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Driving Sustainable Development Through Better Infrastructure: Key Elements of a Transformation Program

Driving Sustainable Development Through Better Infrastructure: Key Elements of a Transformation Program

Full Title: Driving Sustainable Development Through Better Infrastructure: Key Elements of a Transformation Program
Author(s): Amar Bhattacharya, Jeremy Oppenheim, and Lord Nicholas Stern
Publisher(s): Brookings Institution, New Climate Economy, and Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment
Publication Date: July 1, 2015
Full Text: Download Resource
Description (excerpt):

The agendas of accelerating sustainable development and eradicating poverty and that of climate change are deeply intertwined. Growth strategies that fail to tackle poverty and/or climate change will prove to be unsustainable, and vice versa. A common denominator to the success of both agendas is infrastructure development. Infrastructure is an essential component of growth, development, poverty reduction, and environmental sustainability.

The world is in the midst of a historic structural transformation, with developing countries becoming the major drivers of global savings, investment, and growth, and with it driving the largest wave of urbanization in world history. At the same time, the next 15 years will also be crucial for arresting the growing carbon footprint of the global economy and its impact on the climate system.

A major expansion of investment in modern, clean, and efficient infrastructure will be essential to attaining the growth and sustainable development objectives that the world is setting for itself. Over the coming 15 years, the world will need to invest around $90 trillion in sustainable infrastructure assets, more than twice the current stock of global public capital. Unlike the past century the bulk of these investment needs will be in the developing world and, unlike the past two decades, the biggest increment will be in countries other than China.

Getting these investments right will be critical to whether or not the world locks itself into a high- or low-carbon growth trajectory over the next 15 years. There is powerful evidence that investing in low-carbon growth can lead to greater prosperity than a high-carbon pathway.

At present, however, the world is not investing what is needed to bridge the infrastructure gap and the investments that are being made are often not sustainable. The world appears to be caught in a vicious cycle of low investment and low growth and there is a persistence of infrastructure deficits despite an enormous available pool of global savings. At the same time, the underlying growth trajectories are not consistent with a 2 degree climate target. And climate change is already having a significant impact, especially on vulnerable countries and populations.

All statements and/or propositions in discussion prompts are meant exclusively to stimulate discussion and do not represent the views of OurEnergyPolicy.org, its Partners, Topic Directors or Experts, nor of any individual or organization. Comments by and opinions of Expert participants are their own.

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