Tipping points

DAVOS 2024

Earth tipping points

The last session I joined at the SDG Tent was called Impacts of Global Tipping Points on the Agricultural Sector organized by the Artic Basecamp where experts discussed the impacts of global tipping points on our crops, their capacity to grow, and the possibility of their total failure putting at threat our livelihoods, food security and health. “Tipping points in the Earth system pose threats of a magnitude never faced by humanity,” Tim Lenton, from the University of Exeter’s Global Systems Institute.

It is worth mentioning that the food system represents 30% of global emissions of which 60% is for animal feeding. Agriculture is one of the most important threats and opportunities (to restore soil fertility, reduce poverty and anger, provide well-being, etc) for humanity in the coming years.

Earth on verge of five catastrophic climate tipping points, scientists warn | Environment | The Guardian Tipping points at risk include the collapse of big ice sheets in Greenland and the West Antarctic, the widespread thawing of permafrost, ?the death of coral reefs in warm waters, and the collapse of one oceanic current in the North Atlantic.

“Permafrost was once thought to be permanently frozen – hence its name. Covering 15% of the northern hemisphere land area, these massive expanses in the Northern Hemisphere contain twice as much carbon as is circulating in Earth’s atmosphere today. The thaw and collapse of these frozen grounds hold exponential risk for global food, health and infrastructure industries, with substantially increasing levels of thaw likely to occur at 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels". 1.5°C is a physical limit: this climate target can’t be negotiated | World Economic Forum

This last session left me a bit puzzled. What can we do to avoid that? How? This seems so BIG that we could feel powerless hearing that.

Amazing people

However, I left Davos energized and highly motivated after meeting so many amazing and creative people !!!

Davos is intense! you can join a multitude of interesting sessions, and meet great people, entrepreneurs, scientists, activists, farmers, and experts working on fascinating topics and solutions. It gives you a boost of confidence.

AI was prominent in Davos, technology is very often seen as an enabler for a faster transition. This is true, technology can be an enabler for good BUT also for worth, let's not forget that! For many decades we have accepted new technologies as progress without questioning if their use was for the well-being of humanity. We have seen where this could lead us.

Hence, I believe we should empathize more with the importance of relations between people. Collaboration, trust and love should be core values for our daily activities.

Kudos to some sessions organised by Green-up at Climate Hub Davos

Nature focus

The Forum's Global Risks Report 2024 finds that environmental risks make up half of the top 10 risks over the next 10 years, with extreme weather events, critical changes to Earth's systems, biodiversity loss and ecosystem collapse being the top three.

A Long-Term Strategy for Climate, Nature and Energy was one of the core themes being discussed. It is indeed great to see the focus and importance that nature is getting. Innovate 4 Nature had a great opportunity to host a diner How to Accelerate and Scale Nature-Positive Solutions?, other sessions discussed biodiversity credits or methodologies for companies to measure biodiversity such as SBTN or TNFD which announced that 320 companies and financial institutions to start TNFD nature-related corporate reporting.

Nature Positive is a global societal goal defined as ‘Halt and Reverse Nature Loss by 2030 on a 2020 baseline, and achieve full recovery by 2050’.

There seems to be a willingness to put indigenous and local communities, our land stewards and guardians of biodiversity hotspots, at the very centre of each decision. But there is still a long way to go: "4% of the population is guarding 80% of the world's biodiversity and less than 1% of all the finances go towards biodiversity or rewarding those guardians.”?- Atossa Soltani

Positive socio-economic tipping points

A study The 25 Percent Tipping Point for Social Change shows that once groups reach the 25 percent tipping point, they can trigger a change in the rest of society.

Similarly, a very interesting report from The Breakthrough Effect shows that Positive socio-economic tipping points can occur where new solutions cross a threshold in affordability, attractiveness or accessibility compared to incumbent solutions.

The potential is huge in many areas, and I have been amazed to meet so many people working on solutions such as alternative proteins, regenerative agriculture, sustainable management of ecosystems, and many more.

The community of people willing to change the system for a fairer more equitable and sustainable system is more important than we think.

If we continue working together, collaborating, and using technology to speed up the process we could reach soon such positive tipping points before the earth's tipping points are reached.

The window of time is shortening though.

Let's keep acting for a better future !

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