Well done, Ford. The company once said it could make money on gas-guzzling SUVs only. Now it says its smaller, fuel-efficient cars are profitable thanks to skyrocketing gas prices. But Lester Brown of the Earth Policy Institute warns that the sustainability journey has only just started for the motor industry.
Brown is optimistic that we can achieve a sustainable global economy, but his optimism flows from a dark place. He keeps upbeat by rereading "the economic history of US involvement in World War II because it is such an inspiring study in rapid mobilisation". In his book, World on the Edge, Brown notes that one month after Pearl Harbor President Roosevelt announced the country's arms production goals. The US, he said, would produce 45,000 tanks, 60,000 planes, and several thousand ships. He added: "Let no man say it cannot be done."
Brown writes that later "Roosevelt met with auto industry leaders, indicating that the country would rely heavily on them to reach these goals. Initially, they expected to continue making cars and simply add on the production of armaments. What they did not yet know was that the sale of new cars would soon be banned."
In addition, residential and road construction was halted, and driving for pleasure was banned. Strategic goods, including tyres, gasoline, fuel oil and sugar, were rationed. Yet that same year witnessed the greatest expansion of industrial output in US history.
In her book, No Ordinary Time, Doris Kearns Goodwin describes how firms reacted: "A spark plug factory switched to the production of machine guns. A manufacturer of stoves produced lifeboats. A merry-go-round factory made gun mounts; a toy company turned out compasses; and a corset manufacturer produced grenade belts." Still, the point Brown makes is not so much about scale as speed. "It did not take decades to restructure the US industrial economy," he stresses. "It did not take years. It was done in a matter of months."
Brown says the US has the "resources and leadership" to lead the effort to stabilise climate [and] eradicate poverty". The question we may need to ask ourselves soon, though, is: "If not America, who?"
John Elkington is executive chairman of Volans (www.volans.com) and non-executive director at SustainAbility (www.sustainability.com)
