The Millennium Consumption Goals and Rio+20
The Millennium Consumption Goals (MCGs) idea was proposed by Professor Munasinghe of Sri Lanka in January 2011 at the United Nations in New York. According to Professor Munasinghe, “MCGs could help make our development path more sustainable, by focusing on the 1.4 billion people in the richest 20 percentile of the world’s population. They consume over 80% of global output, or 60 times more than the poorest 20 percentile. Instead of viewing the rich as a problem, they should be persuaded to contribute to the solution.” The MCGs will complement the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) designed to help the world’s poor. The (MCGs) aim to provide consumption targets designed to motivate the world’s rich to consume more sustainably. They will make human consumption and production more sustainable in economic, environmental and social terms, thereby improving overall well-being, reducing the burden on natural resources, freeing up resources to alleviate poverty, and ensuring intra- and inter-generational equity.
The MCGs are still a work in progress. Suggested MCGs include the following:
1. Greenhouse gas emissions reduction
2. Energy use (conservation, fossil fuels, renewable energy, transport, buildings, etc.)
3. Water use (conservation, quality, re-use, etc.)
4. Land and biomass use
5. Ores and industrial minerals
6. Construction materials and minerals
7. Pollution and waste (air and water effluents, solid waste, toxic waste and chemicals, etc.)
8. Food and agriculture
9. Health and obesity (Diet, smoking, exercise, etc.)
10. Livelihoods and lifestyles (working hours, work conditions, etc.)
11. Economic-financial systems (progressive taxation, banking reform, measures of well-being, etc.)
12. Military expenditures
A summary of the proposal submitted to Rio+20 reads as follows:
“Establish a set of Millennium Consumption Goals for the period 2012-2020 and for subsequent decades, complementing the Millennium Development Goals, and helping to ensure that the basic needs of the poor are met, preserve and strengthen earth’s natural resource base on which human society depends, and enhance global prosperity, while ensuring a good quality of life and well-being for everyone by 2020, improving intra- and inter-generational equity, and accelerating the shift to more sustainable consumption and production as an essential step towards the ultimate goal of sustainable development.”
Action: During Lent choose one or two of the suggested MCGs listed above and evaluate yourself. What are you doing to reduce your use of water? What can you do to conserve energy? What are your eating habits? Is your lifestyle a healthy one? Take the time to discuss the MCGs with someone else or with a small group. Encourage each other to make changes to reduce the use of natural resources and enhance quality of life.
For further information on the MCGs go to the following website: www.millenniumconsumptiongoals.org
