Introduction to sustainability

Extract: What do we think when using the term sustainability? If we wish to sustain the ecology,the economy, and the social relationships in a river basin, what do we mean? I imagine we think of it in terms of sustaining our particular lifestyles, assuming they are enjoyable. We think of sustaining jobs - no one wishes to worry about losing paid work. This would apply regardless of how we view our work - even work we do not enjoy is valuable because it pays the bills. We want to sustain our incomes however they are earned, as profits, as wages, as rents. And, of course, we need to sustain the ecosystems on which we rely for both income and pleasure, and more generally for life support. Without the gifts of nature we would not exist. This we have come to realise over the past 40 or so years.