et) B.

The climate action required by the Earth is not a responsibility or interest of a few of us. Everyone, without exception, is a crew member on this spacecraft that travels at a very high velocity around the sun, within the solar system, inside a galaxy among billions in a universe that keeps expanding into the vast unknown. We must learn fast and implement public and private policies that result in regenerative development, since there is nothing more important for any rational, sensible and sane human organization –be it a corporation, school, cult or family— to guarantee its existence beyond the lifespan of their current members.

More of this is what we need urgently, and I mean, a matter of life or death. I know 2016 will bring greater climatic challenges and a more shocking reality, but also a more authentic and effective leadership in search for solutions. It is not difficult to achieve the required transformation, but it is certainly impossible if we do not try.

Opening Remarks at Inauguration Session, United Nations University

Opening Remarks

United Nations University

Professor Dr. David Malone, Rector at UNU,

Professor Dr. Kazuhiko Takeuchi-san, Vice-rector and director of the Peace and Sustainability Institute,

Distinguished government officials,

Fellow members of the diplomatic corps,

UNU students, faculty and staff,

Dear friends,

Good morning. I thank you all for being here. I have prepared a few words with a special dedication to the students that start today a five-week intensive course that will certainly transform your lives in many ways.

Last year I had the privilege of attending the closing event, where students like you presented their group projects to a guest panel of which I was a part of, and it struck me how much knowledge was invested by the participants to create ideas that would not have existed otherwise.

It was a very good example of creation of shared value: to bring your individual strengths together in order to give life to something that you would not have been able to create individually or separately. It is a precise illustration of synergy. I believe this is what you are here to do from now until mid October.

Allow me to share a brief story about my family. My great-grandfather was born in the XIX Century and passed away at the age of 96. My relatives say I inherited his big hands and I guess that’s why I decided not to become a dentist. My two grandmothers are 98 years old. With one of them I speak every Saturday on the phone. I like to ask her for suggestions about how she has managed to live for so long in such good condition, and her reply is always along the lines of how she took care of her health.

It makes me wonder if I conduct myself in the same healthy way or if my circumstances and choices are detrimental to my genetic longevity. It also makes me wonder how different her XX Century was from this XXI Century we live in.

Every year of this XXI Century so far, humanity has produced in excess of 30 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide, a figure too big to understand. Simultaneously, the planet has been losing as much as a quarter of a million square kilometers of fertile biomass through deforestation, soil erosion and desertification. To put this figure into context, it is the equivalent of losing all of Japan’s forest coverage every year.

Not only are we releasing excessively large amounts of a highly toxic gas into the very air we breathe, but also the vegetation that could clean such pollution is being reduced at an astoundingly accelerated speed. It makes me wonder how much more human behavior can the planet sustain. We are, clearly, on a collision course.

Science, although limited in its ability to explain the extent of the problem, at least has proof that human-made CO2 emissions in the atmosphere are altering global climatic patterns, disrupting a balance that has remained within a normal range of stability for the last 4 million years. The pace of environmental change is faster than it has occurred at any other period in recorded geological history.

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My favorite definition of “conflict” is simply an incompatibility of goals. What I just described is a global conflict that involves all of humankind and also all other forms of life: we cannot continue our collective behavior if we want to survive and thrive as a civilization on the only planet known to science where life exists. This is the greatest and gravest conflict humankind has ever faced, especially due to the vast extent of its consequences.

My favorite definition of peace, paraphrasing Johan Galtung, is

“the ability to transform conflicts empathically, creatively and harmoniously.”

If we assume it as valid, it helps us focus on what is essential in order to transform any conflict, even climate change. The first one is empathy -which is to stand on someone else’s shoes- not only among us humans, but also with other species that are threatened with extinction. The second one is creativity. Einstein said we could not overcome our problems thinking in the same way we did when we fell into them. So we must be creative. And the third one is harmony, or the sensitivity to move towards scenarios of prosperity with the least possible violence or suffering.

Unlike 100 years ago, today there are global citizens that can exercise their leadership towards effectively transforming the most severe global issues. These are the people concerned and involved in issues that go beyond their place of birth, their place of residence or the state that issued their passport. It is the people that understand that what happens in Asia, does not stay in Asia, but affects Africa, Europe and the Americas.

I believe that global citizens share, at least, six characteristics: an understanding of different leadership styles; cultural sensitivity to better adapt to different cultural settings; the capability to facilitate or mediate in situations of conflict; effective communication techniques that allow them to express themselves assertively; negotiation skills; and a sense of global ethics, or clarity about virtue and good in all cultural contexts.

I believe all of you are global citizens, whether you chose to become or not. I also believe that in the course of the coming five weeks, you will come across many situations with your peers where you will realize that you are actively engaging as global citizens dealing with issues that were unfamiliar to you this morning.

What I find most fascinating about global citizenship is that it is an ongoing learning process that is never finished. You can always learn more, study more, listen more, and grow more. Be aware, throughout this academic experience, how much you will be consolidating your global citizenship among your colleagues from different countries, and perhaps most importantly, living in one of the most global cities in the world.

Yesterday’s designation of Tokyo as the hosting city of the 2020 Olympics is a confirmation of its relevance worldwide. Moreover, Fortune magazine ranks Tokyo as the second most global city in the world in terms of the economic impact and political influence of the decisions that are made here by 47 of the largest corporations in the world whose headquarters are located in the city.

Not only Tokyo offers a unique opportunity to expand your global citizenship. According to the Global Peace Index, Japan ranks in the top 10 most peaceful nations on Earth. This is a more remarkable fact considering that 125 million people live in a country that has up to 72% forest coverage, which leaves only a small fraction of the territory for human settlements. Given such high demographic density, it is impressive that the level of conflict and violence is so low in Japan.

What have the Japanese done differently compared to other countries in the world? I leave you with this question so you explore in the coming weeks with your colleagues. I am confident you will discover elements that will enrich your communities back home.

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Reflecting back on the definitions of conflict and peace that I introduced before, global citizens shall become mindful that humankind will not be able to transform global conflicts through military force. Every year, the world spends collectively US$1.7 trillion dollars in military armament. This is ten times larger than what the United Nations suggests is necessary every year to invest in climate change adaptation and the completion of the Millennium Development Goals together. To make it more absurd, no climate-related catastrophe can be stopped with weapons.

Even military generals are now confirming what ecologists have been suggesting for decades, that one of the biggest threats to peace and security in the coming years is climate change.

Therefore, what we need is a special kind of peace: a peace with nature. We must recover the planet’s biocapacity and its ability to generate all the natural resources we consume every day in every corner of the world. We must be empathic towards other life forms and preserve the rich forests that still stand, most of which are in developing countries in Southeast Asia, Africa and Latin America. We must innovate towards greater energy efficiency, including renewable sources of electricity, smart city technologies to allow for a greater quality of life with a lower demand of energy, and a more efficient management of other non-renewable natural resources and raw materials.

I strongly believe we can do what is required to achieve such peace with nature. I suggest that we can get there through bioliteracy, or the ability to understand the language of life, like the water cycle, the carbon cycle, the fertility process that describes all natural ecosystems, the comprehension of human’s ecological footprint on the planet and the many huge opportunities to develop green infrastructure in a way that is financially, socially and environmentally sustainable.

This is not just wishful thinking. Since 2011, the OECD -Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development- has been proposing green growth as an international policy for economic growth. One day in the near future, green growth will come to us. Let’s not wait for that day. Let’s go to it! Let’s utilize our global citizenship, our leadership skills, techniques, and ethics to take the advantages that green growth represents for this Century.

We are the only generation in human civilization that has faced a global challenge of such proportions. The opportunities for transformation are right before our eyes. All we need is to understand the conflict in order to understand the ways to solve it.

Allow me to share another personal reflection. In two months, my wife will give birth to our first child. If my child has the same genetic longevity of my ancestors, this means he or she will be 87 years old at the turn of the XXII Century. None of us in this room will be alive then, but probably my child will, and more likely, his or her children will too. I am aware that I represent a bridge in my family between the XIX and the XXII centuries. This is why, to me, global environmental change is personal. It is a battle I choose to fight, and I encourage you do the same.

Let me finish with a quote from a book I read last week that made me think of you:

"Inspiration is a magical thing, a productivity multiplier, a motivator. But it won't wait for you. Inspiration is a NOW thing. If it grabs you, grab it right back and put it to work."

…

Thank you.

Tokyo, Japan

Sept. 9^th, 2013

Speech at the 11th Informal Meeting to Further Actions on Climate Change

Thank you, Mr. co-Chair.

I am the Costa Rican ambassador to Japan and I have the mandate to establish a bilateral green growth agenda between both countries.

Two years ago, upon arrival to Japan in the wake of the worst tsunami in 1000 years, my wife and I planted 50 cherry trees that will hopefully be in bloom this week. That is a repeated effort that we have done to increase the planet’s biocapacity.

Yesterday was my first day in school, as some of you mentioned, and today might be my last one, unfortunately. I have had a memorable experience so far although ambivalent in extreme.

On the one hand, I have admired the knowledge, technical skills and experience expressed in every comment and concept that I have heard. For an enthusiast trained in philosophy of law, this has been a magnificent playground and a unique learning opportunity.

On the other hand, I have become increasingly concerned about the state of affairs of the only planet that supports life in the universe. NASA proved last week that life had become extinct in Mars and our main objective must be to revert the trends that are leading Earth towards collapse and reinvigorate life across all species by embracing regenerative development as a humankind.

I feel additionally ambivalent when I compare and contrast ecologists’ prognoses about the planet’s ecosphere –where life lives- and the apparent consensus or at least political leverage to allow the long-term global temperature to rise by 2C.

If you take a closer look, you will see some turtles in the patterns of my tie. If we allow the planet’s temperatures to increase by 2C, there will be no more marine turtles, of which five of a total seven species are born in Costa Rica.

My country committed six years ago to become carbon neutral by 2021 and we are working hard to achieve it, including support from the Japanese and other governments represented here.

But the truth is that for the last 30 years we have become an exemplar of regenerative development, tripling our GDP and at the same time doubling our forest coverage. Our green growth strategy runs on the principle that our behavior must have a net positive impact on our ecosystems.

A final source of ambivalence is when I hear the finances of mitigation and adaptation. One hundred billion dollars a year is less than 10% what the world spends in military armament. If I were the finance minister of planet Earth it would be a no-brainer to shift spending from the latter to the former.

Perhaps that is my cultural bias, as Costa Rica abolished its military army 65 years ago and effectively spent that money in education, healthcare and environmental conservation. In a way, we could say that Costa Rica swapped its weapons for trees.

I am confident that with 65 negotiation days ahead towards a legally binding agreement we will be able to succeed configuring an innovative policy framework that will revert degrading trends and move us swiftly into a regenerative path.

Thank you. 

From Demilitarization to Bioliteracy: How Costa Rica has Become a Biodiversity-Friendly Country

One of the most well-known facts about Costa Rica is the elimination of its military army in 1948. The long-term, positive impact this decision has had in the nation’s development is a collection of benefits that we are still discovering and learning about as we move forward. You may be thinking: what does demilitarization have to do with biodiversity?

For 64 years, several generations of Costa Ricans have been born under a State that has a very high regard for human life. Having no military implies that under no circumstance, a political conflict will become violent through the use of weapons. It also implies that no aggressor, no invader, no trespasser that attempts to violate the country’s territorial integrity or sovereignty will ever be repealed using institutional, violent means.

This decision has shaped the mindset, culture and professional choices of millions of people throughout the last few decades. Most importantly, it has built in many of us the awareness and sensitivity to appreciate life in all its forms, since we have not been taught or raised to end, destroy or offend the lives of other humans.

The conditions of peace that Costa Rica has offered since 1948 have allowed many people to develop expertise in science, arts and humanities, a possibility that is unfortunately difficult in nations that endure long, violent conflicts. Since the 1950s, Costa Rican professionals specialized in fields that offered optimal learning conditions in the country’s natural environment. Today it is a very pleasant part of our history that renewable energies were developed since 1955 as an opportunity to generate electricity from the abundant sources of hydropower along several of the country’s rivers, lakes and waterfalls.

One of the results of these peaceful conditions for human development has been a growing bioliteracy over generations. I would define bioliteracy as the understanding of ecological processes and the richness that derives from them. In a country with outstanding natural characteristics, one is very frequently faced with amazing natural beauty and wealth, making it easier to develop empathy and appreciation for birds and snakes, trees and flowers, whales and dolphins that visit and live in Costa Rica. 

This bioliteracy has facilitated the adoption of the mentality “know-save-use” regarding biodiversity. First, it is important to know the natural wealth in a country’s surrounding ecosystems. As you hear a bird sing or appreciate a colorful tree blossom or experience the might of a whale in open ocean, it is easy to feel a connection with other life forms. Then, making political and economic efforts to preserve ecosystems and save species is more likely, as there is high awareness of such unique high concentration of living organisms in a fairly small territory like Costa Rica. As a result, the use of natural resources for human development and economic growth will happen in observance of other living beings.

This poses an interesting dilemma that needs to be decided by every generation’s leaders: should progress cost us our natural environment? In 1979, leaders chose to stop deforestation, preserve remaining forests and recover the ones that had been lost. A few people made an invaluable contribution to Costa Rica’s biodiversity by implementing an innovative policy that offered economic incentives for conservation. Today, we talk about Payment for Environmental Services, and it is said to be a policy innovation made in Costa Rica. This has recovered nearly half a million hectares of forests, transferring to property owners some US$200 million (JP¥16,000,000,000) in the course of three decades of public, private and international efforts.

In times when humanity’s consumption of renewable and nonrenewable natural resources provokes an ecological footprint that far exceeds the planet’s ability to naturally recover and replenish them, Costa Rica has become the focus of international attention as a result of the country’s economic success while simultaneously reforesting and improving ecosystemic performance. In the last 30 years, Costa Rican GDP has tripled and forest coverage has doubled. This, more than a case of sustainable development, is a case of regenerative development. Instead of setting the goal of not harming nature, Costa Rica has accomplished the goal of enriching nature while improving socioeconomic conditions for its people.

Innovation and entrepreneurship have become important components of this process. In 1989, a group of local and foreign visionary experts followed Dr. Rodrigo Gámez’s initiative to create the Biodiversity Institute, a non-governmental, not-for-profit institution that has been declared of public interest by the government, due to its enormous contribution to environmental conservation, scientific discoveries, bioliteracy and ecosystemic recovery. A few weeks ago, at the COP 11 that took place at Hyderabad, India, Dr. Gámez was awarded the AEON Foundation Midori Prize of Biodiversity, a well-deserved recognition for his efforts to improve the quality of all forms of life on Earth.

For nearly 25 years, the Costa Rican tourist industry has become instrumental in the promotion of ecological tourism, offering abundant business opportunities that have triggered private innovation in the form of ecological activities such as canopy or tree rappelling, surfing and river rafting, as well as tours for bird-watching, whale-watching and turtle-watching.

Public innovation has also played a significant role in the process of improving facilities and conditions for tourists to enjoy nature intensely. In 1996, a public program called Ecological Blue Flag was introduced to promote a healthy competition between tourist destinations, nature reserves and national parks, hotels and government institutions, to comply with sustainability requirements in order to obtain a blue flag that is to be displayed publicly. Every year, each entity must renew its “blue flag” status, raising national and international awareness about these efforts, which attract tourists by the hundreds of thousands.

In 1999, Costa Rica received one million foreign tourists for the first time. Ten years later, it reached two million, despite terrorist attacks in New York or the global economic recession.

Today, the country’s aspiration is to become a global leader in green growth, promoting regenerative development through ecological tourism, commercial use of biodiversity for biotechnology and attracting more modern technologies for renewable energy generation. With this strategy in place, a strong relationship with a country like Japan could create shared value for mutual benefit, and also for the benefit of people from other countries and even for other forms of life.

I hope I have managed to explain the relationship between demilitarization and biodiversity, and explain why Costa Rica means “rich coast” in Spanish, and why it is recognized as the country that has made Peace with Nature.