While the world gradually mobilizes to tackle the climate challenge, huge differences in wealth and opportunities still exist across society, sometimes exacerbated by environmental conditions. In turn, such social divergence can also slow down the efforts to reach an economy within planetary boundaries.
The Covid-19 crisis has further increased disparities between and within countries and communities. These disparities become apparent in terms of access to key resources (e.g. water, energy, land), products and services (food, education, healthcare, telecommunication and internet, but also quality information), markets (labour, housing, financial markets), as well as cultural, political and social spaces.
Inequality and social divides ultimately impact everyone, creating frictions between individuals, within communities and across national borders. A sustainable economy is an economy that works for all, leaving no one behind, or at the margins of society.
