Gilding, author of a new book “The Great Disruption,” has a simple message: We have left it too late to avoid serious impact from climate change and ecological damage after trying to drive global economic growth far beyond system and resource capacity.

As a consequence, we risk an environmental crash, triggering a sudden collapse in the global economy, and need to be ready to respond to the ensuing “social and economic hurricane,” he says.

“If you thought the financial situation in 2008 was a crisis, and if you thought climate change was a cultural, economic and political challenge, then hold on for the ride,” writes Gilding, a former head of Greenpeace International.

“We are about to witness humanity deal with its biggest crisis ever, something that will shake it to the core — the end of economic growth,” added the 52 - year-old Australian, who as an activist was arrested five times

during protests.

After frustration over how the mainstream environmental movement was struggling to get its message heard, Gilding founded his own consultancy that went on to advise businesses from BHP Billiton to DuPont on sustainability

Scientific study indicates we are reaching the limits of driving up growth, he argues, and spiking oil and food prices seen in 2008, followed by a financial crisis partly driven by a desperate bid to drive growth, were the canaries in the mine.

He cites modelling by a group of scientists — the Global Footprint Network — showing that in 2009 we were already running the global economy at 140 percent of capacity, and plans to run it faster and harder as populations soar will hit a wall.

Collective denial about how climate change and resource pressure will impact us will only lift when we properly feel it in our wallets, he adds.

“We will not respond to climate change or sustainability even when it’s clear we risk wiping out 50 percent of the diversity of life on earth. We will respond when the threat is to our economy and lifestyle.”

He sees a series of ecological, social and economic shocks driven by climate change, including extreme weather, melting polar regions and agricultural output changes boosting prices.

Financial markets will see big drops, while the resulting economic and political crises will be massive in scale and last for decades.

“The basic model is broken. If we really got the economy growing again at a significant rate in the West and developing countries again then oil prices would absolutely spike and if oil prices spike and food prices spike that would then undermine economic growth,” said Gilding.

“I think we’ll have another major financial crisis within a few years,” he added, speaking by phone from his home in the island of Tasmania, after recently returning from an overseas tour to promote his book.

“Greece could have been the trigger, it wasn’t this time, it could be next time,” he added. “Who knows what it will be.”

More recent political events too, including the Arab Spring, can also be clearly linked to a jump in food prices, he says.

“There is very clearly a connection between food prices spiking in Egypt and Tunisia leading to political unrest which was then leveraged by the Arab Spring movement.”

Higher food prices were linked to a failure of Russia’s wheat harvest due to extreme climate, and Gilding argues if it had been in the US Midwest grain belt it could have caused a bigger catastrophe in the wheat market.

He doesn’t rule out spectacular breakthroughs in technology, but believes it is realistically too late to stop a crisis.

So what are we supposed to do? Gilding says the stark view that it’s too late now to avoid a crisis at first caused him despair — he recalls breaking down sobbing during a 2007 presentation on the issue to a business audience in New York.

But despite the turmoil and geopolitical strife he says we could face he is optimistic that humanity will quickly respond once it wakes up to the scale of the threat.

He cites the mobilization of much of the world during World War Two and even how strongly world leaders responded to the “comparatively minor hiccup of the global financial crisis.”

The author sees massive industrial and economic shift to contain climate change, including eliminating net CO2 emissions within 20 years, with a 50 percent cut in the first five years.

Among a series of measures, he foresees the closure of 1,000 dirty coal power plants within five years and the building of huge wind and solar farms. He suggests half the world’s aircraft might have to be stranded to cut emissions.

Interestingly, he highlights China, despite its soaring emissions, as already becoming something of a model in the fight against climate change by investing in green technologies.

“They missed the industrial revolution. They missed the technology revolution. They are not going to miss the energy revolution,” he said.

Gilding sees the post crisis world as one where big oil may die but there will be great opportunities for innovative companies, though he says we’ll have to ditch our attachment to a growth-focused, consumer-driven global economy.

And despite the painful transition he thinks the spin-offs will be ultimately positive, with the potential for us to lead a “more resilient lifestyle” including greater income equality and working fewer hours. (Reporting by Ed Davies, editing by Paul Casciato)

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1st Ld-Writethru : Besiktas says it is in talks with Kobe Bryant

SELCAN HACAOGLU | AP

ANKARA, Turkey: Turkish club Besiktas is in talks with Kobe Bryant’s representatives about the possibility of the Los Angeles Lakers star playing in Turkey during the NBA lockout.

“It is a fact that Kobe Bryant’s managers have contacted us,” coach Ergin Ataman said Thursday, a week after Besiktas signed New Jersey Nets point guard Deron Williams.

Ataman said Bryant was waiting for an offer from Besiktas. The club, however, said it would need a sponsor to be able to pay for Bryant’s contract.

“Our board will evaluate that,” Ataman said.

Bryant has won five NBA titles with the Lakers and is a 13-time NBA All Star.

Representatives of some other NBA players have also contacted Besiktas, Ataman said, without naming any of them.

The Turkish League season starts in October.

Williams averaged 20.1 points and 10.3 assists for the Nets and the Utah Jazz last season. Besiktas signed Allen Iverson, the NBA’s MVP in 2001, last year but his time in Turkey was cut short due to injury.

Another NBA player, New Jersey Nets guard Sasha Vujacic, signed last week with Turkish club Anadolu Efes. The 27-year old Slovenian guard agreed to a one-year deal with an optional second year.

Nets’ draft pick Bojan Bogdanovic also signed with Fenerbahce of the Turkish League in June.

Orlando Magic star Dwight Howard, a five-time All-Star, has said he would consider playing in China or Europe if the NBA lockout doesn’t end.

Talks between the NBA and the union broke down June 30, and the owners decided to impose the league’s first lockout since the 1998-99 season was shortened to 50 games. Both sides say there are significant differences between their proposals, raising the possibility that all or part of next season could be canceled.

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2nd Ld-Writethru : Toyota’s new pre-crash technology directs steering

YURI KAGEYAMA : AP Business Writer

SUSONO, Japan: Toyota is developing a safety technology that takes control of the steering so the vehicle can veer away when it isn’t able to stop before impact.

Toyota Motor Corp. showed some of its up and coming safety innovations in a demonstration to reporters Thursday at its facility in this town, west of Tokyo, near Mount Fuji.

All the world’s automakers are working on special safety technology in an effort to woo customers, as competition intensifies among manufacturers already neck-and-neck in delivering the regular features for their products.

Cars that stop or slow down automatically before an object or person in anticipation of a possible crash are not new. But Toyota’s latest pre-collision system adds a steering-control feature.

In the new system, Toyota uses cameras and a super sensitive radar called “millimeter-wave,” both installed in the front of the vehicle, to detect possible crashes such as a pedestrian crossing the road.

The vehicle calculates how braking and steering must be applied to avoid a crash, said chief safety technology officer Moritaka Yoshida.

“We must learn from accidents and keep making improvements in safety features,” he said.

The Japanese automaker declined to say when the feature may be offered on a commercial model, or in which markets, but officials hinted it was ready to be offered soon.

Toyota said it was aiming for zero fatalities and injuries, although it did not say when that goal would be achieved.

Fatalities have been declining in auto accidents, because of better safety features, but deaths among pedestrians in traffic accidents have not gone down in Japan.

Protecting pedestrians is increasingly key, according to Toyota, which makes the Prius hybrid and Lexus luxury models.

Toyota showed what is called a pop-up hood, which rises slightly in a crash, to mitigate the impact of a pedestrian getting hit by a car, similar to features offered by European makers.

It also showed how parts of the rays from high-beam headlights could be blocked so that drivers could still see clearly what was ahead while headlights would appear to be on low beam to the driver in a car coming from the other direction.

Toyota also showed a steering wheel in development that measures the heartbeat of the driver to prevent crashes that can happen when drivers suffer heart attacks.

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UPDATE 2-At least 10 dead in Malawi clashes - official

* Wave of civil unrest hits Malawi

* Deaths likely to intensify public anger at Mutharika

(Recasts with protester deaths)

By Frank Phiri

BLANTYRE, July 21 : At least 10 people have been killed in clashes between Malawian demonstrators and police during a wave of riots in the southern African nation against President Bingu wa Mutharika, health officials and relatives said on Thursday.

Health Ministry official Henry Chimbali told the Zodiak private radio station nine deaths had been confirmed in the northern city of Mzuzu, where rioters ransacked the offices of Mutharika’s Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) on Wednesday.

Relatives told Reuters another man had died after being shot in the southern commercial capital of Blantyre, where police and soldiers fired teargas to disperse crowds of demonstrators demanding Mutharika step down.

In the capital, Lilongwe, security forces confronted groups of anti-government protesters for a second day on Thursday, a radio station reported, although there was no mention of further casualties.

The death toll, which police did not confirm, and reports from human rights group Amnesty International of several 13-year-old children with gun-shot wounds are likely to intensify public anger against Mutharika in the landlocked nation of 13 million people.

The former World Bank economist, who was first elected in 2004, has presided over six years of high-paced but aid-funded economic growth.

But the sheen has come off this year as Mutharika became embroiled in a diplomatic row with Britain, Malawi’s biggest donor, over a leaked embassy cable that referred to him as “autocratic and intolerant of criticism.”

The cable led to the expulsion of Britain’s ambassador to Lilongwe. In response, Britain expelled Malawi’s representative in London and suspended aid worth $550 million over the next four years.

The freeze has left a yawning hole in the budget of a country that has relied on handouts for 40 percent of its revenues, and intensified a foreign currency shortage that is threatening the kwacha’s peg at 150 to the dollar.

The dollar crunch has also pushed up fuel prices and exacerbated an already chronic energy shortage, making a government economic growth forecast of 6.6 percent for this year look increasingly unrealistic.

In Blantyre, shops that had been shuttered during Wednesday’s clashes between soldiers, riot police and opposition marchers reopened although some banks remained closed.

Blantire region police spokesman Davie Chingwalu said the riots had caused extensive property damage and several demonstrators and police had been injured. A number of arrests had been made, he added.

On Wednesday, as unrest erupted across the normally sleepy former British colony, state media broadcast a long economics lecture by Mutharika in which he harangued critics including the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

“We are not off-track. It is the IMF which is off-track in Malawi,” he said.