This article presents a theoretical model for a dynamic system based on sustainable development. Due to the relatively absence of theoretical studies and practical issues in the area of sustainable development, Romania aspires to the principles of sustainable development. Based on the concept as a process in which economic, social, political and natural environment are combined in order to sustain planet management, our goal is to promote an economic tool for Romanian decision-makers in order to evaluate scenarios and planning options.
"Bruntland Report" defines sustainable development as "…a process of change in order to create a harmony environment between resource exploitation, investments, technological and institutional changes to enhance the current and the future potential of human needs".
Starting from this statement, it is obvious that the concept of sustainable development tries to test the coexistence of environmental protection and economic development in a global and long -term point of view.
Sustainable development is neither a doctrine nor a theory, much less a synthesis between economics and ecology. It is a pragmatic approach to implement economic tools for planet management. Sustainable development is a new term for an old idea: there is no viable economy without natural resources and no resources management without economic rationale. We can distinguish two type of redundant views related to the concept of sustainable development: a vision of a global economic space and an environmental vision.
Global economic vision for sustainable development involves complex conditions and factors that enable the revenues to increase involving economic welfare aspects as population growth rule, classification of resources reflecting their relative scarcity, changing production and consumption structure in order to maintain the stock of scarce resources.
The environmental vision of sustainable development involves the management and the maintenance of resource stocks and factors yielding a consistent productivity, at least, in the spirit of equity between generations and countries. The resource stock includes two different components: “artificial” capital stock (includes all production factors made by human civilisation) and “natural” capital meaning all renewable and non-renewable resources (water, fauna, flora and soil).
Issues on sustainable development include the following: (1) resizing of economic growth given a more equitable resources distribution and an increased production quality, (2) conditions to eliminate poverty in the context of people’s essential needs assurances such as employment, food, energy, water, housing and health, (3) reduction of uncontrolled population growth, (4) preserving and enhancing of natural resources, (5) maintenance of ecosystems’ diversity, (6) monitoring the environmental impact on economic development, (7) technology diversion and risks control, (8) government decentralization, (9) increasing people’s participation of decisions on environmental and economic problems.
In order to create a sustainable development model we are forced to use some system dynamics techniques to formulate and simulate such a model. To simplify real world phenomena and interrelationship of various variables we turn into some abstractions.
First of all, it is necessary to identify the system we want to model and its components. It is important to consider all components and to prioritize them. Usually, all indicators are qualitatively and/or quantitatively measured. It is our choice to choose them taking care of sustainable development system behaviour concerning human, economic and natural components.
The human component concerns the social dimension of sustainable development. There is no sustainable development without a strong human basis centred on individual development (personal education, abilities, opportunities etc.). The social sector (education system, health, social insurances etc.) is another facet of the same problem, as well as government sector (laws, rules).
The economic component implies all economic aspects on sustainable development (public economics, economic growth, welfare, life quality and infrastructure).
The natural component represents the environmental aspect of sustainable development (natural resources and environment). Now, it is obvious that a sustainable development model must integrate the social, economic and environmental components. So, the conceptual model design could be as follows (Figure 1). The next step is to segment its components and to measure indicators (Figure 2). First of all, social sector implies population and it is focused on social security, health care, social organizations, domestic income composition etc. It is important to measure population immigration and emigration referring to births (in-migration) and deaths (out-migration). Both are modelled based on a logarithmic function of form (Mayerthaler, 2009): Government sector is represented by public finances, taxes, national gross domestic product per capita (GDPP) etc. GDPP=
GDP is a sum of Consumption (C), Investment (I), Government Spending (G) and Net Exports (X -M); POP -population.
Individual development refers to elements of education, recreation, leisure, social integration, standard of living etc. To measure this component we use human development index (HDI), education index (EI), health index (HI) and income index (II).
HDI has three dimensions, measured by one or two indicators each:
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