DELIVERING THE CIRCULAR ECONOMY A TOOLKIT FOR POLICYMAKERS

30 • DELIVERING THE CIRCULAR ECONOMY – A TOOLKIT FOR POLICYMAKERS
Box 1: Natural systems degradation
According to the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP): “The
currently observed changes to the Earth System are unprecedented in human
history. Efforts to slow the rate or extent of change – including enhanced
resource efficiency and mitigation measures – have resulted in moderate
successes but have not succeeded in reversing adverse environmental changes.
As human pressures on the Earth System accelerate, several critical global,
regional and local thresholds are close or have been exceeded. Once these
have been passed, abrupt and possibly irreversible changes to the life-support
functions of the planet are likely to occur, with significant adverse implications
for human well-being”. 20 A selection of four elements contributing to this
environmental pressure are:
• Climate change: GHG emission reduction plans to 2030 released by the
G7 and the EU would leave the world on track for warming of 3–4°C by
2100 compared to pre-industrial levels, well above the 2°C limit agreed by
the UNFCCC. 21 Risks of climate change to human livelihoods and health,
agricultural productivity, access to freshwater and ecosystems include:
increased storm surges, coastal flooding and sea level rise; inland flooding;
extreme weather events; extreme heat; and the loss of marine, coastal,
terrestrial and inland water ecosystems. 22 The economic cost of these effects
could potentially by a reduction in GDP of 20% per annum in 2050. 23
• Loss of biodiversity and natural capital: At a global scale, without any
additional policy action, losses in the value of ecosystem services due to
biodiversity decline are estimated to reach EUR 14 trillion by 2050, 7% of
projected global GDP. 24
• Land degradation: the productivity of over 20% of land globally – on which
1.5 billion people reside – has declined persistently between 1981 and 2003. 25
Land degradation costs an estimated USD 40 billion annually worldwide,
without taking into account the hidden costs of increased fertiliser use,
loss of biodiversity and loss of unique landscapes. Agricultural productivity
growth has been steadily declining, from 2.2% per annum in the 1960s to
0.9% per annum in the 2010s, despite increases in the use of fertilisers,
chemicals, fuels and other inputs. Today, more nitrogen is fixed synthetically
in fertilisers than naturally in all terrestrial ecosystems combined. 26
• Ocean pollution: An estimated 8 million tonnes (Mt) of plastic waste enter
the oceans every year, a figure predicted to rise to 17.5 Mt per annum by
2025. Since they are so long lived in the environment (it is estimated, for
example, that PET takes 450 years to decay into unrecognisable fragments
in the ocean), the stock is also rising – it is forecast to increase from 130–150
Mt in 2013 to 250 Mt by 2025 27 . While some of these plastics sink, others
degrade into micro-particles that are absorbed into marine food chains.
20 United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), Global Environment Outlook 5 (2012).
21 Climate Action Tracker, G7+EU INDCs: some improvement, but a large emissions gap remains (June 2015).
22 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), Climate Change 2014: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability,
Working Group II contribution to the fifth assessment report of the IPCC (2014).
23 N. Stern, The Economics of Climate Change: The Stern Review (Cambridge University Press, 2006). It should
be noted that integrating into economic models an appropriate assessment of the impacts of climate risks
presents challenges that include continued uncertainty regarding the magnitude and probability of such
impacts and difficulties converting them into monetary values. For more detail see The Global Commission
on the Economy and Climate, The New Climate Economy Report (2014).
24 European Commission, The Cost of Policy Inaction (COPI): The case of not meeting the 2010 biodiversity
target (2008).
25 Bai, Z., Dent, D., Olsson L., and Schaepman, M. E., Soil Use and Management 24, pp.223–243, ‘Proxy global
assessment of land degradation’, (September 2008).
26 European Environment Agency The European environment – state and outlook 2015: synthesis report (2015).
27 Jambeck et al, Science, Vol. 347 no. 6223, Plastic waste inputs from land into the ocean, (13 February 2015).