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The Green Economy in the UK... What's Missing

According to Wikipedia, the green economy is one which "aims at reducing environmental risks and ecological scarcities, and... aims for sustainable development without degrading the environment." I went to a celebration of it this week, hosted by Business Green. The Green EconomyWe'd been shortlisted for an award and I had a cracking night. The food was great and the wine flowed. Fab people and inspiring stories. Lots of enthusiastic young, and a lot of companies represented. There were 25 awards, and a short list of 136 finalists for them, ranging from large household names to small companies like us*. There was a real buzz and enthusiasm about the evening. We heard a lot about low carbon, zero emissions, renewable energy, battery storage, energy efficiency, clever building, recycling, and sustainability generally. Business Green is a good publication, and they'd taken a lot of care to host a very enjoyable event. They launched their Net Zero Now campaign on the night, which helps business and government develop net zero emission strategies. There was, however, something missing. It's something which is generally missing from events like these. Given the rest of the evening it almost seems churlish to mention it, but I just have to. It's the ecological scarcities bit of Wikipedia's definition. Biodiversity loss didn't get a look in. In fairness, there was an award for Best Environmental Awareness Campaign. This did include one project which seemed to be about ecology. That meant that 2 out of the 136 finalists were directly concerned with reversing biodiversity loss - including us, who are so small we don't really count! This is entirely typical of the green economy in the UK. Reversing biodiversity loss just isn't a priority; not for government, NGOs, policy wonks, business, and specialist media. Climate change and sustainability generally completely dominate their agendas. I suspect in years to come this will be as baffling to most people as it is to me now. *no, of course we didn't win. I was thrilled to be on a shortlist, though.