Eating the Earth: why we need to change the way we do business with nature

Abstract

Money talks, but it doesn't always tell the truth ... Fossil fuel-fired capitalism has generated riches for billions, but is underwritten by a planetary pyramid scheme - one in which withdrawals from the natural world are not supported by underlying capital replenishment, resulting in global impacts such as climate change and biodiversity loss. Investment banker Justyn Walsh argues that the failure to properly value nature is more than just a glitch in the system, but in many ways is the system - one enabling a 'cowboy economy' that relentlessly rolls forward to new frontiers of exploitation, and gives the appearance of wealth being created when in fact much of it is being destroyed. Stark in its warnings but hopeful in its prescriptions, Eating the Earth argues that we need to embrace a new story - one acknowledging that humankind is a part of nature rather than apart from nature, that measures how life is enriched rather than destroyed, and that lives off nature's dividends rather than eating into its capital