Beyond our Means? Interactive Series of Events on the Limits of our Present

How will we be able to feed 10 billion people without destroying natural resources globally, worsening economic imbalances, or increasing social inequalities? Which concepts are available to us in science, industry, and politics which offer workable solutions in the face of this immense challenge?

With a keynote speech at the digital event "LIMITS OF THE GLOBAL FOOD SUPPLY - Are we eating up our planet?" on April 14, 2021, Prof. Edeltraud Günther kicked off the interactive and interdisciplinary series of events funded by the German Federal Environmental Foundation titled “Beyond our Means? Limits of our Present”. The supervising professor of project C5 "Sustainability assessment of new business models for mobility concepts on the way into the 22nd century" of the Boysen-TUD Research Training Group focused on the above questions, as did the experts who gave further keynote speeches: Dr. Jan Grossarth (journalist and author, e.g. Future Food. Die Zukunft der Welternährung (2020)), Dr. Lisa Koep (Head of Sustainability-Corporate-Social Responsibility at Lidl GmbH) and Prof. Harald Rohm (food technician, TU Dresden). The event was moderated by Cornelius Pollmer (Süddeutsche Zeitung). The approximately 100 virtual participants were initially able to share their ideas, opinions, and questions with one of the speakers of their choice in four small groups and discuss them with the experts there before opening the discussion to the entire group.

Prof. Dr. Edeltraud Günther is an economist at TU Dresden, director of the United Nations University Dresden - UNU-FLORES, and board member of PRISMA.

In a total of five evening events between April 14^th and June 2^nd, 2021 and in cooperation with the German Hygiene Museum, PRISMA – Center for Sustainability Assessment and Policy at TU Dresden (Sven Herzog and Jens Krzywinski), as well as UNU-FLORES (Edeltraud Günther), the Chair for Systematic Theology at TU Dresden (Julia Enxing) explored where the practical limits of the human-made promise of infinite growth lie, as set by the resources of our planet, and how we can deal with those limits.

You can find detailed information and further event dates here.