Business and the environment Flashcards
Business activity has an impact on the natural environment, how?
resources such as timber, oil and metals are used to manufacture goods
manufacturing can have unintended spillover effects on others in the form of noise and pollution
land is lost to future generations when new houses or roads are built on greenfield sites
What are the unintended negative effects of business activity on people and places called?
social costs
What do social costs include?
noise
pollution
visual blight
congestion
Ethical businesses v social costs?
Ethical businesses are careful to minimise the impact of their behaviour on the environment.
Why are government laws used?
Government laws are used to protect the environment. For example, firms must apply for planning permission before building factories or offices on greenfield sites. Grants are available to encourage firms to locate on brownfield sites, run down areas in need of regeneration.
What are social benefits?
Social benefits are business activities that have a beneficial or favourable impact on people or places. For example, a business start up can have a multiplier effect. Suppliers will win new trade from them and the new workforce will become customers in the local shops.
What comes with a proposed project?
A proposed project often generates both costs and benefits. For example, building a new factory on a greenfield site creates social benefits in the form of new jobs. However, the loss of open land is a social cost. Building is justified only if the benefits exceed the costs.
What are Short and long-term environmental effects?
Some business activity can cause short-term environmental costs which can be put right in the longer term. For example, the impact of cutting down forests for timber is much reduced if young trees are planted in their place and left to grow into maturity.
Effects of non renewable and renewable resources?
Some trees, such as pine, grow quickly and can be considered a renewable resource. Other resources, such as mahogany, take hundreds of years to grow and so are non-renewable in our lifetime. Resources like oil that can only be used once are non-renewable.
Whats sustainable growth?
Business activity - such as intensive fishing in the North Sea - can compromise the ability of future generations to meet their own needs and is unsustainable. Sustainable growth means meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.
Whats a greenfield site?
An area of land that has not been built on before.
What is visual blight?
When something has spoilt a pretty view or is ugly to look at.
