Resource efficiency is a key approach to decoupling economic growth from environmental degradation while enhancing human well-being. It stimulates innovation, the creation of new industries, and boosts economic competitiveness. Ultimately, it is good not only for the environment but also for the economy.
Resource efficiency is both a requirement and an opportunity for sustained economic prosperity in G20 countries - a dynamic group of leading economies with a diverse set of visions and approaches for sustainable development, and member states all over the world. The collective impact of this group could drive large-scale transformation in a direction that can lead us to the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals.
The response of coastal wetlands to sea-level rise during the twenty-first century remains uncertain. Global-scale projections suggest that between 20 and 90 per cent (for low and high sea-level rise scenarios, respectively) of the present-day coastal wetland area will be lost, which will, in turn, result in the loss of biodiversity and highly valued ecosystem services. These projections do not necessarily take into account all essential geomorphological and socio-economic system feedbacks. Here the authors present an integrated global modelling approach that considers both the ability of coastal wetlands to build up vertically by sediment accretion and the accommodation space, namely, the vertical and lateral space available for fine sediments to accumulate and be colonized by wetland vegetation. The authors use this approach to assess global-scale changes in coastal wetland area in response to global sea-level rise and anthropogenic coastal occupation during the twenty-first century.
