Rushing through the china shop the bull avoids all the expected catastrophes, pirouettes and exits

Rushing through the china shop the bull avoids all the expected catastrophes, pirouettes and exits taking all the real answers to climate change mitigation with it.

That thought entered my mind sitting through the hour-long webinar - “How can business and sport join forces to accelerate low-carbon technologies across different sectors?”

Much discussion in the Sustainable Innovation in Sport 2018 webinar, although worthy, well thought through and relevant to encouraging sustainability in sport, it seemed to skirt the intricate and implanted social issues that must be addressed if climate change is to be adapted to, and so mitigated.

The wedinar, the organisers argued, redefined the role of business and sport and highlighted examples of proven collaborations that would lead to tangible climate action. 

“This webinar”, they added, “Discusses approaches to overcome barriers in the introduction of lower-carbon solutions and decarbonisation of value chains and describes how voluntary economically viable approaches can support the Paris Agreement.”

Little to be questioned there, except our want to rush to all points of the earth, indulge in extravagant social events we link to sport and if we can mitigate the fringes of carbon emissions in doing so, we celebrate.

As aforementioned, most of the ideas discussed during the webinar were worthy and considered sustainability, but did not address the perverse social need we appear to have to pit our sporting prowess against others, even when we know this carnival of sport is caving up Earth’s atmosphere.

So the question is more fundamental - can we continue with this carnival of sport, with its associated carnivals and festivals that encourage millions of people to criss cross the world in polluting aircraft?

The answer, I would suggest is probably “no” and the so the idea of sport on an international basis needs a significant rethink.