Modelling 6 Conclusions


The simulation of future scenarios with an integrated cross-sectoral model highlights the characteristics of the green economy approach and provides an assessment of the global impacts of green investments, relative to BAU. These impacts are summarised below.


Undertaken at the global level, this analysis necessarily does not


regional circumstances, which should be an area for additional work. Among other aspects,


such


analysis will need to pay attention to the means and ability of governments to direct investment at the scale envisaged, financial flows.26


including necessary international


The projections in the additional BAU investment scenarios (BAU1 and BAU2), are for increases in GDP and employment, but accompanied by a growing depletion of natural resources. More specifically, water stress will worsen, impacting population growth, agriculture and industrial production. A larger number of vessels in the fishery sector will allow fish catch to rise in the short-term but fall in the medium- to longer-term, limited by a considerable decline of fish stocks in capture fisheries in the next 40 years. The increased use of chemical fertilisers is projected to increase yields in the agriculture sector in the short-term at the expenses of a longer- term decline of soil quality. This will require more land - converted from forest area to farmland - to feed the growing population. Moreover, the increasing use of fossil fuels projected in the additional BAU scenarios will


further jeopardise energy security


and tend to slow economic growth, through higher energy (especially oil) prices. As a consequence of


high fossil fuel dependency and deforestation, CO2 emissions are projected to grow beyond BAU over the 40-year period. As a consequence, while GDP will still grow, its pressure on natural resources will increase, pushing our ecological footprint to over two times the available biocapacity by 2050 and atmospheric carbon concentrations to over 1,000 ppm by 2100.


In the green economy significant


conservation


efficiency and


scenarios, one observes improvements,


carbon mitigation,


resource which


contribute to stronger and more resilient economic growth in the medium- and long-term. The


26. Such issues are discussed in more detail in the chapters on enabling conditions and finance.


533 reflect different national or


sustainable management of natural resources, resulting from a reduction in fishing capacity, a decline in deforestation, the promotion of organic fertiliser and a reduction in fossil fuel use, will allow the restoration of stocks of key natural resources, or greatly mitigate their depletion. For example, fish stocks, forestland and soil quality are estimated to increase by 64 to 106 per cent, 21 per cent and 21 to 27 per cent respectively relative to BAU by 2050, with clear benefits for the productivity of these sectors. In addition, the efficiency improvement of water and energy use in a number of sectors will considerably curb the consumption of these resources (below BAU by 34 to 50 per cent for fossil fuels and 24 to 19 per cent for water in 2050) and avoid negative consequences arising from their depletion. With increased the


carbon potential sequestration sequestration from forests, from conservation


agriculture (still to be estimated in detail), and the substitution of traditional energy resources with low-carbon alternatives, CO2


Increasingly of natural


decoupled from the consumption resources, GDP growth under a green


scenario is expected to surpass that under BAU in the medium- to long-term. Taking into account the improved maintenance of natural capital in the G1 and G2 scenarios, an adjusted measure of net domestic product would probably perform even more favourably relative to the BAU scenarios (see Box 1). Driven primarily by green investments and the subsequent push to economic development, total net direct employment in the sectors analysed in this chapter is projected to be lower than additional BAU cases in the short-term, and to then rise above all BAU scenarios in the medium to long run (2-3 per cent above BAU1 and BAU2 scenarios, respectively, and 8 to 14 per cent above BAU in 2050). When total employment is considered, the green scenarios are expected to converge to the corresponding BAU cases in the longer-term, and exceed BAU by 3 to 5 per cent in 40 years. These results point to the need for policies that recognise and manage the transition costs


involved in moving towards


a green economy, with a focus on an equitable distribution of costs and benefits that emerge from new opportunities.


and GHG emissions,


will be considerably lower than BAU over the next 40 years.


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