COVID-19: Challenges and Opportunities for the Environmental Sector

How the COVID-19 Shutdown Exposed the Link Between Economic Activity and Environmental Health

By Gretchen Greene, Rabia Ahmed, and Jeri Sawyer pf Greene Economics, with contributions from Deborah McGrath, Professor of Biology at the University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee.

The COVID-19 pandemic has dramatically changed nearly every aspect of our lives. Our collective willingness to act to minimize the contagion is a stark reminder that we can and must work together to manage the natural environment. For the environmental sector, these actions and the resulting global economic shock offer a unique opportunity to better understand how we affect the natural world and manage our environment.

Emerging opportunities include a call for more research on human-wildlife interactions and a heightened awareness of the profound connection between environmental quality and economic activity. Challenges include finding innovative funding mechanisms for environmental management and preserving economic stability while maintaining environmental compliance and enforcement.

Environmental Health Research

1. There is a clear need for improved management of protected areas so that wild spaces can stay wild.¹ SARS, MERS, and H1N1 are all zoonotic infections that emerge quickly, spread rapidly, have high fatality rates, and for which no vaccine can be developed quickly. These diseases originate from increasing human interaction with wildlife populations that serve as reservoirs for novel pathogens. Human encroachment into wildlife habitat through forest clearing and land-use change, illegal wildlife and bushmeat trade, and wet markets (where domestic and wild animals mingle before on-site slaughter) all serve as potential points of zoonotic transfer.² Since nearly 75 percent of new infectious diseases are zoonotic, global health experts now embrace the "One Health" model—a collaborative, multisector, transdisciplinary approach that recognizes the health of people is closely connected to the health of other animals, plants, and our shared environment.

Opportunity: Collaborative research on zoonotic diseases and the human/wildlife interface.

Challenge: Translating results into a coordinated detection, prevention, response, and control plan.

Environmental Impact Awareness

2. The abrupt decline in economic production and sales is creating a host of impacts as people lose income and have fewer resources to feed and care for their families. Typically, poor and vulnerable populations suffer disproportionately. At the same time, the slowdown provides a window of opportunity as we recognize the direct relationship between our economic activity and its environmental impact. One striking example is the significant improvement in air quality around the globe, portrayed in photographs from Wuhan, China, London, and the U.S. Research shows that between 100,000 and 200,000 people in the U.S. die from poor air quality each year,³ and approximately seven million die globally.⁴ We have to wonder,can we come together to improve air quality intentionally to save lives, just as we have rallied to save lives from the pandemic? An interesting question to consider: how do lives saved from cleaner air compare to those lost to COVID-19?

3. An unexpected outcome has been a reduction in noise pollution, especially in urban areas. Seismologists who study the rumblings of citywide transit systems, traffic, construction, and other sources have noticed less noise from Wuhan to Europe to New York, and this global reduction improves detection of earthquakes. The drop in cruise ships and other maritime traffic has eased pressure on whales and other ocean species. Anecdotally, citizens are noticing bird calls and appreciating the natural world like never before.

4. Water quality may be affected by the global slowing of production and attendant pollution, but reports of improved water quality—for example, online claims that water clarity in Venice, Italy had dramatically improved with reduced tourism—were not scientifically supported. Still, because water may appear to improve in quality, this can raise awareness of the direct relationship between human activity and the environment. Meanwhile, researchers remain unclear about whether COVID-19 could be a viable threat to swimmers as a result of raw or undertreated sewage released to surface waters. The virus lives for several days in sewage, lending itself to transmission through fecal-oral routes.

5. The economic slowdown has also caused a temporary reduction in energy demand, fossil fuel use, and associated emissions. For example, restricted travel has reduced fuel consumption for cars, ships, and airplanes. While this has improved air quality, the emissions reduction is unlikely to be sustained once economic activity picks up. With the normalization of virtual meetings and conferences, it is unclear whether global travel will return to pre-COVID-19 levels.

6. The temporary drop in fuel demand has, in part, caused a steep reduction in oil prices. Typically, a lower price would encourage a rebound in demand as individuals and businesses switch to cheaper fuel or simply consume more because it is cheaper. Unfortunately, there may be prolonged downward pressure on oil prices as a result of an ongoing price war between Russia and Saudi Arabia.

Opportunity: With the environmental benefits so visible, there's a rare opening to build public will for cleaner air and lower consumption.

Challenge: Transforming that awareness into action once we've returned to more normal lifestyles.

Public Policy Funding and Enforcement

7. Both public health and the natural environment are public goods, historically requiring government funding for most of the care and management of the natural environment. With the current stress on fiscal budgets created by emergency health care and economic needs stemming from the pandemic, environmental priorities will receive lower funding. For example, Washington State Governor Jay Inslee was forced to cut $50 million in proposed new climate change funding due to the fiscal crisis created by COVID-19. Such cuts are likely to persist over the long term, because the economic slowdown will simultaneously decrease state and local tax revenues.

8. Many companies are experiencing lost revenue and/or an inability to operate due to COVID-19 restrictions. In response, the EPA recognizes that such economic hardship may affect reporting obligations and milestones set forth in settlements and consent decrees, and "the ability of an operation to meet enforceable limitations on air emissions and water discharges, requirements for the management of hazardous waste, or requirements to ensure and provide safe drinking water."⁵ This decison demonstrates that environmental priorities rank lower than necessity goods and services. That is, when incomes decline, demand for environmental services declines more than proportionally. From an economic perspective, this signals that environmental services are perceived as a "luxury item."

Opportunity: Greater incentive to turn to environmental funding and policy solutions that use fewer public resources, such as innovative public-private partnerships.

Challenge: During the pandemic, public funding for environmental policy may be reallocated to health and economic emergencies even as revenues decline.

Agriculture and Food Security

9. Agricultural production is somewhat exempt from the economic hiatus, since it is generally considered part of our critical infrastructure. However, agricultural labor is not immune from COVID-19. The recent shutdown of Smithfield pork production in South Dakota, which processes about five percent of the nation's pork, demonstrates that the impact of an outbreak inside the agricultural supply chain can be significant. Similarly, about 25 percent of hired farm labor in crops and crop support is conducted through the H-2A guest farmworker program for foreign nationals, who come to the U.S. on temporary work visas. Although the U.S. Department of State is expanding the program in the face of the pandemic, it is not clear whether there will be an adequate supply of healthy farm workers — domestic or foreign — to meet the needs of normal production. Finally, lost sales and interrupted supply channels for food that normally goes to restaurants and educational institutions are causing additional snags in getting products to consumers. The resulting production decisions by farmers will have a widespread impact on environmental conditions, from produce left in the field, to reductions in water use, to changes in farming practices.

Opportunity: Food security through more localized farming systems gains importance, with growth in small and urban farms and greater reliance on sustainable agroecological practices.

Challenge: As supply and distribution channels falter with worker illness and supply-chain upheaval, will low-income communities be able to feed their families?

Environmental Risk

10. We can learn a lot from the idiom "an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure," because, as the pandemic underscores, we often fail to invest in prevention and instead react to crisis. Risk-awareness research shows that while preparedness for all manner of unexpected emergencies makes good sense in the long run, most people never think unpredictable, catastrophic events will happen to them. This lack of public understanding of risk translates into an unwillingness to accept the financial burden of preparation. We hope a silver lining from this pandemic will be the shared recognition that it IS happening to everyone. Perhaps the experience will strengthen our collective willingness to invest in the collaborative preparation, detection, and response needed for the next zoonotic infection,⁶ as well as create more resilient health care systems available to all.

11. There are numerous parallels between the COVID-19 and climate change crises. Changes to life as we know it may come more slowly with climate change than with the urgent response to the pandemic. Like the pandemic response, climate impacts will be global, unpredictable, and costly. Climate change will also take a toll on public health and affect vulnerable populations most, heightening discussions of inequities across race, culture, and socioeconomic status. However, unlike a viral infection for which a vaccine will be developed, global climate change is likely irreversible.

Opportunity: Once we recover from the pandemic, the lessons we learn can inspire a collaborative approach to preventing future damage from a changing climate and the other pressures we place on the natural environment.

Challenge: Communicating risk and putting mitigation strategies in place to reduce long-run community harm from environmental forces is difficult — especially during a crisis.

This blog is also posted on the Northwest Environmental Business Council (NEBC) website: https://www.nebc.org/industry-news/

[References]

1. Andersen, Inger, 2020. "COVID-19 is not a silver lining for the climate, says UN Environment chief." https://news.un.org/en/story/2020/04/1061082

2. Belay ED, Kile JC, Hall AJ, et al. "Zoonotic disease programs for enhancing global health security." Emerg Infect Dis, 2017. https://doi.org/10.3201/eid2313.170544

3. Tessum CW, et al. "Inequity in consumption of goods and services adds to racial–ethnic disparities in air pollution exposure." PNAS, 2019. https://www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.1818859116

4. World Health Organization, Health Topics: Air Pollution. https://www.who.int/health-topics/air-pollution

5. Bodine, Susan (EPA), "COVID-19 Implications for EPA's Enforcement and Compliance Assurance Program," March 26, 2020. https://www.epa.gov/sites/production/files/2020-03/documents/oecamemooncovid19implications.pdf

6. Belay ED, et al. (see reference 2).

[1] Anderson, Inger, 2020. COVID-19 is not a silver lining for the climate, says UN Environment chief, available at: https://news.un.org/en/story/2020/04/1061082 [2] Belay ED, Kile JC, Hall AJ, Barton-Behravesh C, Parsons MB, Salyer S, et al. Zoonotic disease programs for enhancing global health security. Emerg Infect Dis. 2017 Suppl. https://doi.org/10.3201/eid2313.170544 [3] Christopher W. Tessum el al., "Inequity in consumption of goods and services adds to racial–ethnic disparities in air pollution exposure," PNAS (2019). www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.1818859116 [4] World Health Organization, Health Topics, Air Pollution, available at: https://www.who.int/health-topics/air-pollution#tab=tab_1 accessed on April 13, 2020. [5] COVID-19 Implications for EPA’s Enforcement and Compliance Assurance Program, Susan Bodine, Agency Administrator, March 26, 2020. Available at: https://www.epa.gov/sites/production/files/2020-03/documents/oecamemooncovid19implications.pdf, accessed April 13, 2020. [6] Belay ED, Kile JC, Hall AJ, Barton-Behravesh C, Parsons MB, Salyer S, et al. Zoonotic disease programs for enhancing global health security. Emerg Infect Dis. 2017 Suppl. https://doi.org/10.3201/eid2313.170544