Springer

The natural capital manifested in nature’s many activities drives human well-being and the foundations of modern society. Natural capital sustainability is threatened with an increasing regeneration deficit due to the growing human population and appetite for high consumption. The linear economy principles if remain the norm of business practices and consumption patterns, the outcome is likely to be shortages of certain materials, growing price volatility, and continued environmental degradation.

This chapter proposes an Islamic blended finance structure for water and sanitation in Nigeria. The rising shortage of water, sanitation, and basic hygiene facilities pose a threat to the development of Nigeria and its people. A large segment of the Nigerian population in both the urban and rural communities lacks access to improved water and sanitation facilities. Open defecation is widespread in many parts of the country.

Currently, our consumption-driven society contributes to the production of a large quantity of waste every day in urban environments. Low recycling rates pressurize city authorities to handle waste more sustainably. Despite this pressure, waste management systems have paid little attention to the urban planning processes, compared to other sectors like energy or water.

Since the adoption of the SDGs in 2015, it has been a 5-year journey of trial-and-error experimentations all over the world to come up with innovative solutions beyond business-as-usual and get the job done. In this paper, we assess blockchain-backed solutions beyond the hype.

The production and consumption of electrical devices are rapidly growing and generating social, economic, cultural, and scientific benefits globally. In addition, this rapid growth leads to an increase in the amounts of disposal, obsolete, defected, or broken devices, which calls for strategic action in e-waste management. On this regard, nine out of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are with targets relatively linked to e-waste management.

The world is facing unprecedented ecological, social, and economic imbalances and insecurities. Over the last few years, a circular economic system is emerging and introducing means and processes to learn from nature and minimize all types of wastes. It espouses a zero-waste economic system that calls for moderation in consumption and better treatment of natural resources, which mirrors Islamic finance and economy principles.

Crises and disasters, man-made or natural, prove to be an opportunity from which mankind can benefit and take lesson to learn to be conscious of Allah’s blessings and care for its rights. One of the lessons learnt is that capitalism is naturally driven by profit maximization actions that have adverse effects to our surroundings. This economic hegemony has led to environmental problems, which pose threats to humankind livelihood.