Affordability = inclusive growth = sustainability

Résumé détaillé

Sustainable development must prioritize affordability to ensure inclusivity, especially for poorer communities. Policies should focus on reducing costs in agriculture, energy, and pollution management to make green solutions accessible to all, fostering equitable growth.

Affordability was on the ballot in the United States midterm elections. The reasons are obvious. The question we should be asking is why it has taken so long to bring it to the forefront of political debate, and what this shift now means for development in the US. I ask this in particular, as affordability lies at the core of sustainability for us in India.

In the US midterms, the Democrats’ “blue tsunami” swept the country, taking even states that had long been deeply and avowedly red Republican. The key issue was the Iran war, but what mattered most to voters was the rising cost of living — from the price of diesel to food to energy and, of course, medical bills because of the changes to the affordable healthcare provisions introduced in recent years.

This is an important signal for future policies in the US and beyond. For too long, environmental and climate strategies have discounted the need to be populist — or affordable. Environmental policies have often added to the costs of development and industries; the trend even extends to sectors like agriculture and energy. Consider organic agriculture. A green policy to reduce the toxic burden of pesticides often makes it more expensive than conventional agriculture. It then results in higher food prices, meaning that only some — the richer in society — can afford to buy this “good” food. It then becomes an elite choice.

This does not work in countries like India, where cost of food is critical not only for the poor but also for the government, which must procure vast quantities for its food distribution programmes. This is why, in our part of the world, we are discussing how agriculture can improve the well-being of farmers—not by increasing the cost of food production but by reducing it, making food more affordable and farming more sustainable.

We are learning the same lesson, albeit slowly, when it comes to water pollution. Initially, we adopted pollution-control models of the developed world — intercept sewage from…

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