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"We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children."
-Native American Proverb

With the increasing globalization of our planet, underdeveloped nations are being caught up in the drive to industrialize, to modernize, to become interconnected into the global economic and societal community. These countries, in their drive to become one with the community, are observing our past to glean information as to how they can rise up to prosperity. Yet, simultaneously, it is these environmentally-unsound practices which are now set to doom the advanced industrial nations as they scramble to find new methods in which to continue living with the trappings of modernizaiton. We must demand, of EVERY NATION, that to the greatest possible extent every industry adheres to "green" practices...

We cannot ask these countries to go it alone, however. Those industrial superpowers, who have grown into global economic behemoths because of their poor past examples, have a moral and environmental imperative to work together to improve and make more economically feasible those techniques and products which enable industries and individuals to become more ecologically sound.

It is not global WARMING about which we worry... it is global CLIMATE CHANGE. When weather patterns change drastically - ice caps begin melting, snow starts falling where it shouldn't, hurricanes and tsunamis become more destructive - it is indicative of a global climate imbalance. Humans are the cause of that imbalance. Fossil fuels were not meant to be pulled from the soil and burned into the stratosphere... and our addiction to this limited product is quickly causing the planet to reach its critical point where there is no cure save eliminating the cause of the imbalance.

The most critical issue is that the United States and other highly-developed nations can no longer look at this problem as an "us and them" issue. Every member of the planet is affected adversely when one member contaminates that planet. Those countries and those businesses who have the most, it must be remembered, have the most to lose in the end. The most economically-sound policy for businesses is to begin the process of modernizing their industrial practices beyond the fossil-fuel, contaminant-laden rut in which they currently plod along. It has become fashionable of late to ensure short-term success - both in business and in individual living - at the behest of sound long-term planning.

Industrialized nations must set the example by which underdeveloped nations can advance and prosper in the global community. At the same time, the United States and the other superpowers must work themselves to ensure that there is a global community in which all the nations of the world may prosper. It is fair to ask every country to adhere to environmentally-sound principles. What happens to the soil and air and water in one country affects every nation, poor and rich alike. It is as John Muir once said: "When one tugs at a single thing in nature, he finds it attached to the rest of the world."

Learn more about this author, Zach Bigalke.
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