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development, it cannot easily be returned to its original state and
made to produce timber or fisheries again. There are limits to the
carrying capacities of the earth’s resource base, and once these limits
have been surpassed there will be rapid declines in all natural,
economic and social systems. Herman Daly, a former senior executive
of the World Bank, best sums this up through the following often-used
analogy:
“Ship captains continuously monitor the Plimsoll line indication of
their boats. For if water rises above the Plimsoll line, it is a sign that
the boat is too heavy and is in danger of sinking. At this point, there
is little choice but to reduce the weight of the cargo and crew on the
ship – simply rearranging items will not prevent the ship from sinking.
The problem is the total weight, which is over and above the carrying
capacity of the ship.”
3. Many governments are now working on national environment accounts
and adjustments to gross domestic product calculations to reflect
environment losses and gains. The objective is to produce a more
accurate picture of national production and consumption costs and
revenues.
4. Companies are experimenting with a variety of methods to evaluate
not simply resource inputs, waste and emission outputs, but also their
‘environment burden’ - their actual contribution to environment change
and degradation.
5. As the power and size of companies grow, their consumers, competitors
and investors no longer judge them by profits and product quality
alone, but also on their overall contribution to society. Companies
today are expected to be socially and environmentally accountable and
play a leading role in improving the environment and the quality of life
of their host. The 1998 GlobeScan Survey on Sustainable Development
Trends states that ‘corporate reporting on social performance is
predicted to be more common in five years than is corporate
environment reporting today’.
6. There is also increasing focus on environment defence expenditure –
the costs of anticipating and avoiding environment damage as well
as pollution clean-up and regeneration costs - and ways and means
to incorporate them into market prices. We cannot begin to work
towards improving the environment if it is more cost effective to waste,
contaminate and pollute than it is to anticipate, avoid, manage and
regenerate.
This manual, which has discussed the tourism and hospitality industry’s
environment agenda, environment management systems and sustainable siting,
design and construction, is only the beginning. It is all too important to bear in
mind that to overcome environment challenges, we need not only conciseness and
expertise, but also persistence, courage and vision.
“We have to acknowledge the facts. We cannot create a sustainable future if we
keep dragging a veil over reality, not only ignoring depletions and the collapse of
life support systems, but actually counting this as progress. The limits to growth
will then hit us even faster.”
Dr. Alexander King, Member of the Club of Rome