A Jurassic Park of GDP monsters

The economic crisis, the ecological crisis and the food crisis are a reflection of an outmoded and fossilised economic paradigm. It is a paradigm that grew out of mobilising resources for the war by creating the category of “growth”. It is rooted in the age of oil and fossil fuels. It is fossilised because it is obsolete, a product of the age of fossil fuels. If we have to address the economic and ecological crisis, we need to move beyond this fossilised paradigm.
Economy and ecology have the same root, oikos in Greek, meaning home. The home here refers to both the earth, our planetary home, and our house where we live with our families and the community.
But economy strayed from ecology, forgot the home and focused on the market. Thus, an artificial “production boundary” was created to measure gross domestic product (GDP). This “production boundary” defined work and production for sustenance as non-production and non-work — if you produce what you consume then you don’t produce. In one sweep nature’s work in providing goods and services disappeared. The production and work of sustenance economies disappeared and the work of women disappeared.
To the false measure of growth, a false measure of “productivity” was added. Productivity is output for unit input. In agriculture, this should involve all outputs of biodiverse agro-ecosystems — the compost, energy and dairy products from livestock, the fuel, fodder and fruit from agro forestry and farm trees, the diverse outputs of diverse crops. When measured honestly in terms of total output, small biodiverse farms are more productive.
Inputs should include all — capital, seeds, chemicals, machinery, fossil fuels, labour, land and water.
The false measure of productivity selects one output from diverse outputs, the single commodity to be produced for the market. And one input from diverse inputs, i.e. labour.
Thus, high-input low-output chemical-industrial monocultures, which have a negative productivity, are artificially rendered more productive than small, biodiverse, ecological farms. This is at the root of the false assumption that small farms must be destroyed and replaced by large industrial farms. This false, fossilised measure of productivity is at the root of the multiple crisis that we are facing in food and agriculture.
It is at the root of hunger and malnutrition: While commodities grow, food and nutrition have disappeared from the farming system. The “yield” measures the output of a single commodity and not the output of food and nutrition.
It is at the root of the agrarian crisis: When the cost of input keeps increasing and is not counted in measuring productivity, small and marginal farmers are pushed into a high-cost farming model. This often results in debt and, in extreme cases, farmers’ suicides.
It is at the root of the unemployment crisis: When people are replaced by energy slaves because of a false measure of productivity based on labour inputs alone, destruction of livelihoods and work is an inevitable result.
It is also at the root of the ecological crisis: When natural resource inputs, fossil fuel inputs and chemical inputs are increased but not counted, more water and land is wasted, more toxics are used and more fossil fuels are needed. In terms of resource productivity, chemical-industrial agriculture is highly inefficient. It uses 10 units of energy to produce one unit of food. It is responsible for 75 per cent use of water, disappearance of 75 per cent of diverse species, 75 per cent land and soil degradation and 40 per cent of all greenhouse gas emissions that are destabilising the climate. According to a recent report by the Inter-Governmental Panel on Climate Change, the loss, globally, due to extreme climate amounts to $80 billion annually.
We need to move from these false and fossilised indicators to real indicators that reflect the health of nature and the well-being of our economy. The inadequacies of the old paradigm based on economic growth and false productivity are being recognised at the highest levels.
In food and agriculture, when we transcend the false productivity of a fossilised paradigm and shift from the narrow focus on monoculture yields as the only output, and human labour as the only input, instead of destroying small farms and farmers we will protect them because they are more productive. Instead of destroying biodiversity we will intensify it because it gives more food and nutrition.
Futureconomics, or the economics of the future, is based on people and biodiversity and not on fossil fuels, energy slaves, toxic chemicals and monocultures. The fossilised paradigm of food and agriculture has led to displacement, dispossession, disease and ecological destruction. A paradigm that robs 250,000 farmers of their lives and millions of their livelihoods and robs our future generations of their lives by denying them food and nutrition is clearly dysfunctional. It has only led to corporate profits while diminishing life and the well-being of our people. The new paradigm we are creating on the ground and in our minds enriches livelihoods, health of people and ecosystems and cultures.
On April 2, 2012, the United Nations organised a high-level meeting on “Wellbeing and Happiness: Defining a new Economic Paradigm” to implement Resolution 65/309. Conscious that the pursuit of happiness is a fundamental human goal and “recognising that the GDP does not adequately reflect the happiness and well-being of people”, the resolution places “happiness” on the global agenda.
The meeting was hosted by Bhutan whose Prime Minister, Jigme Thinley, has recognised that “growing organic” and “growing happiness and well-being” go hand in hand. For this reason, he asked me and the Navdanya Trust to help his country become 100 per cent “organic” . This is futureconomics.

The writer is the executive director of the Navdanya Trust