A/HRC/41/39 and waste production. That will entail radical and systemic changes, including incentives, pricing, regulation and resource allocation, in order to disrupt unsustainable approaches and reflect environmental costs in entire economic subsystems, including energy, agriculture, manufacturing, construction and transportation. 84 44. Economic prosperity, decent work and environmental sustainability are fully compatible. Studies have found that it is possible to rely on wind, water and solar energy for all new energy projects by 2030 and transition the entire energy system to renewable energy by 2050 with current technology and at a similar cost as fossil fuels. 85 Fiscal policy and carbon pricing can incentivize low-carbon investment and emissions mitigation, generate revenue to bolster social protection and support people in poverty, and incentivize the creation of good green jobs.86 45. The World Bank sees no reason that a low-carbon path must slow economic growth.87 There is strong evidence that reducing emissions will mitigate the economic harm of climate change by trillions of dollars.88 Renewable energy will create jobs while energyefficient investments can lead to greater energy savings and fewer emissions. Climate adaption and a sustainable economy would also reduce the costs of health care and environmental degradation, restore overused and exhausted resources, increase food and water security, and reduce poverty and inequality. 89 Studies have shown that the benefits of reducing pollution for health and agriculture alone could make up for the cost of mitigation, at least until 2030.90 46. Twenty-three countries have already decoupled economic growth from emissions through the use of renewable energy, carbon pricing and green subsidies and jobs, meaning their economies are growing faster than their emissions or resource use. On average, they have done so while reducing poverty faster than other countries. 91 The barriers are social and political, not technological or economic. Private sector 47. The response to global warming requires transformational change, and while some see a chance to address inequalities and fulfil basic rights, others seem to see an opportunity for long-sought, investor-friendly reforms. The World Bank and the United Nations Development Programme have jointly begun an initiative, “Invest4Climate”, to “identify policy and regulatory barriers to scaled up investment and develop solutions and political support to address them”.92 The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) has called for “resilient investment” policies that are difficult to distinguish from the recommendations such institutions have been issuing for years and that have got us to this point: Governments must ensure that the economy is “open to competitive investment”, ensure labour markets are “flexible”, embrace “core investment principles such as not discriminating against foreign investors” and eliminate tariffs and local-content obligations.93 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 See UN Environment and others, Green Industrial Policy: Concept, Policies, Country Experiences. See Mark Z. Jacobson and Mark A. Delucchi, “Providing all global energy with wind, water, and solar power, part I: technologies, energy resources, quantities and areas of infrastructure, and materials”, Energy Policy, vol. 39, No. 3 (March 2011); and Energy Watch Group, “100% renewable electricity worldwide is feasible and more cost-effective than the existing system”, 8 November 2017. See UNEP, Emissions Gap Report 2018, pp. xxi–xxii. World Bank, World Development Report 2010: Development and Climate Change, p. 7. See Marshall Burke, W. Matthew Davis and Noah S. Diffenbaugh, “Large potential reduction in economic damages under UN mitigation targets”. UN Environment and others, Green Industrial Policy: Concept, Policies, Country Experiences, pp. 26, 27 and 31; and Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Special Report: Global Warming of 1.5ºC, summary for policymakers, p. 21. World Bank, Shock Waves: Managing the Impacts of Climate Change on Poverty, p. 23. ILO, Greening with Jobs. World Employment Social Outlook 2018, pp. 7, 13 and 15. See World Bank, “About Invest4Climate” (February 2019). OECD, Investing in Climate, Investing in Growth (2017), pp. 185, 187–188, 209 and 215–216. 11