Environmental Shariah Standards
Scholars must develop Shariah standards for the environment. A detailed, more nuanced, ijtihad that explains the environmental limits of transactions and products. What are the limits of consumption? What are the limits of production? Is the connection between this product and its ultimate impact on the environment tenuous or direct?
As fiqh stands today, would it be permissible for a non-Islamic investment bank based in London to issue Sukuk to fund a rubber company that further destroys the Sumatran rainforest; or for an Islamic bank in Dubai to finance the creation of a dam in China that floods a fragile ecosystem; and so on? Fiqh does bear upon the general interests of society and, increasingly with the planet’s environment hanging in delicate balance, what happens in one part of the world affects all society.
The environment is a fiqh issue.
Next Week
Part 4 of 6: Supporting Community-Based Finance
Click here to see Part 2 of 6: Climate of Change — Launching a Gold-Based Currency
Click here to see Part 1 of 6: Climate of Change — Four Initiatives Islamic Finance Must Undertake
This article was approved by Mufti Ismail Ebrahim Desai.
