In Belgium, less than one in three sustainability criteria are moving in the right direction. If the trend continues, it will not be possible, for example, to make Belgian fishing 100% sustainable. Reducing the poverty risk to 10.8 percent also seems unfeasible, as does reducing the number of smokers to 9.2 percent. On the other hand, we are on the right track with regard to the share of renewable energy, as well as with regard to the decrease in the number of occupational accidents. In fact, the target of spending 3 percent of the economy in research and development has already been achieved.
This is just a selection of the results for dozens of indicators, which can be found in a report that the Planning Bureau published on Tuesday. It shows how Belgium is doing in terms of sustainable development. “This balance of 51 indicators shows that only few social development goals will be achieved in 2030 if current trends continue,” is the strict assessment. The 51 indicators are linked to the social development goals defined by the United Nations.
In concrete terms, 7 of the 26 indicators with a figure target are feasible, while of the 25 indicators without a figure target, 9 are moving in the right direction. The remaining 35 indicators are progressing too slowly, remaining constant or even moving in the wrong direction. The latter applies to two indicators: the population of field birds and the size of the national debt.
2008 was our peak
In addition to the UN indicators, the report also reports on the well-being of the Belgian population. This meets the desire to examine non-economic indicators in addition to the economic indicators of the gross domestic product. This shows that the well-being of Belgians has been deteriorating for years.
The well-being indicator peaked in 2008, on the eve of the financial crisis. In the years that followed, things went downhill quickly, until 2015. Then a recovery started, but the previous level was no longer achieved. In 2019, well-being even took a new hit: it reached the lowest point of the measurement period. Remarkably, in the pandemic years, well-being rises again, probably due to a sense of connection and solidarity, but in 2022 it falls back to almost the level of 2019. Health, both physical and mental, is mainly the culprit. This is reflected, among other things, in the number of people with long-term illnesses. Other well-being components, such as unemployment and material deprivation, show systematic improvement. But they cannot compensate for the deterioration in health status.
After us the deluge?
The report also looks at the well-being of future generations. “The sustainable development of a society means that meeting the needs of the present does not compromise the ability of future generations to meet their own needs,” the report explains. In other words: whoever lives now should not harm the quality of life of his or her grandchildren.
We are not doing very well in that area. Admittedly, things are going in the right direction with human capital (for example, the number of highly educated people), social capital (including contact with friends and family and trust in institutions) and economic capital (such as infrastructure). But environmental capital has been on a downward trend for years. This concerns air and water quality, open space and biodiversity. “Based on the composite indicators in this report, Belgium’s current development is not sustainable, given the decline in environmental capital,” the report concludes.
