UN Report: Investing in planetary health would deliver higher GDP, fewer deaths, less poverty

The most comprehensive assessment of the global environment ever undertaken has found that investing in a stable climate, healthy nature and land, and a pollution-free planet can deliver trillions in additional global GDP, avoid millions of deaths and lift hundreds of millions of people out of poverty and hunger.

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The Global Environment Outlook, Seventh Edition: A Future We Choose (GEO-7), released during the seventh session of the United Nations Environment Assembly in Nairobi, is the product of 287 multi-disciplinary scientists from 82 countries.

The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) report finds that climate change, biodiversity loss, land degradation, desertification, and pollution and waste have taken a heavy toll on the planet, people and economies – already costing trillions of dollars each year. Following current development pathways will only intensify this toll.

However, whole-of-society and whole-of-government approaches to transform the systems of economy and finance, materials and waste, energy, food and the environment would deliver global macroeconomic benefits that could reach US$20 trillion per year by 2070 and continue growing.

A key enabling factor of this approach is moving away from GDP to indicators that also track human and natural capital – incentivizing economies to move towards circularity, decarbonization of the energy system, sustainable agriculture, ecosystem restoration and more.

“The Global Environment Outlook lays out a simple choice for humanity: continue down the road to a future devastated by climate change, dwindling nature, degraded land and polluted air, or change direction to secure a healthy planet, healthy people and healthy economies. This is no choice at all,” said Inger Andersen, UNEP Executive Director.

“And let us not forgot the world has already made so much progress: from global deals covering climate change, nature, land and biodiversity, and pollution and waste, to real-world change in the booming renewables industry, global coverage of protected areas, and the phasing out of toxic chemicals,” she added. “I call on all nations to build on this progress, invest in planetary health and drive their economies towards a thriving, sustainable future.”

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A better path

The report presents two transformation pathways, looking at behavioural changes to place less emphasis on material consumption, and changes in which the world relies primarily on technological development and efficiency gains.

The transformation pathways predict that the global macroeconomic benefits will start to appear in 2050, grow to US$20 trillion per year by 2070 and boom thereafter to US$100 trillion per year. The pathways project reduced exposure to climate risks, reduced biodiversity loss by 2030 and an increase in natural lands.

Nine million premature deaths can be avoided by 2050, through measures such as cutting air pollution. By 2050, almost 200 million people could be lifted out of undernourishment and over 100 million people out of extreme poverty.

To achieve net-zero emissions by 2050 and ensure adequate funding for conserving and restoring biodiversity, annual investment of about US$8 trillion is needed until 2050. However, the cost of inaction is far higher.

Sweeping transformations required

Following the transformation pathways would require sweeping changes across five key areas. The report outlines recommended measures for each area, including:

Economy and finance: Move beyond GDP to comprehensive inclusive wealth metrics; price positive and negative externalities to value goods correctly; and phase out and repurpose subsidies, taxes and incentives that result in negative impacts on nature.
Materials and waste: Implement circular product design, transparency and traceability of products, components and materials; shift investments to circular and regenerative business models; and shift consumption patterns towards circularity through changing mindsets.
Energy: Decarbonize the energy supply; increase energy efficiency; back social and environmental sustainability in critical mineral value chains; and address energy access and energy poverty.
Food systems: Shift to healthy and sustainable diets; enhance circularity and production efficiency; and reduce food loss and waste.
Environment: Accelerate conservation and restoration of biodiversity and ecosystems; back climate adaptation and resilience, leaning on Nature-based Solutions; and implement climate mitigation strategies.

The report calls for a parallel co-development and co-implementation of such solutions. Considering diverse knowledge systems, especially Indigenous Knowledge and Local Knowledge, is crucial to just transitions that address both environmental sustainability and human well-being.

The report calls on governments, non-governmental and multilateral organizations, the private sector, civil society, academia, professional organizations, the public and Indigenous Peoples to acknowledge the urgency of the global environmental crises, build on progress made in recent decades, and collaborate in the co-design and implementation of integrated policies, strategies and actions to deliver a better future for all.

Growing degradation

Drawing on multiple sources, the report also lays out in detail the current and future consequences of business-as-usual development models.

Greenhouse gas emissions have increased by 1.5 per cent each year since 1990, reaching a new high in 2024 – raising global temperatures and intensifying climate impacts. The cost of extreme weather events attributed to climate change over the last 20 years is estimated at US$143 billion annually.

Between 20 and 40 per cent of land area worldwide is estimated to be degraded, affecting over three billion people, while one million of an estimated eight million species are threatened with extinction.

Nine million deaths are attributable annually to some form of pollution. The economic cost of health damages from air pollution alone was about US$8.1 trillion in 2019 – or around 6.1 per cent of global GDP.

The state of the environment will dramatically worsen if the world continues to power economies under a business-as-usual pathway. Without action, global mean temperature rise is likely to exceed 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels in the early 2030s, exceed 2.0°C by the 2040s and keep climbing. On this path, climate change would cut 4 per cent off annual global GDP by 2050 and 20 per cent by the end of the century.

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Land degradation is expected to continue at current rates, with the world losing fertile and productive land the size of Colombia or Ethiopia annually – at a time when climate change could reduce per-person food availability by 3.4 per cent by 2050.

The 8,000 million tonnes of plastic waste polluting the planet will continue to accumulate – driving up the estimated health-related economic losses of US$1.5 trillion attributable annually to exposure to toxic chemicals in plastics.