Sustainability is on my mind. A sense of disquiet took me back to a time I spent with focus groups of families who had chosen to eat in a socially conscious way about two years ago. It was coming across the online post by NKWO, an Abuja-based sustainable fashion design house, that crystallised what I was thinking. If you take away the word “sustainability” from a brand, what would you find?
Sustainability is everywhere. The EAT Diets for a Better Future Report (2020) tells us that if wealthiest countries continue eating in the way that they are, food-related GHG emissions will be 263% higher than what the planet can support in 2050. We would need at least one to seven more Earths to support our eating. The Special Report on Climate Change and Land Report (SRCCL) cautions that reducing greenhouse gas emissions from all sectors including land and food is essential if global warming is to be kept to well below 2ºC.
There is an increasing sense of urgency with an unprecedented number of business and governments now in support of strong climate ambitions through the U.N. High Level Climate Champions’ Race to Zero campaign. The commitments place a higher burden on developed countries and bigger businesses for reducing GHG food-related emissions in recognition of their respective heavier contribution to date.
But what does net-zero even mean? Net-zero means producing less human-caused GHG emissions and balancing this production out by proactively removing GHG emissions from the atmosphere. GHG emissions contribute to climate change and therefore drive land degradation, higher susceptibility to poverty and food insecurity.
Most of us are oblivious. In its 2020 Living Planet Report, the WWF bemoans that “too few of our economic and finance decision-makers know how to interpret what we are hearing, or, even worse, they choose not to tune in at all. A key problem is the mismatch between the artificial ‘economic grammar’ which drives public and private policy and ‘nature’s syntax’ which determines how the real world operates. The result is that we miss the message.” Contrary to what the authors of the report suggest, it’s probable that it is “human- nature tuned language” and “political dynamics” rather than “nature’s syntax” is what truly drives how the world operates. The language of economics AND academia might be failing us.
Unfortunately, sustainability is too important to leave to just politicians, economists or businesses. Mzamo Masito, CMO of Google Africa, sees sustainability as being core to the African project of human and economic prosperity. Moreover, he proposes that we regard sustainability as inherently African rather than a foreign concept. Think recycled ice cream plastic tubs, eating of the whole animal without any food wastage, car tyre plant pots and recipes on the back of envelopes. When I buy inyama yenhloko, usu or even function cakes in my township, I have to take a container with me which in most cases is a 2 litre ice cream container. We are in many instances already recycling, reusing and reducing.
If we want sustainability to realise its promise in the region, we cannot position it solely as a green and energy issue. Masito believes that the sustainability conversation needs to address how it can help tackle challenges Africans regard as most pressing, from job reaction, education, poverty to justice. None of the families we spoke to in 2019 mentioned the planet or emissions as a motivator of their actions despite this being the likely outcome. However, they could confidently articulate benefits, be it income, community resilience or health.
Our language has to change. It has to invite interest and engagement with sustainability, which should ultimately inspire more individual and community agency, which informs local political and economic priorities. It felt poetic to come across NKWO’s eloquent post that dares us to talk about sustainability outside only (added by author) fancy words and certifications. We could add a few more words like wellbeing, nutrition and food safety to include food entities but the sentiment is perfect. Like a joke, we shouldn’t need to overtly explain sustainability for most of us to get it.
If you take away the word ‘sustainability’ away from every brand (big or small), what would you find?
Are they focussed on people? Fostering peace,prosperity, providing safe working conditions, paying fair wages, no child or slave labour, manufacturing locally to support and create jobs in local economies, preserving skills and traditions?
Or are they focussed on the planet? Considering origin of fabric, environmental impact of raw materials and manufacturing processes, mass production, waste disposal and packaging?
NKWO, Instagram post