LEconomist Jean Pisani-Ferry stated, in World on October 26, that we are now faced with a difficult choice: we “imposing sacrifices in the name of climate”or simply give up – at predictable and dire risks.
But what sacrifice exactly? Is eating better, less meat and more organic, by consuming more food produced locally, a sacrifice? Is reducing the number and length of daily trips due to the elimination of urban sprawl a painful thing? Is lack of independent work and sleep unpleasant? Less investment in highways, motorways, urban toll roads and motorway interchanges, doesn’t that save money for more enjoyable things?
Reduced air travel only bothers 2% or 3% of the population, this is not dramatic, it means less spending on planes, airfields, kerosene and it will reallocate the economy by limiting the exchange of goods between continents.
An idea that makes eco-bashing easier
Less impervious land would avoid many disasters of great human and financial cost: we can achieve this thanks to a gradual refocusing, in all inhabited environments, jobs, businesses, equipment that are unfortunately relegated to highly specialized peripheral areas. Does local urban planning interfere? Isn’t this achievable if we give the city new ambitions?
Don’t throw stones at Jean Pisani-Ferry. The idea that an environmentally friendly world requires us to give up many beautiful things is widespread, including among certified ecologists. However, this is a very questionable idea because it tends to alienate many citizens from ecology and facilitates eco-lobashing, which in recent times has increasingly taken over everything.
It is therefore urgent to present ecology in addition to simplifying shortcuts, namely: exorbitant costs, unpleasant resistance, endless efforts, unsettling turmoil. It is under these conditions, in political debates, that ecology will receive serious attention.
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