Statement embargoed to 1pm Weds 9 April in support of a presentation at Parliament by Wise Response. (This is not the primary news source)

Sustainable Living Education Trust supports the call today by New Zealand ‘Wise Response’ scientists and concerned citizens, for NZ politicians and public servants to address five strategic issues including fossil fuel dependence and climate change*.

The Trust is doing its part, collaboratively within local government, to help educate people about the environmental impact of their domestic and workplace decisions, shopping choices and everyday behaviours. We help people learn future living skills. Community education is valuable, as recognised internationally in the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development 2005-2014 (to which we have contributed), but it is not enough. Central Government and state institutions also need to also need to address these issues seriously and urgently, to provide support and a context for individual actions. Let’s face the challenges together (says national Coordinator Rhys Taylor).

See our website at http://www.sustainableliving.org.nz

*Further information on Wise Response:

http://wiseresponse.org.nz/?page_id=136

Caring, informed people now accept that a healthy sustainable environment is integral to all life and that our future depends on having genuine sustainability as our core goal.

Today, most scientists believe critical “thresholds” are upon us, that the consequences are likely to be disastrous and irreversible if we do not make urgent fundamental changes. In this respect the links between climate change, current fossil fuel extraction and combustion, and a stable economy are deeply concerning. So far, successive NZ governments have failed to truly face up to such unprecedented threats to our collective security.

We, the undersigned, therefore call on the New Zealand parliament to face up to the situation and forthwith, dispassionately assess the risks in the following five priority areas and from those recommendations, design cross-party policies to avert any confirmed threats to give future generations the very best chance of security, peace, social justice and opportunity.

1. Economic security: the risk of a sudden, deepening, or prolonged financial crisis.

2. Energy and climate security: the risk of continuing our heavy dependence on fossil fuels.

3. Business continuity: the risk exposure of all New Zealand business, including farming, to a lower carbon economy.

4. Ecological security: the risks associated with failing to genuinely protect both land-based and marine ecosystems and their natural processes.

5. Genuine well-being: the risk of persisting with a subsidised, debt-based economy, preoccupied with maximising consumption and GDP.

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