>I was struck by three (unrelated--it all seems related!) letters to
>the editor of the Washington Post on 8/28/99:
>Dennis Avery tells us we have nothing to fear from global
>warming;
up to now even in europe almost everyone knows, that avery is the
self-declared expert #1 on every item ;-))
but: there are indeed indications, that some northern
countries might be among the few winners of a global warming.
that's why by the slowdown of agreements for the 25% co2 reductions
by the american delegations in rio and rome you did not make
friends with a lot of other countries (esp. indonesia, tonga
islands and the netherlands).
so it depends on how you define the word "WE" (from a view from
abroad: does that mean "YOU" or really "WE" ??)
---------------------------------------
Global Warming Bad? Not to Some Farmers In Alaska's Far North.
The Wall Street Journal, June 10, 1998, ppA1,A8.
Farmers in Alaska such as Dennis Green and Scott L. Hollembaek are
experiencing some profitable benefits from the rising temperatures
of the past three decades. Green was able to harvest a surprise
crop of oat hay last year after his usual oat crop. The extra crop
earned him $75,000, almost all of which was profit.
Weather analysts say that the growing season in this area of
northern Alaska has lengthened by about 20%. Also, the average
temperature of winter nights has risen from 50 or 60 degrees below
zero to 20 or 30 below. "Hell, we're out there running around in
our T-shirts," said Hollembaek, a neighbor of Green.
Hollembaek's cattle and bison have been able to survive the winter
on a smaller amount of the expensive feed that is necessary for
them to keep up their body heat. Hollenbaek's own heating bills
have dropped as well, and he only went through 10 cords of firewood
at $50 each last winter, rather than his usual 20 cords.
Areas near the Arctic circle are more dramatically affected by
climate change than other regions of the world. Warming
temperatures cause the areas' snow cover to melt, which then
reflects less sunlight away from the earth, allowing for even
further warming.
In the late seventies government programs were established to
attract farmers to Alaska from other states. Many of them seized
the easy loan money and tried to grow the same crops they grew in
"the lower 48." Farming in Alaska is harsh, though, and an early
September snow can stay on the ground all winter, ruining an entire
crop. Most of the farmers who came to Alaska for the program gave
up early and left.
With the recent warming trend, however, more people are trying to
make it by farming in Alaska. Popular crops include barley, grass
for lawns in Anchorage, and bison that will become low-cholesterol
steaks. Green is experimenting with a reindeer herd to make
reindeer sausage.
But there are down sides to the warming trend, too. The permafrost
is thawing in places, which is causing roadways and construction to
sag. Caribou herds are also suffering because the moss that they
live on is not thriving in the warmer temperatures. And insect
pests, such as spruce beetles, are able to migrate further north,
now.
Not all of the farmers in the region even believe that global
warming is happening. William Sutton, a transplanted farmer from
Idaho, says, "Thirty years ain't enough to tell you anything. This
is all Al Gore smoke-and-mirrors BS."
-------------------------------------
>a tofu company defends its product that has only 0.1
>percent GMO materials;
let's face it, although it might look like the fight about gmo in
agriculture seems to tend in the direction of public refusal, we
are VERY far from a real stop of mixing conventional with ge
food. ask any breeder you really know quite good enough to be
honest to you an he will tell you, that there is almost no way to
differenciate a conventional bred variety from one injected with
strange genome and that it quite easy to cheat. where should be
the difference ? chromosomes are a sequence of genes, which are
altered and mixed with other genes by the breeding process and if
breeders do not force the process up to the extreme (injecting
specific and already identified codons from other species) and do
not tell the authorities of their gene lab work, noone would be
able to prove otherwise... just how ??? it would not be THAT
simple as i said here in 2 sentences, but you can perfectly well
fake a breeding line and the further breeding process in 4 to 5
years.... hell, you cannot control everything, esp. with the
trend of "lean government".
[next article]
>Climate, Castles, Cathedrals
>Luckily, we can look at the prospect of warming through the
>historical record, not an uncertain computer model. The answer is
>that we'd return to the finest weather in recorded history, the
Medieval Climate Optimum (950-1300 A.D.).
ahh, another #1 expert.. the "finest" weather for whom ?
>All of the famous cathedrals and castles in Europe were built
>during that period because people had time to spare from working
>in the fields.
just call it plain rubbish ! noone of the workers had spare time,
they simply HAD TO HAVE "spare" time for god's honor (and forced
a little bit by their landlord's hellebardes and swords's bearers
and their bishop's fulmination of excommunication, if they did
not obey immediately)
there were no longlasting pattern in food production and hunger
from the 12th to the 18th century. famines came and went and they
were mostly influenced by wars and huge armies occupying a
country and seizing every food they got. if it was a "standing
army" they robbed the farmers continuously and brougth the seized
food into their own countries (tax, called "the tenth", though it
often was more than half), if they passed through, they devasted
the fields by the tactic of "burnt soil".
[if anyone in doubt: literature available and i'm willing to give
avery a short lesson in ancient european church history. if i
look out of my window in the institute, i have a perfect view on
the oldest cathedrale in europe just 500 m away]
>Storms were fewer and milder. The polar ice caps did not melt.
>There was no wave of wildlife species extinction.
>DENNIS T. AVERY
>Swoope, Va.
ahh, now i see, that i'm wrong, it's the same expert as before
(just on another topic).....
meteorologist will tell him, that it's quite the other way round.
the warmer, the more storms.... assurance companies will tell the
same story..
[3rd article]
>The French farmers protesting American hormones in imported beef
>are probably only sorry they didn't think of it first
a strawman, hormones simply are NOT allowed AND they are one of
the few things, which are controlled *rigourously* by diaries &
the governmental control system..
statement of the EC:
Risks to Human Health from Hormone Residues in Bovine Meat Products:
http://europa.eu.int/comm/dg24/health/sc/scv/out21_en.html
>produits de qualite I can only gag on the enormous amounts of
>fertilizer, insecticide, herbicide and you-name-it-cide I see
>them spreading everywhere, polluting the groundwater and
>endangering public health throughout its beautiful country.
as often, partially true (but not as global as cited).
whenever i've been in switzerland, austria and the french midi in
early spring, i was very surprised of the intense green colors of
the meadows even in high altitudes (when it's still cold and not
yet the time for intense growth). i did not wonder anymore, when
i saw the big tractors carrying huge barrels of manure bringing
up to the high moutains. there it's spread by huge pumps onto the
meadows and sometimes even onto the snow. result: early grass
growth, but also high leaching into the groundwater. i do not
know the situation in france (it should be the same, because
subsidies are paid from bruxelles, not from paris) but in
switzerland and austria those mountain farmers are paid
subsidaries up to 90% of the average income, because by
cultivating the mountain slopes these farmers are preventing
landslips, people in the valley are extremely afraid of. (if you
do now mow the meadows, the snow tends to slip in dangerous
avalanches like on a sheet of ice. if you have ever been in the
alpes, you know that the countries there consist of either
mountains or valleys, but very few flat regions. that's why the
non-farmers are all too willing to pay the remaining few mountain
farmers).
so farmers there are not just paid for producing milk, cheese and
meat, but more for preventing major catastrophies, these
countries and their economies are very vulnerable against. france
is different, because the mountains there make only a minor part
of the country. on the other side prices for agricultural
products are lower in france, so the pressure for farmers to use
fertilizers and pesticides is much higher. the organic system in
france is quite well developed, also in the mountain regions
(haute provençe & drôme). at least, that's what i was told by
officials from the department of saône..
so the reporter cited might very well have told the truth, but
it's the same as everywhere else: small farming (mostly
selfsufficient and older people, who do not have the money to buy
big tractors) and big farming makes a huge difference in
management..
unfortunately the younger people are heading to the cities for
jobs in a bank and the old farmers get older. so the government
tries to keep the younger ones up in the mountainfarming business
with high subsidaries.
besides that: try to tell anyone in switzerland, that there is no
global warming and they stare at you, as if you were a madman
just fled from an asylum. switzerland has lost more than 40% !!
of its glaciers in less than 80 years.. result: the mountains are
collapsing and swiss government has to spent more and more money
in building expensive steel and concrete barriers in the
mountains to prevent gigantic landslips. nowadays they have to
spent about 8% of their BNP just in barrier building, repairs of
streets and houses. tendancy: quickly rising.
switzerland is a marvellous country. but last year i spent a
holiday in a valley, just in the shadow of a mountain, which the
geologic experts expect to come down in the next 10-20 years, at
first i did not sleep that calm as in a usual holiday and get a
feeling of the risk of farming in that region... bankruptcy is a
nasty thing, but being buried under millions of tons of stones is
worse.
klaus
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