On Wednesday, Khushi Chhaya attended a college-wide talk by Barnard College Professor Mulu Gebreyohannes on green growth and sustainable development in Ethiopia.

On Wednesday, Barnard College Economics Professor Mulu Gebreyohannes presented a college-wide talk Green Growth Policies in Action: A Case From Africa. The talk explored the idea of developing countries growing their economies by sustainable means by analyzing a case study from Ethiopia. 

Professor Gebreyohannes is a developmental economist and has conducted research in many areas including investment, trade and industry policies, private sector development, and science, innovation, and technology policy. He previously held senior researcher positions at the United Nations University Maastricht in the Netherlands and the Ethiopian Development Research Institute. He has also worked with policymakers and the private sector in developing countries. 

Currently, Professor Gebreyohannes is a Weiss International Fellow at Barnard College and teaches undergraduate students. He is also a Visiting Fellow at Columbia’s Center for Economic Development and Policy. 

Professor Gebreyohannes began his talk by broadly introducing the topic of climate change as an existential threat affecting people around the world, whether they are major contributors to global greenhouse gas emissions or not. 

After outlining the many consequences of climate change—water and air pollution, deforestation, droughts, extreme weather—Professor Gebreyohannes offered data that showed sharp increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide since the industrial revolution, evidence that climate change is indeed human-caused. “We are destroying ourselves, that is the reality,” he said. 

These carbon emissions are dominated by China and the USA. Emerging countries across the world have also seen a rise in emissions, Professor Gebreyohannes stated. While the outlook was bleak, national governments and international institutions took up a “better late than never” stance and “woke up” to the threats of climate change. 

Professor Gebreyohannes then raised the question of whether developing countries could still achieve their desired growth through sustainable means. He asked if they would benefit from green growth or if it was a forced strategy from outsiders that would not serve them. 

Sustainable development means that countries can meet the needs of current generations without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own.  Professor Gebreyohannes explained that green growth is the path to sustainable development with a first step of decoupling carbon emissions from economic development. The two have been intertwined since the industrial revolution, but don’t have to be. 

Currently, the world grapples with whether adopting green development creates limits or spurs growth. Previously, the popular thought was to “pollute and clean later,” allowing developing countries to rely on coal and oil to establish their economies and shift to renewable energy later. Now, there is an emerging view in favor of synergy, where developing countries can “leapfrog” over past technologies to adopt newer innovations. 

Professor Gebreyohannes then moved to his case study of green growth in Ethiopia—the second-most populous country in Africa but one of the poorest as well. Ethiopia’s contribution to global carbon emissions is minimal, about 2% of the USA’s total emissions. Despite this, Ethiopia was the first country in Africa to announce a green economy strategy in 2011. 

Ethiopia also took up a leadership role in Africa’s international climate diplomacy. With the ambitious goal of growing its economy by over 10% each year with net zero carbon emissions. 

According to Professor Gebreyohannes, this goal poses two important questions: What motivated Ethiopia, and what the outcome of the green economy goals have been.

Firstly, the issue had to be framed in a way that would gain popularity among the government and the general population. One way of doing this was to link green growth with poverty reduction. By doing this, the two issues were viewed as one and the same, with each one being inseparable from the other. Sustainable development was the best way to combat poverty and vice versa. Green growth was also framed as a necessity as well as an opportunity. It is necessary since Ethiopia is vulnerable to the impacts of climate change while also being an opportunity for economic growth. 

Another important part of getting green growth underway was mainstreaming, Professor Gebreyohannes said. This included integrating the principles of green growth into existing industries such as agriculture and transportation. There was also an industrialization of greening itself, with an emphasis on generating green electricity and building eco-industrial parks that rely solely on hydroelectric power. These parks attracted international enterprises and supported thousands of jobs. 

Despite the efforts to push for green energy, Ethiopia still had weak national innovation projects, limited access to financing, and a lack of reliable data and expertise, Professor Gebreyohannes explained. There was also a great deal of international attention and partnership, but limited local stake in Ethiopia’s green energy goals. 

This created a gap between Ethiopia’s policy ambitions and their reality. In order to bridge this gap, Professor Gebreyohannes noted that the recourse gaps have to be addressed through global cooperation.

To conclude his talk, Professor Gebreyohannes spoke briefly about how to scale this commitment to green growth. While green growth can be implemented in other developing countries, specific plans and policies will have to be tailored to their resources and needs. Green growth can be pursued as a path to economic prosperity given adequate resources, messaging, and international collaboration. 

Image via The Blue & Green Journey