Laura and the sustainable development essay

I am off sick from work and bored out of my tiny mind. To keep me out of trouble, Jeni has set me another essay. For your viewing pleasure,I present to you the said essay:

'Sustainable Development is more important than Diet Coke'. Discuss.

During this essay I will be examining the controversial statement that sustainable development is more important than diet coke. For your comfort and enjoyment, I will examine the evidence and present an unbiased and logical conclusion.

Firstly, it would seem an obvious point that diet coke is more important because it is more widely recognised. Although having some basic knowledge of sustainable development, I was not privy to a full definition of exactly what it entailed and had to ‘Google’ it to be sure of its full ramifications. And I have been to University and consider myself to be about 7 out of 10 on the intelligence scale. It can be suggested that while the world knows in full detail what diet coke is, the same can not be said for sustainable development. I bet if you went up to anyone in the street and said ‘what’s sustainable development?’ you would get more than a few quizzical looks. But if you asked ‘what’s diet coke?’, you would receive many answers, ranging from ‘a great fat free fizzy beverage that lends itself well to all of life’s ups and downs’ to ‘the elixir of life’.

So now that we have established that diet coke is more widely recognised and has a much higher profile, its importance cannot be underestimated.Sustainable development information states that we are using up the worlds resources too quickly and not providing the means for future generations to meet their own needs. Apparently we are putting stress on the environmental systems of water, land and air through actions such as chopping rainforests down and doing too much fishing. Government guidelines state there is much we can do as individuals to lessen the burden on our planet.While diet coke enjoys such a high profile, it could then be used in this global predicament and instead of competing for the ‘top spot’ of being the most important, could actually be used to support sustainable development. World Leaders could do well do enforce hourly ‘diet coke breaks’ for forest choppers and fishermen, where they had to down tools and go and ogle members of the opposite sex doing menial tasks like on the telly. The breaks could last for up to 20 minutes, thus reducing the amount of trees felled and fish removed from the ocean.

We are advised that there are many things we can do in the home to support sustainable development. Do not waste energy, we are advised. Recycle everything, the guidelines state. But if only people recognised how important diet coke is, many of these actions would happen automatically. The more cans of coke a person brings into their house, the more that person will have to sit down and drink them. People waste energy all the time rushing around doing household chores, using the washing machine and cooker when they could be having a nice sit down and a few cans. Plus, diet coke cans are perfect for recycling and so the more you drink, the more recycling you will be able to offer to the environment.

Sustainable development is all about preserving the water supply, of which we are using too much. It seems like childish folly to put the preservation of the water supply above diet coke when the answer is obvious. If more people drank diet coke, this would lessen the burden on the world’s water supply. A typical can of diet coke is only 80% water whereas a glass of water from the tap is 100% water, so you do the math. An even better solution would be to get diet coke to come out of the taps, which is something I have been campaigning for over the last year.

In conclusion, it would seem that undoubtedly, sustainable development is not more important than diet coke. If one analyses the evidence objectively, it can be seen that diet coke is the definite winner in this war and in fact could offer many solutions to the quandaries of sustainable development. In fact, I would go as far as arguing that diet coke is more important than most things in the world, but that’s another essay.