On Wednesday 22nd February, in the lead up to Rio+20, a panel of leading experts, chaired by the BBC environment correspondent, Richard Black, will come together at the Natural History Museum, London to discuss how we can measure progress beyond GDP.
Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is a universal measure of a country’s economic activity and output, yet it takes no account of the appreciation or deprecation of a country’s building infrastructure, or of the condition of its natural resources and the ecosystem services provided by the environment, such as crop pollination. Furthermore, GDP provides no measure of the health, wealth, or wellbeing of a country’s population, or how these are distributed across society.
While GDP remains the most important measure for international financing, alternative measures, which take into account natural and social capital, are needed to incentivise investment in a green economy. This raises some key questions: Do alternative measurements of progress exist? Why will measuring things differently lead to changes in what we do?
These issues will be discussed on Wednesday 22nd February in a panel debate held at the Natural History Museum, London and chaired by BBC environment correspondent, Richard Black.
The Panel
- Emily Benson, a project manager for the Green Economy Coalition
- Hannah Ryder, a senior economist for DFID advising on low-carbon and climate-resilient economic growth in developing countries
- Andrew Simms, author and Fellow of the New Economics Foundation
- Paul Simpson co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of the Carbon Disclosure Project
Take part in the debate
Your questions and comments will form an important part of the debate. Visit the Earth Debates website to share your thoughts and propose questions for the debate.
Watch the debate
The Earth Debate will be webcast live on 22 February at 19:00 GMT. Watch the live debate online here.
About the Earth Debates
The Natural History Museum, Stakeholder Forum and The British Council launched the Earth Debates series to drive momentum and contribute to discussions surrounding the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development (UNCSD), also known as Rio+20, happening in Brazil 20-22 June 2012.
This flagship series of debates will bring together high level representatives from key sectors including Government, non-government, civil society and business and tackle key issues at the heart of Rio+20 ‘the global transition to a fair and green economy’ agenda.
You can watch the first Earth Debate on Ecosystem Economics – can we put a price on nature? here.