>IMO this is the central environmental issue: making room for wild nature.
>"Sustainability" is the wrong issue.
I*M*O, sustainability IS the issue because it signifies survival - the survival of everything [except maybe cockroaches, mosquitos, ticks, fleas and possibly a few more - but that is a purely personal and sentimental concern, as the future of those pests is not at risk, anyway. I just wish it was]. By the same token, when you say:
>Agriculture in some form is
>sustainable because people have to eat.
You are assuming that "people" are going to be around indefinitely, in spite of the destructive things they do to each other and the environment, including so many things done in the name of agriculture. The reason why agriculture must become MORE sustainable is because the biosphere that sustains (temporarily) even relatively unsustainable practices (and the difference between sustainable and unsustainable is exactly that - relative in time, while both relative and absolute in principle, since one is degenerative, the other regenerative), must be given more consideration by the people using unsustainable methods, so everyone's cell line can count on a home in the future. The importance of doing this is the reason that:
>Most concerns on Sanet are
>anthropocentric and political.
People have created the problem and people will have to resolve it; people themselves and their governing bodies. These are issues that that affect us all. Therefore, they are public issues and what is or isn't legal is precisely the big issue, along with the incentives that should be given to desirable activities and the impediments (like taxes) that should be reasonably placed on undesirable ones. These measures too must be provided with a legal basis, in order to produce the desired effect.
You may be assuming that this will happen anyway (by itself) because "people" (as a whole) will recognize and respond to pressing needs. However, in reality some will do so first, and oblige others whose vested interests tends to run counter to the public interest, even while their economic power tends to corrupt both legal systems, law makers and the media. The important thing is to substantiate exactly what the issues are, to focus on all important aspects involved. Not so long ago, the multifaceted environmental factors involved in chemical &/or monocultural, industrialized agricultural systems were barely understood. Now, with the advent of GMO's, a whole new can of worms has been opened. Much attention must (and will) be given to the field and the interchange of data and opinions is just beginning.
I hope you agree, because I will be off line for a while. In any case, IMO; sustainability, the test of time (which presumes health), is as good a measurement as any. "Making room for wild nature" is fine, but it doesn't seem as basic in that while "wild nature" may have rights and adherents, the underlying concept is less purposeful in a metaphysical sense - the sense of going somewhere. The sense of purpose itself. With "wild nature", the focus can be shifted to many disparate, momentary and not necessarily cohesive or evolving realities.
Douglas Hinds
*********** REPLY SEPARATOR ***********
On 17/06/99 at 10:20 AM Wilson, Dale wrote:
>John,
>
>> Dennis, Dale, and others: do we have enough global cropland
>> to accommodate fuel production as well as rising levels of
>> meat consumption...
>
>We don't have to eat so much meat, and we don't have to use so much energy.
>If meat cost, say, $10/pound in terms of todays dollar, you can bet meat
>consumption would drop. If diesel fuel cost $5/gallon, we would use less,
>and producing biodiesel will be very attractive.
>
>Times will change and markets will adjust. The prevailing view among
>proponents of "sustainable" agriculture seems to be that public policy
>should seek to discern the distant future and institute strong policy to
>accomodate their model of the future. This is dangerous because it is hard
>to predict the future. Not only that, we have enough clear inequities,
>market distortions and environmental problems to deal with in the immediate
>future.
>
>IMO, we need to create policy that looks ahead about a decade to catalyze
>the seeds of the solutions to tomorrows problems. For example, the
>government subsidizes R&D in solar power in anticipation that this will be a
>market-driven solution in the forseeable future. This backfired in the
>1970's because the need was too far in the future (it isn't anymore).
>
>Right now, meat consumption is rising because grain is very cheap. Farmers
>burn a lot of diesel and apply excess N because petroleum is cheap, but that
>won't last very long. The markets are inexorable, and I trust them more than
>central planning in the long run.
>
>> plus necessary biodiversity, wilderness reserves, etc.?
>
>IMO this is the central environmental issue: making room for wild nature.
>"Sustainability" is the wrong issue. Agriculture in some form is
>sustainable because people have to eat. Most concerns on Sanet are
>anthropocentric and political.
>
>Dale
>
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