Not the End of the World How We Can Be the First Generation to Build a Sustainable Planet, reviewed

We look at this topical and timely book by Hannah Ritchie. See more about Not the End of the World: How We Can Be the First Generation to Build a Sustainable Planet here.

Not the End of the World How to Build a Sustainable Planet, reviewed

This book is a positive and empowering read. The author, Hannah Ritchie does a lot of good myth busting and deconstructing some of the wilder and less fact based assertions around the future of the planet. Ritchie addresses both overly negative statements, particularly around the ‘population bomb’ assertions, and also climate change deniers too. She does a series of deep dives into veganism, organic food, and shopping local or further afield.

While some books we have reviewed recently have failed to both inspire and offer a road map forwards in terms of if the planet can even be saved. We felt this book made a much better stab at engaging with these issues, while not leaving the reader so depressed as to descend into nihilism and despondency. This is a book that we will pass on to our teenagers, as it is informed, intelligent and a useful stepping stone to doing more in the areas where it can have the best effect.

More about the book

Feeling anxious, powerless, or confused about the future of our planet? This book will transform how you see our biggest environmental problems — and how we can solve them.

A STYLIST BEST NON-FICTION 2024 * A GUARDIAN BIGGEST FICTION AND NON-FICTION FOR 2024 * A WATERSTONES ‘BOOK YOU NEED TO READ IN 2024’ * A GUARDIAN ‘FIVE GREAT READS’

We are bombarded by doomsday headlines that tell us the soil won’t be able to support crops, fish will vanish from our oceans, that we should reconsider having children.

But in this bold, radically hopeful book, data scientist Hannah Ritchie argues that if we zoom out, a very different picture emerges. The data shows we’ve made so much progress on these problems, and so fast, that we could be on track to achieve true sustainability for the first time in history.

Packed with the latest research, practical guidance and enlightening graphics, this book will make you rethink almost everything you’ve been told about the environment, from the virtues of eating locally and living in the countryside, to the evils of overpopulation, plastic straws and palm oil. It will give you the tools to understand what works, what doesn’t and what we urgently need to focus on so we can leave a sustainable planet for future generations.

These problems are big. But they are solvable. We are not doomed. We can build a better future for everyone. Let’s turn that opportunity into reality.

‘Practical and truly essential’ MARGARET ATWOOD * ‘Does for the environment what Hans Rosling did for health’ BILL GATES * ‘Invigorating, inspiring, often surprising’ DAVID WALLACE-WELLS * ‘I find it hard to express how much I love this book’ RUTGER BREGMAN * ‘An unmissable myth-busting book to save our planet – read it’ TIM SPECTOR

More about the author

Dr Hannah Ritchie is Senior Researcher in the Programme for Global Development at the University of Oxford. She is also Deputy Editor and Lead Researcher at the highly influential online publication Our World in Data, which brings together the latest data and research on the world’s largest problems and makes it accessible for a general audience. Her research appears regularly in the New York Times, Economist, Financial Times, BBC, WIRED, New Scientist and Vox and in bestselling books including Steven Pinker’s Enlightenment Now, Hans Rosling’s Factfulness and Bill Gates’s How to Prevent a Climate Disaster. In 2022, Ritchie was named Scotland’s Youth Climate Champion and New Scientist called her ‘The woman who gave COVID-19 data to the world’.

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