Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. It can be broken down into three main pillars – Economic, Social, and Environmental, with no pillar being more important than the other.
This means eradicating poverty, shifting patterns of production and consumption to be more sustainable, and protecting natural resources while also developing economically and socially. It increases environmental protections and social support to uplift society, at the same time ensuring that our future generations can enjoy the same benefits we do today.
However, while we may begin to consume less, a growing population also means increased environmental impact. These both cancel each other out. Sustainable development therefore implies net-zero damage. This means that we can continue developing at the expense of the natural environment, as long as there are benefits returned to nature in other aspects. This exists in the concept of net-zero production, net-zero buildings, and carbon offsetting.
However, considering that our past development has already impacted the natural environment, shouldn’t we begin to think of ways to restore it as much as possible? Sure, extinct species cannot be brought back to life, but by maintaining larger, more connected swathes of “natural” areas, they can help to stabilise our ecosystem and contribute to biodiversity conservation. We need to begin to think about net-positive returns in development.
There are many different levels of developmental processes, each causing different extents of degeneration or regeneration in the environment.
To engage in “regeneration” is to rethink development as designing and building communities with the idea of participating “with and as nature”, instead of “doing things to nature”. In order to carry out regenerative development, there are three key aspects that positively reinforce one another:
- to understand the place;
- to formulate a design and concept plan for the place; and
- to develop the place and engage the community.
By engaging the community, we can learn more about how they perceive the place, thereby furthering our understanding of the place and improve on the processes to better develop it. These steps may seem usual for any development of land use plans, but these aspects have to be put into a more “regenerative” light. By engaging in regenerative design, not only do we maintain our biodiversity, as the earlier example suggested, but it has the potential to restore planetary health in all aspects.
This framework represents the safe boundaries/operating spaces of different aspects to ensure planetary health and sustenance of life
Using examples in Singapore, let’s contextualise the different levels of development designs to help us understand how “regenerative design” is different.
Programmes that use building and design to try and restore what used to be the natural state of things, like the OneMillionTrees Movement and design concepts like the naturalised canal in Bishan-Ang Mo Kio Park, are restorative.
Our development plans mapped out in the Singapore Green Plan 2030 are reconciliatory in nature. It recognises that we, humans, are part of nature, and that we must find solutions towards a sustainable way of living.
One way that we might be developing in a regenerative manner is the creation of the Forest Corridor in the upcoming Tengah Town housing estate. The corridor is only made possible by understanding the importance of the land area as a connection between the Central Catchment Nature Reserve and the Western Catchment Area.
The re-creation of this forest corridor and the building of a human settlement around this corridor is a suitable example of how we understand the properties and significance of the original place, and it is a solution as to how humans can live with and together with the natural ecosystem and the natural state of things. (Of course, it will be best if the corridor is made up of a preserved patch of land that is left untouched during development.)
Thus, regenerative design is a step further from sustainable development. It’s not just about reducing nature’s deterioration, but to allow nature and society to flourish together, hand-in-hand. This enables the identity and significance of the place to be preserved, and to support the ecological or social services that the place has to offer.
However, for Tengah Town to be truly regenerative by design, the rest of the town must incorporate the same concept. By the looks of it, the rest of the town is not much different from any other urbanised town in Singapore, barring the addition of sustainable technologies and increased greenery. The design is thus more sustainable and restorative in concept than regenerative.
Thus, we need to begin to go one step further from just sustainable design. While the best way to preserve nature is to leave them untouched, in the backdrop of development, regeneration may be the closest we can get to returning to the natural system.
That said, without a basic motivation for sustainable development, it will be even harder to begin regenerative development. However, if we are willing to begin to skip the idea of sustainability, and begin to think in a more “regenerative” sense, then we might be able to achieve our sustainable development goals and even sooner.