A sustainable blue economy is essential for the world’s future economic growth and environmental preservation

Markus Mueller, global head of ESG in the chief investment office at Deutsche Bank, has clear views on the transformation required to create a sustainable economic system. Meanwhile Jean-Baptiste Jouffray, of Stanford University and previously the Stockholm Resilience Centre, is a leading young thinker around the effects of our era on the oceans. LUX Editor-in-Chief Darius Sanai brings them together for a refreshing and thought-provoking conversation.

What happens when a leading economist with a strong understanding of science and a focus on the oceans, and a brilliant young ocean scientist with an interest in economics, get together? Fireworks, or at least one of the more interesting conversations to be had over Zoom.

I first introduced Markus, a good friend and at that point also a client of ours, and Jean-Baptiste, whose charm and perspective on the oceans and what needs to be done had always intrigued me, a year or so ago, and we decided a free-ranging chat about the economy, oceans, and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) would be compelling for our readers. So we came together again, over Zoom, and it was as engaging as I had hoped.

Markus is a thought-leading economist and also a realist; Jean-Baptiste is a brilliant thinker on the oceans but also knows sustainability is indelibly linked to economic systems. Let the conversation begin.

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Darius Sanai: Let me start with the question of shifting baselines. As I understand it, that means that people of a certain age or coming into awareness at a certain time have a different experience of the world than those who remember things 20, 30 years prior, in a world that’s rapidly changing.

Specifically when it comes to the environment and nature, although that could also include politics, economics, and everything else. As a basic example, a child today could thinks 40 degree summers and green winters in the Alps are “normal”. How important is this? Is it a universal negative? And how do we address it?

Markus Mueller: I think shifting baselines is something which fortunately makes humans and societies resilient. Because they automatically, through the shifting of baselines, adapt to the new reality which they have not seen unfolding.

Deutsche Bank’s Markus Müller says that nature-based solutions are a critical tool in creating a sustainable economic system

DS: Does it also make them complacent?

MM: This is a risk. It makes them complacent at the same time. There is a little bit of ambiguity. So, on the one side, I think it’s an important ingredient for social and economic development in the end because it makes us resilient in regards to changing environmental constitution and impacts on us.

But being not aware of this change makes us too complacent in the sense that we might run into a risk that something will further limit our development.

DS: Jean-Baptiste, can I ask you a variation of the same question? Last week, I watched a repeat of a TV show made in 2010, a murder mystery. The police detectives are standing outside the scene of the crime in the British countryside in summer.

And what struck me was that this frame was full of insects. And right now, 2024, just 14 years later, you wouldn’t see these insects. That’s a shifting baseline because a child born in 2010 would have no idea. That has to be a worry?

Jean-Baptiste Jouffray: Thanks, Darius. I think Markus knows how to trigger a debate because by pointing out how a shifting baseline is making us more resilient, he’s already triggered me. From an academic perspective, the shifting baseline syndrome is really well documented – it’s a whole theory, to explain change’s in the natural environment. And I wouldn’t have started by saying it makes us more resilient.

I would have argued that it makes the loss of resilience. One of the challenges of the shifting baseline is that, as you just pointed out with your example of the loss of biodiversity and insects in the British countryside, as generations come through, they are no longer accustomed to what things used to be.

Read more: Javad Marandi on investing and philanthropy 

A very typical example in the coastal environment is fisheries in Florida, where you have historical photos of the catches of competition that takes place every year, about who is able to catch the biggest fish. And it’s a striking legacy of photos because you go back 70 years ago and you see the size of the fish and the first prize is this gigantic fish.

And the fishermen holding the fish and smiling with it. And as the years go by, the first prize goes to smaller and smaller fish. And it is almost an iconic illustration of the shifting baseline. For the people who come into that competition for the first time, that’s their biggest fish and that’s what the ecosystem has. There is no memory of what it used to be.

MM: And this is what I meant! And this is exactly the point why are we in a more biological devastating situation yet are still acting. Because we do not know how it was, we just know it in memory. It’s a nice story. I’m doing now the same with the younger generations.

When I was young, I went into church in April, and it was still snowing. It’s now warm. But I worry because I recognize it. But the new generations who just hear this from me do not worry about the situation in general.

JBJ: And that’s why I would argue that it may lead to inaction.

MM: Exactly. And complacency. It is a slippery slope because it shrinks our possibilities. It limits the room, which is already limited through physics and physical limitations.

DS: Can I now ask with regard to the situation you both outlined, just relating that to the question of effective change on climate and the blue economy? The idea of shifting baselines means, that I think we agree, that people are less incentivized to act because they don’t see change because it happened before they remember. Yet the change has happened.

How important is that emotive aspect in creating meaningful action? Or in fact, is that an irrelevance? Because the economic system and the regulatory system, which are not shaped by emotion, but by capitalism, are set up in a way that cannot enable this change. So is it really something that we shouldn’t be worrying about?

Read more: The future of philanthropy: AVPN South Asia Summit, Mumbai

JBJ: I would argue that it matters a lot and that emotions matter a lot and that it has been one of the battles that ocean conservation has had to face, when it comes to places in the ocean so remote like the deep sea, for instance, which has had to fight that battle for public awareness and public emotions.

How can people relate to a place that is pitch dark, 6,000 meters below the water and that no one has ever seen except a handful of people? More people used to have walked on the moon than actually dived at the very bottom of the Mariana Trench. So that aspect of emotion has been something really important in the context of ocean conservation.

Jean-Baptiste Jouffray says that shifting baselines, where new generations do not have the same perception of what environmental “normality” is, are a real and present issue. Photograph by Pelle T Nilsson/SPA

MM: In terms of economics, put simply we don’t need more money in order to deal with the situation. We just need to make the money flowing in the sustainable and economically viable projects if we factor in all costs. But this is not what we are currently doing. Hence, I fear that we run into situations where suddenly something is not anymore possible. And then we change. So you see this with the energy situation in Europe.

DS: On that note, Markus and Jean-Baptiste, so it’s now nine years since the SDGs were adopted. It’s coming up to four years since the Dasgupta report (which outlined the need for a new economics of biodiversity, to create systemic change in the sustainable future). How would you rate progress?

MM: I think in general, the progress is there. But this progress in the biodiversity and the ocean world has also been piggybacked by the climate change discussion, which is more immediate to us as more and more have to admit that they feel it.

Something which was there, which we didn’t know that it was there, and which then disappears, we don’t miss. This is one problem. The other problem is that it’s so local that it’s maybe not relevant for us in other places.

Read more: YCAB’S Veronica Colondam on bringing hope and change to Indonesia’s youth through social entrepreneurship

My last point is that we do not have a systemic discussion. We still have a very separate discussion. And this leads to the following problem. For example around SDG 4, education. Someone said to me recently, why is the SDG 4 so under-invested?

And for me, it’s clear, because if you do not have a labour market in a country which is able to absorb highly skilled people. Why should you invest in education, from a return capital perspective? So we need to think about developing a system which enables us also to generate the returns we need for societal prosperity in the end. It is not just as simple that we say, we stop here and all will be good. We also need to find an answer to what will the people get out of it to feed their families, to pursue their daily life. And if I develop education without having a functioning labour market, I will have a brain drain in the best case. In the worst case, I will have no investments in education.

JBJ: I think Markus made some really interesting points. Starting with how can we care about something we didn’t know existed.

Well, that really brings us back to the shifting baseline syndrome. And it’s interesting because, in a sense, that is one of the issues, right? So I’m glad we finally came to terms with that.

MM: But again, this is a risk. But it’s interesting that we are still able to survive in situations where something is not anymore there, which has been there before, right?

JBJ: Absolutely. No, no. And I’m half teasing you, half being serious here. But one of the embodiments of the shifting baseline syndrome is precisely that lack of caring, which might hinder progress. That’s one aspect.

To answer your question, Darius, yes, there is progress. But what we’re seeing, first and foremost, is progress in the vision rather than the impact. So in other words, we are living in an era of ambitious collective vision, but limited collective impact.

Oceans are at systemic risk from climate change. Photograph by Isabella Fergusson

I think the vision is one thing, and it’s great. That’s where we’ve seen countries coming together. That’s where we’ve seen multiple stakeholders coming together. That’s why there’s an increasing number of multi-stakeholder collaboration and voluntary commitments.

All those are articulating progress in the vision of what one should do. But the impacts do not follow. And I think if we look at metrics, we’re nowhere close to where we should be given the urgency of the situation.

The financial sector is not doing, what it should do. The private sector is not doing, what it should do. It doesn’t have the incentives to do so. And the governments and the regulators certainly are not levelling the playing field and doing what they should do.

We’re now within six years of the 2030 agenda and we are not on track to achieve any of the SDGs. The Kunming Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework may be superseding the SDGs and giving us an outlook for a post-2030 agenda with more ambitious targets.

MM: I would agree. The other thing I wanted to add is that, compared for example to AI, the discussion about ESG is not liked. Sustainability is not liked. It’s seen as a paternalistic activity driven by regulators and governments.

Who wants to tell us how we should live, how economies should act? A regulatory approach for more sustainable development should be supportive, an approach which enables the economy, corporates, individuals to find solutions for their challenges… instead of telling them what they should not do.

Read more: Art collector Andrea Morante talks on artist Sassan Behnam-Bakhtiar

So these are two different sides of the same coin. To forbid something, but at the same time to enable something.

JBJ: I could argue that those two are not exclusive. And so I would tell Markus, maybe, you know, maybe regulators should enable while forbidding.

What I’m trying to get at here, and it’s something we have discussed in the context of the role of financiers in particular, is that I agree with Markus that there is a role for finance and financiers and financial institutions as enablers of sustainable futures and enablers of the blue economy.

The world’s oceans produce more than 2/3 of our oxygen and are essential for regulating our climate and biodiversity. Photograph by Isabella Fergusson

That brings us back to this dominant narrative in the blue economy of an ocean finance gap, right? Because, indeed, SDG 14 (about the oceans) is the least funded goal of all. So there is a gap in terms of ocean conservation.

There’s not enough investment going towards sustainable and equitable projects and into ocean conservation. In that sense, regulators, the public sector, the private sector and the financial institutions really have a role to play as enablers to unlock capital towards those projects.

DS: What needs to happen this year?

JBJ: Gosh, so many things. If I stick to the context of the ocean economy and the blue economy, one of the high-level processes that is ongoing is the ratification of the United Nations Agreement on Biodiversity beyond National Jurisdiction.

That’s often referred to as the High Seas Treaty or the BBNJ Treaty, which has been celebrated as a landmark of multilateralism. Countries have agreed on the treaty, which was a milestone, and now it needs 60 signatories to enter into force.

As of today, there are only four signatories. So if you ask me, by next year, which will also coincide with the 2025 UN Ocean Conference hosted by France and Costa Rica, then my hope would be that, this serves as a milestone for the treaty to enter into force. So what I’m hoping to see and what needs to happen is 56 countries between now and next summer to actually ratify the BBNJ Agreement.

DS: Thank you. And Markus?

MM: At COP 29 (in Baku in November) in a nutshell, collaboration, alignment and trust-building will be crucial ingredients to make progress on all of the aims. To deliver in the end a resilient and sustainable future. I think we have a lot on our plate and we need to work on it.

I think it’s a bad idea to put more on the list instead of working down the pile of things we already have on the list. I think this is a challenge of the COP that it’s not about adding on top all the time. It’s rather about getting the things done we already have on our list instead of putting new things on.

www.db.com

oceansolutions.stanford.edu

LUX’s Chief Contributing Editor, Maryam Eisler, talks to friends and internationally acclaimed artists, Italian Michelangelo Pistoletto and Cameroonian Pascale Marthine Tayou about artistic dialogue, cultural roots and creative chaos

Maryam Eisler: I’m fascinated by this idea of creative duality, a dialogue which wouldn’t naturally come together. You have always said ‘one and one makes three… it is the fusion of differences’. How do you explain this? Why does it work?  

Michelangelo Pistoletto: It’s a perfect duality made of two antique yet contemporary cultures. All the elements that we have in the exhibition are made with these two cultures: one European, the other African. Although there is a long history separating these continents, there is a shared perpetual connection and aggression, a cultural, ecological and technological aggression. We live in a moment where we need to fuse these opposites, to produce a third phenomenology that I call ‘the third paradise’. 

Turin-born painter, Michelangelo Pistoletto, acknowledged as one of. the pioneers of the ‘Arte Povera’ movement in Italy, has a focus on reflections and mirrors across his work

ME: Pascale, I believe you’ve found inspiration in the words of Edouard Glissant; what are your thoughts on him saying that ‘the mixture of art and language produces the unexpected, this other space, this third paradise, a space where dispersion allows for connections, where culture clashes, where disharmonies, disorders, and interference become creative forces’.  

Maryam Eisler, photographer and LUX’s Chief Contributing Editor, photographs Pascale Marthine Tayou, Belgian-based artist with a focus on setting man and nature ambivalently together, to underscore the fact that artworks are social, cultural, or political constructions

Pascale Marthine Tayou: I think it’s about how you bring those elements together and finding what’s in between the lines. In terms of culture becoming a creative force, I believe a key part of my evolution was these elements influencing me while growing up. I didn’t know which path to take because there was so much confusion around my upbringing, so I had to find my own way to escape and survive. I never thought I was ‘making art’, but I’ve learnt a lot about my practice through connections and people’s opinions; I’m discovering myself through others’ eyes. For this body of work, I asked myself about the magic of form. I thought I’d find what makes these objects so special, maybe because they are so dark and it’s impossible to get through them. I thought of what I could do with transparent material, to try and catch the truth, but I went even deeper. More transparency means it’s harder to catch this truth; that is the meaning of life. There’s no answer, you must only express yourself.   

ME: You’re talking effectively about spirituality, a bit of philosophical death tying in beautifully with reflection, refraction and use of glass and mirror. Walk me through this use of light.  

MP: You see in this room we have black and white.  

The collaboration between Pistoletto’s multi-disciplinary, multi-voiced practice, and Tayou’s works, seeking to redefine postcolonial issues via the European experience, has been the rich source of creative dialogue.

ME: Yes, yin and yang! 

MP: They present the two opposites. Without them, we have nothing in between. There cannot be solely light or darkness, but together, they make a new world.  

PMT: They are like two borders. There’s always something between and that’s the mystery of creativity, trying to catch that. 

MP: But between, we have all the colours!  

PMT: Of course! The harmony comes from balancing both shadow and light. You are only visible because of both; that third paradise is in between.  

MP: The two extreme elements produce an explosion at the centre! Something chaotic, working towards harmony. The objective of the arts is to recombine with harmony. Art has always been in search of peace, and we are still trying to recombine these concepts.  

ME: Chaos and harmony, interesting words today. What is this chaos you talk about?  

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MP: To clarify, the chaos isn’t necessarily negative. Chaos is the only order possible, but we need to understand how it can be used to allow us to live in an advanced, spiritual way.   

ME: An interesting discussion in a world where everything isn’t in ‘orderly chaos’ necessarily.  

MP: Chaos is fantastic because everything is included within it; the universe is working by contrast. Despite this, it’s up to us to create harmony and dynamic balance.  

Both Pistoletto and Tayou express interest in materials and their significance within art, and both artists find that every point in the universe is a centre-point; there is not just one.

ME: Is this the power of art? Can life and politics replicate art?  

PMT: Art is a state of mind, like a group of people making soup. If two people had the same spices, water and tomato, they would make two completely different pots of soup. As we grow up and progress as human beings, we become more political. We go deeper into the traffic of evolution and learn about a life of confrontation, refraction and fragmentation, which we learn to deal with. Through art, we can share this.  

ME: Now we understand your chaotic journey, your chaos is a different kind, isn’t it Mr Pistoletto? 

MP: Not necessarily. We just have different approaches. Mine is more rational and his is more emotional. But from his emotions he grows a diverse dimension, amalgamating emotion and reason. Personally, I start with rationality. I try to research and give reason to the basic phenomenon of existence. That’s why the mirror painting shows reality without personal interpretation. Just as it is.  

Read More: Maryam Eisler: Confined Artists

ME: I find it very interesting that you’ve referred to these mirror paintings as a symbol of society, with each fragment representing an individual.  

MP: I included society, nature, day, night, time and space. While doing these paintings, I saw the universe concentrate on the infinity of the mirror. This is a phenomenon; its not something I decided. I had no feelings about it, nor did I want to have any. Finally, when I saw the real truth, I experienced the biggest emotion one can experience : that related to reason. I had the answer to my question.  

ME: At the end of the day, it’s about a collective memory, is it not? 

MP: In my work, there is Pistoletto, not as one, but as everybody. They are the author of my work, not just me. I simply raised the formula that includes everybody and everything. The mind has the power to bring images to reality; the mirror is the image of existence. While the image doesn’t know it exists, I know I exist. This is what is important: art has the capacity to interpret existence. 

Tayou’s work explores movement, changes, economics and the environment; the artist uses repurposed materials for a lot of his practice. 

ME: From this dialogue, what have you learnt from each other? This is the third exhibition you’ve done together? 

MP: I think there’s love between us, not in a romantic sense.  

ME: What about respect? 

MP: Love is a precursor for respect. Respect is not sufficient; one gets to it with sentiment.  

PMT: Personally, I think respect is something innate and platonic. For example, my father’s love for me is just that of a father’s love for his son, not because we are on the same level.  

Pistoletto’s iconic mirror images are photo-silkscreened images on steel. These works were developed in 1962, and represent Pistoletto’s interests in conceptualism and figuration. The reflective nature of the pieces force the viewer to become an integral part of the piece, as well as the gallery itself.

MP: I say ‘love differences’, which I mean literally; the Mediterranean is surrounded by cultures. Loving differences isn’t just accepting or respecting, but ‘loving’ goes further. Between two people, in order to create, you have to love. Nothing else.  

ME: This is possibly the most positive message we can project out there in the universe, precisely with this very recipe.  

Pistoletto and Tayou underscore the importance of friendship in spurring concepts, art and art theory in fruitful dialogues.

MP: Today, we share the human spirit; we have common ancestors from Africa, where the concept of humanity was developed. This spread North and South, to America and everywhere else. We are the first and last threads of history. We’re talking about the art of this very wave which unites all these ideas.  

PMT: Honestly, it’s not easy for me, coming from a continent polluted by the conquering European race. We might say that I am sold, as reality is rather conditioned by the material.  

MP: This reality means that we are conditioned to ask questions where there are problems. We’re not going to look for wealth elsewhere; we must redefine all of this. If I’m involved in this, art does not exist. It doesn’t interest me. What interests me are people.  

See More:

This interview was conducted at Patricia Low Contemporary, Gstaad, in February 2024, during the exhibition ‘Alternative Centers‘, a dialogue show between Michelangelo Pistoletto and Pascale Marthine Tayou, which ran fro, December 26 to February 11 2024.

pistoletto.it

galleriacontinua.com

patricialow.com

maryameisler.com

There is a vineyard in the heart of Napa Valley that is a legend among wine cognoscenti; and one wine estate above all others that is celebrated for the wines it makes from it. Darius Sanai embarks on a tasting of Schrader’s celebrated To Kalon vineyard Cabernet Sauvignons

Schrader’s wines come from the heart of the Napa Valley in California

Anyone who enjoys the world’s great wines will have been asked a variation of the following question by a friend or acquaintance who is not a wine drinker: why are they worth it?

Top wines cost hundreds or even thousands of pounds/euros/dollars a bottle. What is it about a liquid, opened and dispatched over the course of a couple of hours, that is so much better than other bottles of very similar liquid, on sale for a fraction of the price?

My favourite answer is that a great wine makes you think. It carves its own conversation and memory in your mind. It has a depth and breadth of complexity which starts, like any foodstuff, with your sensory organs (smell, taste, sight, touch), but which then transfers into your brain to engrave itself on your experience.

Great food also has sensory complexity (and can also be expensive and confined to the very wealthy). But wine has two qualities which are unavailable to food: a bottle of wine accompanies you and your companions during the course of a part of a day (rather than as a course in a meal), taking part and assisting in numerous conversations. And a great wine evolves, and has a different conversation with you over the space of a couple of hours. The greatest wines leave a city’s worth of impressions on your mind.

I was thinking of this during our tasting of Schrader Cellars wines. Schrader is one of the big names of Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon: if you are a hedge fund titan in New York, an oil magnate in Dallas or an entertainment investor in LA, you will likely know the winery.

Jason Smith, Master Sommelier at Schrader

The first three wines we tried – three of the winery’s flagships – were all from a legendary piece of land, the Beckstoffer To Kalon vineyard in Napa Valley.

Drive by Beckstoffer To Kalon on Highway 29, the main road bisecting the valley, and you would be forgiven for missing it. Unlike some of the spectacular vineyards of the region, perched amid hillside forests or on mountainsides, To Kalon is flat, on the valley floor, just an array of vines. But then, so are vineyards like those around Chateau Latour or Chateau Petrus or Chateau Cheval Blanc in Bordeaux. Visual appeal has no relationship to vineyard quality.

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Like a Burgundy vineyard, To Kalon has a number of different wine estates making wines from its esteemed grapes; Schrader is probably the most celebrated. But what makes Schrader, as well as this vineyard site of To Kalon, so special?

The To Kalon vineyard is on the valley floor of Napa, touted by forested mountains

Jason Smith, the urbane, cosmopolitan General Manager of Schrader, with whom we had our tasting, is too modest to give a direct answer: it’s a combination of the vines and the winemaking. Smith is a rarity in that he is a Master Sommelier running a prestigious winery; and as such has real insider knowledge of the fabulous restaurants which manage to get their hands on a small stock of Schrader wines. He says the wines are best drunk over dinner with a small group of friends; although the wines weave such a conversation we would be happy to drink them alone.

Tasting notes by Darius Sanai

Schrader Cellars Heritage Clone 2019

So many layers wash over your senses when you sip this wine: as soon as you think you have separated and worked out the different elements, more arrive to replace them. If it were an artwork, it would be a late-period Rembrandt: on first note, a portrait of a person, then you notice the eyes, the unfinished sleeve, the posture; keep looking, and keep sipping, and more nuances appear and others disappear. Unlike a Rembrandt, this will improve over time: its conversation will be even more fascinating in 2029 or later.

Schrader Cellars CCS 2019

The To Kalon vineyard is cooled by breezes and fogs coming in from nearby San Francisco Bay

Schrader is very scientific over which parts of the To Kalon vineyard make which of its wines. CCS is made from grapes from nearest the centre of Napa Valley itself, near the river. The soil is full of mineral deposits, which apparently make the wine balanced, lifted. My impression was of a wave of blues, greens, greys and reds; its conversation was playful yet intellectual, never too heavy, but always very precise. It reminded me of a Chagall; not one of his sadder paintings, but a more joyful work, figures flying, but always with a poignant poetry behind it. Again, I would keep my next bottle for a few years, as this conversation developed as the evening went on.

Schrader Cellars RBS 2019

For me, the most famous of Schrader’s wines and the only one I had tried before, in various different vintages. This is not a wine that hides its qualities behind its coat. It is made from the warmest part of the vineyard, and Napa does get very hot in summer, although To Kalon is mitigated by both the fact that it is near the cooling effect of the Bay, and that the valley floor has cooling fogs flowing in from the Bay and the Pacific, which can also keep sunshine off. So with the richness comes a balance. Still, this is a showcase wine with power and wow factor: a Damien Hirst sculpture of a wine, a showcase. I would drink this anytime from now, but ensure Alain Ducasse was around in my kitchen to cook up a tenderloin with foie gras or alternatively a morel mushroom casserole with plenty of truffle and parsley, to accompany it.

Read more: A tasting of Vérité wines with Hélène Sellian

Double Diamond Cabernet Sauvignon 2019

The wine made for people who can’t afford or don’t want to broach the fabulously expensive wines above, I expected Double Diamond to be a bit of a disappointment, like the second wines of top Bordeaux chateaux are sometimes. But hell no. Although it’s made from 100% Cabernet Sauvignon, like all the wines here, Double Diamond is sourced from outside To Kalon (but within Napa Valley), and it’s altogether a different conversation. Open, delicious, very sophisticated in its own right, perhaps less demanding of your attention and conversation than the artworks above, which require the limelight; ready to drink now and not really needing a food accompaniment. A mid-career contemporary artist, perhaps Flora Yuhnkovich, enjoying their success.

Find out more: schradercellars.com