Amsterdam will become the first city in the world to adopt the “doughnut” economic model thought up by Kate Raworth, the British Economist from Oxford University’s Environmental Change Institute.
The doughnut economic model aims to create a circular economy that we can all thrive in, rather than constant never-ending growth. Raworth explains:
When suddenly we have to care about climate, health, and jobs and housing and care and communities, is there a framework around that can help us with all of that? Yes, there is, and it is ready to go.
The outer ring of the doughnut represents the earth’s ecosystem and the harm we as humans need to avoid. It highlights such things as ocean acidification, chemical pollution, air pollution, land conservation, and climate change.
The inner ring represents the minimum that we need to live a thriving life. This includes everyone having access to clean water and eliminating social inequalities. Living in a more balanced system of energy, housing, education, healthcare, income, and political voice. Those who fall into the doughnut hole are the less fortunate that we see so much of in current societies around the world.
The dough in the middle is the sweet spot. This is where everyone’s needs are being met and people are set up to thrive and live their best lives. Providing a framework for a circular economy, the doughnut involves people working together to care for the planet.
Amsterdam will adopt its own scaled-down “city portrait” version that will focus first on what they can do on a city level to ensure people’s basic needs are being met, and how to stay within the planetary boundaries that are currently being overshot.
Amsterdam’s deputy mayor, Marieke Van Doorninck spoke to the Guardian via a Skype call about how the doughnut model can help after facing the coronavirus pandemic:
I think it can help us overcome the effects of the crisis. It might look strange that we are talking about the period after that but as a government, we have to … It is to help us to not fall back on easy mechanisms.
Many people in Amsterdam are struggling. Nearly 20% of the cities’ tenants have very little money left over after paying for their monthly rent. There are 60,000 online applications for social housing assistance and only 12% of those people are receiving help. That leaves the other 88% to fall into the doughnut hole.
As for the outer portion of the ring, since 1990 Amsterdam has increased its carbon emissions by 31%. They estimate that 62% of these emissions come from the importing of food, various consumer products, and building materials.
With the new model, Van Doorninck and the city plan on regulating building materials. Promoting the use of recycled bio-based products and natural wood products. This will offer new ways of looking at the economy as she points out:
The fact that houses are too expensive is not only to do with too few being built. There is a lot of capital flowing around the world trying to find an investment, and right now real estate is seen as the best way to invest, so that drives up prices. The doughnut does not bring us the answers but a way of looking at it so that we don’t keep on going on in the same structures as we used to.
Van Doorninck also told the Guardian that Amsterdam will be exploring the ways they can move on from the dependence on the fossil fuel industry, which she expects will naturally evolve from the adaptation of the doughnut economic model.
Raworth summed up the current situation being felt by everyone on Earth right now, and how there has never been a better time to adopt such a system.
The world is experiencing a series of shocks and surprise impacts which are enabling us to shift away from the idea of growth to ‘thriving’. Thriving means our wellbeing lies in [the] balance. We know it so well in the level of our body. This is the moment we are going to connect bodily health to planetary health.
