The New Global Context: Drivers of Change in Favor of Sustainable and Inclusive Development: The Voices of Industry

Introduction

Flint (2013) defines sustainable development as the proper organization and coordination of development and balancing the wellbeing of the natural systems like the environment. Even as human beings seek ways to improve their lives, they must consider the natural environment within which they live, to avoid depleting or exhausting it to low levels. The actions of humans must sustain the natural resources and environment while minding about the status and condition of the future. For instance, a good approach to sustainable development of the natural resources is avoiding cutting down trees, as they will affect the rainfall levels in the future.

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Nature and Imperatives for Sustainable and Inclusive Development

Nature provides solutions for human beings. It is the responsibility of humans to identify the solutions and help take care of the environment while avoiding activities that may degrade the quality of the environment (Zaccai, 2012). As the number of humans' increase in the world, there comes the need to get more land and resources that can sustain the large populations. It pushes man to engage in activities that cause the environment like the clearing of forests, which in turn increases the desertification levels in the world. The destruction of natural resources results in negative social, economic, and environmental impacts. Other imperatives for the negative effect on the three sectors include lack of innovative ideas that can help reduce the growing inequalities in the environment. For instance, there is need to look for solutions for countries that do not have natural resources and help increase the survival rate of both plants and animals. For instance, in areas where there is no rainfall, irrigation can work well since it will help supply water during the dry months. This helps take care of the social and economic needs of the people since they stop relying on donor food and help. When there is proper management of such imperatives, it helps increase the food supply for all the locals, and there is a probability of exporting the excess, earning the nation some foreign exchange. In the long-term, this contributes to the improvement of globalization relationships and levels among countries. Resource depletion means that the future generations will have no means of sustaining their lives, and will also continue destroying the natural resources.

Current State or Technical and Vocational Education and Training from a Global Perceptive

The world is moving towards improving the sustainable levels in all sectors in the economy and has changed the type of education and knowledge it instills in children. The education sector is going through changes and bringing in new information and training that will help equip the younger generation with skills and knowledge on how to take care of the environment (Vanhulst and Beling, 2014). The current state of technical and vocational education is letting students understand their role in taking care of the environment, while they need to come up with ideas that can help sustain the economy. This strategy of introducing the knowledge in schools has helped shape the perception of younger people, and they understand the implications of their actions on the environment and economy as well. It is common to find institutions of higher learning introducing environmental studies as common courses and incorporating programs affiliated with taking care of the surroundings. This attracts a large number of learners who want to spearhead the change they want to see in the world. The availability of courses is spread across all technical and vocational training learning institutions (Flint, 2013). Graduates get jobs in any sector in the economy as their input is important in helping corporates come up with greening solutions and development of sustainable ideas in their production and manufacturing processes. This has encouraged more students to register in learning centers due to the ease of accessing job opportunities. This is positive hope for the world in creating an environment with high levels of sustainable development within a few years.

Opportunities and Challenges in Moving Forward

The range of opportunities in reaching the highest levels of sustainable development lies in the countries that have not attained the requirements. This means that there is still potential for growth for the developing countries that have delayed or not initiated plans for sustaining the environment and their economy (Nabli and Arezki, 2012). Developed nations have an opportunity to train and equip environmentalists, businesspersons, governments, and other important stakeholders on the importance of adopting sustainable goals as it contributes to the global goals of supporting a large number of people living in the world. Also, it helps affirm the notion that the countries of the world are intertwined with each other, necessitating the need to look out for each other, so that growth levels can be the same. Incorporating the sustainable development culture means that countries of the world will move towards similar objectives, as well preservation of the natural environment as a team (Mowforth and Munt, 2015). Working together has a high probability of presenting opportunities in the brainstorming sessions with representatives of each country coming up with the idea that would work in their surroundings with ease.

However, some of the global challenges in moving forward and attaining the highest levels of sustainable development is the lack of commitment from member countries and ignorance (Gupta, 2010; Holden, Linnerud, and Banister, 2017). Some of the countries in the world are willing to work towards sustainable development levels, but not committed to engaging in activities that help reach the goals. This means that their attention and commitment is diverted, rendering their abilities null and void. Most leaders in business, politics, environment, transport, among other sectors, lack knowledge on how they can work together, by integrating their ideas towards a sustainable growth model (Lane, 2010). The lack of unity among the different sectors in the world leads to a conflict of interest, and failure towards reaching the sustainable levels. For instance, when vehicle manufacturers release vehicles in the global market that produce harmful gas, the degradation levels of the environment increases, which affects the climate changes. This lack of adherence to the requirements has caused an imbalance in the world.

Conclusion

In conclusion, sustainable levels can only be reached when the global leaders and influencers work together and agree to reach certain levels. This requires the commitment of every driver in the economy, while implementation of the ideas should be within the available resources for each nation. The commitment of each nation to work towards sustainable development will lead to the collective goal of the world, in reaching high levels. Developing countries with limited resources can engage in simple, yet effective sustainable development solutions, as long as they remain committed towards the objective of developing the economy and environment.

References

Flint, R. W., 2013. Basics of sustainable development. In Practice of Sustainable Community Development (pp. 25-54). Springer, New York, NY.

Gupta, A.K., 2010. Grassroots green innovations for inclusive, sustainable development. In The Innovation for Development Report 2009-2010 (pp. 137-146). Palgrave Macmillan, London.

Holden, E., Linnerud, K. and Banister, D., 2017. The imperatives of sustainable development. Sustainable Development, 25(3), pp.213-226.

Lane, M., 2010. The carrying capacity imperative: Assessing regional carrying capacity methodologies for sustainable land-use planning. Land Use Policy, 27(4), pp.1038-1045.

Mowforth, M. and Munt, I., 2015. Tourism and sustainability: Development, globalisation and new tourism in the third world. Routledge.

Nabli, M. M. K., & Arezki, M. R., 2012. Natural resources, volatility, and inclusive growth: Perspectives from the Middle East and North Africa (No. 12-111). International Monetary Fund.

Vanhulst, J. and Beling, A.E., 2014. Buen vivir: Emergent discourse within or beyond sustainable development?. Ecological Economics, 101, pp.54-63.

Zaccai, E., 2012. Over two decades in pursuit of sustainable development: Influence, transformations, limits. Environmental Development, 1(1), pp.79-90.