Should economic growth be prioritised over environmental sustainability?

In a world where governments pursue prosperity at all costs, humanity’s blind faith in economic growth has become misguided. As industrialised economies chase unnecessary growth, global biodiversity loss has amounted to USD 10 trillion annually (Biodiversity, 2025), and over 22.5 million people are displaced per year due to weather-related disasters (Torres and Casey, 2017). Economic growth, untethered from sustainability, isn’t progress; it is a slow destruction of civilization. In order to ensure our world’s future, developed and developing countries alike must move away from ineffective policies and create an economy with sustainability at the heart.

For citizens of all too many developing countries, economic growth is indeed vital to achieve a basic standard of living. World Bank data shows that 8.5% of the global population - almost 700 million people - live on less than $2.15 per day in extreme poverty (Poverty Overview, 2024). To many, this problem can only be solved by industrialisation: it has lifted millions out of poverty, catalysed infrastructure development, advanced technology, and created many jobs (Müller, 2024). In the past 40 years, China’s industrialisation has caused the number of people under the International Poverty Line to fall by close to 800 million (China, 2022).  Nonetheless, tangible improvements in the basics of life happen way before a country’s per capita income reaches the level of advanced industrialised economies (Friedman, 2006). Over the past three decades of economic growth in the US, standards of living have barely improved, and life expectancy increased by less than 1% (O’Neill, 2024). Despite this fact, industrialised countries continue to blindly pursue economic prosperity at the expense of global health, threatening the future with a preponderance of catastrophic climatic events (Sturm et al., 2025). Even in emerging economies, blindly prioritising economic growth with inadequate infrastructure and governance only exacerbates income inequality and lowers average living standards. In sub-Saharan Africa, for every one percentage point increase in GDP each year, nearly 130,000 people per country fell into extreme poverty on average (Ecker, Ortiz-Juarez and Molina, 2023). Prioritisation of environmental sustainability is vital to translate economic growth into welfare gain; mindless consumption simply drains our planet with no tangible benefit.

Per Daniel Bell, “Economic growth has become the secular religion of advancing industrial societies.”(Bell, 1972) Modern society features an unfounded belief that growth-driven technology innovation will autonomously resolve the environmental crisis, with some using the Environmental Kutznet Curve, which illustrates eventual environmental gains from economic expansion (Öztürk and Özcan, 2019), to justify economic growth eventually bringing environmental improvements. Yet given that industrialised countries account for 80% of global CO2 emissions (Müller, 2024), natural resource depletion will still outpace replenishment rates by far. Future technological innovations can’t bring back the more than 1 million species threatened with extinction (Martin, 2019) or the 48% of the world’s land area at risk of flooding by 2100 (Kirezci et al., 2020). The concept of economic growth and environmental sustainability is simply incompatible in the current economy. Jevons’ paradox assesses that market dynamics lead to the infinite wants of humans dominating, and any increase in efficiency will be balanced out by increased demand (York, 2006), creating a self-defeating pursuit of sustainability.

However, despite this pressing need for immediate sustainability action, developing countries have taken a superficial approach in their solution, choosing to focus on the carbon footprint of emerging economies instead of their own. In a form of ‘green imperialism’, proposed agreements like the EU’s CBAM burden developing countries with carbon taxes (Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism - European Commission, 2025), reducing their price competitiveness and squashing their hopes of development. This is while advanced nations use piecemeal sustainability strategies and insincere promises to appease the global crowd, too caught up in their pursuit of economic expansion to address the sustainability problem properly. While the Paris Agreement reaffirmed the 100 billion USD pledge from developed countries to vulnerable ones for climate action, the US only provided 5% of its fair share (Goswami and Koop, 2023). Advanced economies isolate themselves from the global collective action on climate change, not recognising that it affects them just as much. Air pollution causes more than 200,000 premature deaths per year in Europe (Environmental health impacts, 2025), and from 2008 to 2015, climate and weather-related disasters have displaced an annual average of 22.5 million people (Torres and Casey, 2017)..

Developed countries must confront the harsh reality: their current actions are not enough, and monetary gains must be temporarily abandoned in favour of a global sustainable system – a circular economy where economic growth can occur without sacrificing the natural world. Per the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, a circular economy ‘redefines growth, focusing on society-wide benefits.’ (Circular Economy Overview, no date) The concept of CE reduces the burden on natural resources, allowing for developing countries to have a sustainable industrialisation process for long-term, sustained growth. However, this requires social responsibility from developed countries, given limited resources from local governments in emerging regions to set up CE programs. The previously established Green Climate Fund to financially support developing countries has set a significant precedent (Goswami and Koop, 2023), but advanced economies must now back up promises made with action.

Global stakeholders must recognise that a greener economy is in everyone’s self-interest. The EU environmental economy has created 2 million new jobs between 2000 and 2021, while generating a 937 billion euros output in 2021 (Statistics Explained, no date). Observing CE principles in developing countries, Bangladesh has saved US$4.7 million from recycling lead from batteries (Ahmed, Mahmud and Acet, 2022). Even in the private sector, the majority of research tends to support a positive correlation viewpoint between ESG systems and corporate performance in the long run (e.g. (Agbakwuru et al., 2024)), as improved corporate social responsibility enhances firm reputation and innovation while increasing customer loyalty, improving overall financial performance (D’Amato, D’Ecclesia and Levantesi, 2024). Given the mutual benefit of environmental implementation, a circular economy is not out of reach even in a capitalist system. Nevertheless, CE success will require local government support and making national regulatory and policy framework conducive for circular economy finance (‘CIRCULAR-STEP Mobilizing Financing- 4.28.2023_0.pdf’, no date). A CE era focuses on external partnerships and stakeholder collaboration. Through public-private partnership, China’s sludge-to-energy program not only reduced almost 98% of emissions, but was also financially breaking (Maassen, 2017). With sufficient support, minor green projects in developing regions can scale to a systems-level circular economy, driving economic growth in a sustainable development process (Maassen, 2017). Developed nations, having accumulated wealth through the environmental exploitation process of industrialisation, bear a duty for this transition.

As global concerns for sustainability shift, so must our approach to economic policy. Advanced economies must lead worldwide changes and abandon superficial strategies to solve the climate crisis, empowering developing nations instead of oppressing them. Growth-centred ideologies must change, and policymakers must not rely on future innovation to solve present problems. A circular economy must be achieved in time to ensure a future where humanity can develop sustainably, and this can only happen if individual stakeholders reach viable partnerships and effective collaboration. The planet isn’t waiting, it’s time to take action.

References

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