2002

Nature & Society - February 2002

roba — Thu, 24 May 2012 16:17:37 +1000

Editorial

It is just a year since Donella Meadows died. Who was she? Better known as Dana Meadows, she was the lead author of the 1972 report “The Limits to Growth” to the Club of Rome. Dana had worked with Jay Forrester, the researcher who modelled the continuous critical problems the Club of Rome wanted to address. As they worked, the modelling team saw that there was a primary cause for all these problems.

Forrester reported to the Club members on what the modellers had found. “There is a primary cause of the Continuous Critical Problems. It is growth - exponential growth of the physical economy and population against the earth’s physical limits. That which all the world sees as the solution to its problems is in fact a cause of its problems. Complex systems are often like that - counterintuitive.”

The Club members listened politely, then went back to discuss each of the world’s problems as though each was unrelated, and as though there were no limits. In her memoirs Dana commented on “… the inability of people to hear a message that questions one of their deepest assumptions. Even the concerned, sophisticated members of the Club of Rome could not accommodate in their conceptual framework the idea that growth might be a problem as well as a solution.”

In the intervening thirty years we have not become any better at understanding messages that conflict with our preconceptions. Business and government insist we must have growth, growth is good. Yet we can all see that as population and GDP grow so too does inequality. Humanitarian crises are on the rise and the number of refugees continues to escalate as a result of environmental problems as well as war.
When New York suffered the terror of the destruction of the World Trade Centre last September, what was the message that was heard? It was that the terrorists were evil men who hated the United States because of its democracy and way of life. And yes, the terrorists did hate the USA, but that country itself should question its own role in the matter. Some Americans wondered out loud why they should be hated when they were always doing good in the world. It is true that they often do good, but the world trade system over which they preside has done great harm to many countries.

The optimism of the early post World War II years has given way to despair as the poorer countries have watched the destruction of their own economies while the western world has become ever more affluent. The one fifth of the world’s population that live in the west now consume four fifths of the world’s production. That statistic alone shows that there is cause for ill will if not downright hatred. There are additional reasons such as religious intolerance and cultural animosities, but the sheer inequality goes a long way to explaining even these.

If we could manage to seek the real cause of the problems, to make the connections, to understand that growth itself can be good, bad or neutral, we could examine the claims for different kinds of growth. We would understand that growth that hurts other people, that harms the environment and destroys other species is bad. Growth of alternative technologies that provide a measure of comfort for everyone without destroying the environment is good. Growth in kindness and social capital is good. A decrease (negative growth) in inequality and in conflict would be very good indeed.

If the money which was almost effortlessly found so quickly for the War on Terrorism could be found to reform the world’s financial system to the benefit of debtor nations then that would be excellent. It would also ease the problems of the richer countries for it would reduce the stream of refugees and minimise the risk of terrorism. In our own interest we need to look for constructive ways to reduce inequality rather than go to war to protect ourselves.

Forthcoming NSF meetings

20 February - 7.45 pm, Heysen Street, Weston

What Canberra needs to do to become sustainable

joint presentation by Dr John Schooneveldt and Dr Janis Birkeland

John and Janis will talk about the set of criteria for judging sustainability of urban environments they have recently developed as part of a consultancy with the ACT Government.

20 March - 7.45 pm, Heysen Street, Weston

Commercialisation of solar power and the Kyoto Protocol

Dr Andrew Blakers

The Australian National University has substantial R&D activities in the area of photovoltaics and concentrating solar thermal systems. The photovoltaic and solar thermal groups combine to form the Centre for Sustainable Energy Systems (CSES). CSES has about 40 staff and research students and derives most of its income from non-University sources. Our work covers the spectrum from basic R&D through to commercial contract research in the fields of photovoltaics and solar thermal. The talk will describe our activities in the context of commercialisation of solar energy and international negotiations over the Kyoto Protocol.

17 April - 7.45 pm, Heysen Street, Weston

The Australian Eco-labelling Program: a market trigger for sustainable development

Petar Johnson, President, Australian Environmental Labelling Association (AELA)

The Australian Ecolabel Program seeks to deliver to the Australian market a credible indication of the environmental performance of a product or service. By being able to recognise environmentally preferable products and services, consumers can better choose their ecological footprint and manufacturers can gain a competitive advantage on environmental performance. Environmental labelling promises to be an important market-based instrument for increasing design for environment and integrated product policy on the Australian market. Petar will present an overview of how the Ecolabelling Program works.

Unfair Trade

You may have heard Professor George Mondeo talking on Background Briefing, Radio National on 13 November last year or in one of its summer repeats. Mondeo, of the UK University of East London, was speaking about the undemocratic nature of most of the international bodies which increasingly affect our lives.

The World Trade Organisation, for instance, represents corporations and presides over a “race to the bottom”, to the lowest common denominator in environmental standards. It penalises countries if they try to protect their people or their environment. It ensures that no country can prohibit imports on the basis of ethical, health or environmental concerns.

The almost unheard of Trans-Atlantic Economic Partnership was proposed by Tony Blair and Bill Clinton in 1997. Anything that is allowed on one side of the Atlantic must be allowed on the other side. No barriers are admitted, for example, to trade in milk produced by injecting hormones into dairy cows in the USA, no matter what the cost to the cows or to human consumers. This organisation is run and monitored by the Trans-Atlantic Business Dialogue, consisting of the chief executives of the 100 biggest companies on either side of the Atlantic.
Turning to the resentment, anger and helplessness felt in so many indebted countries, Mondeo looked at the terrible legacy of debt inflicted by the current world financial system. He pointed out that the British economist John Maynard Keynes, dismayed by the results of debt between the two world wars, devised a system that would prevent recurrence.

Keynes realised that trading in national currencies would be a disaster as hard currencies would effectively wage war on soft currencies. He proposed a special international currency to be run by a bank he called The International Clearing Union. It would charge creditor nations the same interest as debtors, so there would be an incentive to maintain a zero balance. Any country with a credit would either invest heavily in poorer countries or it would alter the terms of trade to favour indebted ones. This would ensure indebted countries received fair terms for their products, which is the reverse of what happens now.

Arguing for its proposal, Keynes predicted exactly what would happen if it lost. It did, and we got the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund and debt.

A World Trade Organisation that reversed its present stand would be a good thing. It would set minimum international standards in human rights, social and environmental protection, and use sanctions to prevent any undercutting of them.

We need to discuss the politics of scale as well as economies of scale in economics. It may be necessary to limit the size of corporations, some of which are bigger than nation states. A global cap on executive pay, limiting it to a certain multiple of the lowest wages paid in the corporation, could effectively raise the living standards of lower paid workers.

Mondeo concluded that governments do not give power away, but people can take it by non-violent protest and by full participation (not just by voting) in the political process.

He thinks this is the point when the world could begin to change for the better. Making the world better, more prosperous and much fairer would be a fitting memorial to the people who died on 11th Sept. and those who have died since in Afghanistan.

Slow Cities

The “slow food” movement started as a protest in 1986 when McDonald’s first opened in Rome. Now more than 70,000 people in over fifty countries have joined the movement to celebrate meals prepared with love and consumed at leisure.

Recently Italy took a lead again in resisting the global speed-up. In 1999 Paolo Saturnini, mayor of Greve-in-Chianti, a medieval hilltop town in Tuscany, started thinking about applying the slow food philosophy to towns. He got together with some other mayors, discussing the same principles of cherishing local traditions, believing in diversity, and resisting the globalisation of culture.

More than thirty Italian towns have signed up. They are not anti-progress. They are happy to use technology to control air, noise and light pollution. They want modern waste-cycling and composting facilities. They are keen to encourage local business. They value their own communities and traditions.

The movement is spreading slowly (as is appropriate) with some towns outside Italy interested. So far not one town in the English speaking world has shown any interest.
(The Canberra Times 8 Jan 02)

Now there’s a thought. Maybe Canberra could take the lead. Of course many Sydneysiders and Melbournians would scoff and say that Canberra is already an unwitting member, which we in Canberra know is not true. But it seems that the ideas of the Slow Cities movement would sit nicely with conservation ethics. They should also appeal to the land of the long weekend, where lazy days at the beach or the cricket ground have traditionally been treasured.

Emboldened by this article I am including in this issue an essay I wrote last year for a competition run by Shell and The Economist on the topic “Going faster - but where?” Unfortunately slowing down did not appeal to the judges!

Jenny Wanless

Going Faster - But Where?

by Jenny Wanless

The Aboriginal people of the Uluru (Ayers Rock) region of Central Australia put out a video for tourists some years ago. One of its aims was to gently dissuade tourists from climbing the rock, which is sacred to their tribes. The video showed a speeded-up view of the climbers, like a procession of ants scuttling up the rock and down again. It made the activity look ridiculous and raised the question, “what are these people doing?”

This is an appropriate image and question for humans hurrying around the globe during the 20th Century. The advent of the railways in the 19th Century enabled many people to travel and the car and the aeroplane greatly expanded the number of travellers over the next century. What will happen in the present century? At the moment the trend is up, with exponential growth in numbers of tourists, just as there has been in the total number of humans. A hundred years ago it was fairly rare for a person to have been around the world. Now a great many people have been around it several times and some circumnavigate it every few weeks. And just as sheer numbers of people are harming the earth so too is the ceaseless travel. It has been said that tourists destroy the very things they go to see, and there is a good deal of truth in that.

There are several ways in which mass transport of people and goods harm the world. The most obvious is the use of fossil fuel in various forms to power planes, trains and motor vehicles, with the concomitant exhaust gases contributing mightily to the enhanced greenhouse effect. A second problem is increased consumption and waste en route. At home a careful person can avoid small packets of food and toiletries, cutting down on unnecessary packaging. When travelling it seems inevitable that you become part of a vast chain of rubbish, and that opportunities for recycling become less. Also sheets and towels will be laundered more frequently for travellers than for stay-at-homes, using more electricity, water and detergent.

A third problem is that multitudes of people trampling over ancient sites or natural landscapes cause erosion. Even the air the visitors breathe out can be damaging, which is one of the reasons Lascaux Cave had to be closed to the general public.

Another very serious problem which is becoming apparent is the unwitting transport of diseases and pests. Ships have always carried “passengers” on their hulls or in their bilge water. Now ballast water is a major problem; it has carried many pest species of marine life to new areas. In a time of slower travel it was possible for quarantine services to prevent some diseases and pests from travelling to new areas. Now, with faster travel and huge numbers of movements, quarantine services are rendered largely ineffectual. Planes are particularly bad as they can travel anywhere on earth within the incubation period of any disease.

So although many countries are basing their economies more and more on tourism the costs of tourism may at times outweigh the benefits. When a country has to destroy its sheep and cattle herds because of disease introduced from another country then the profitability of mass transport and tourism must be questioned.

Even the more benign sounding eco-tourism has its down-side. It is simply not possible for more than small numbers of people to visit an important or endangered area without deleterious effects on it: the more people, the greater the impact. Eco-tourists, too, unless they are prepared to walk everywhere and do without many comforts, will have similar effects to other tourists in their use of fossil fuels and other resources.

So there are reasons why the great increase in travel of our own times may well be a temporary feature. Just as the population has been growing exponentially but now shows signs that it will peak and then decline, so too mass tourism will decline as reality bites during the 21st Century.

It is not only tourism that produces the untoward results. Even when we stay at home our modern lifestyle leads to similar problems. In our rush to fit more into our day we go everywhere by car. This not only leads to a great increase in harmful emissions, but also to a huge expansion in road systems which have their own serious consequences. Good agricultural land gets consumed, wild life suffers as habitat is carved up, run-off from roads can poison ground water.

The consequences for humans are also serious. Drivers suffer tension and frustration, which add to the tensions inherent in living in a rush. But while the nervous system is abused by over-use, other bodily systems, such as the muscles, including the heart, get too little healthy exercise. The result is a great increase in obesity, diabetes and other diseases of modern life. These effects on health were obvious before the end of the last century and attempts have been made to counter them. But the cure is often as bad as the disease, with people rushing (yet again) to the gym for a work-out, or travelling considerable distances to sporting activities. Many of these sports generate their own environmental problems.

Meanwhile environmental consciousness has been rising and people have been increasingly concerned about what is happening to wildlife and forests, water, air and the climate. But for a long time there has been great resistance to the realisation that modern lifestyles, as well as population numbers, have been driving the changes.

Looking back from the late 21st Century, it will be interesting to study the attitudes of people at the time. Quite early the plight of the panda was used to mobilise people to save wildlife, but the panda was seen as a victim of forest clearing and over-population in China. The demise of wild tiger populations early in the present century upset many people but it was blamed on traditional medicine demands. Our great ape cousins were eliminated from the wild, but this was caused by habitat loss and the bush meat trade. In every case someone else was at fault. But when the last wild polar bears died in the first quarter of this century the developed nations were finally struck with their guilt. The bears had not been hunted, trapped, tortured or used in any way. They had been left almost alone in the arctic wilderness, the only intrusion being a few harmless oil fields but modern living had deprived them of the snow and ice without which they could not live.

What was worse was that although it might have been possible to keep captive populations of apes and tigers, breeding generation after generation while some portions of the earth were reforested, there was nothing that could be done for the polar bears. There was no way to make snow in sufficient quantities to enable the bears to go back to the wild. As even skiers admitted reluctantly, driving to the snow fields and making the snow artificially had helped to cripple their sport and doom the bears.

This realisation at last forced people to think about what they were doing. They realised this ease of travel had been bought at great cost to the environment and had already destroyed much of what made travel worthwhile. Cities everywhere were very similar, the distinctive animals and plants of different regions were disappearing and what was left was being swamped by introduced species.

Instead of travelling, people started to look back to what had been lost. They visited a virtual world by use of sophisticated technologies, not including real-time travel. Participants ‘travelled’ back to the world of 50 or 100 years earlier, visiting the rainforests, the arctic tundra, the coral reef that had been lost. They determined not to let any more species vanish from the earth if it was possible to prevent their disappearance. About the same time governments in developed countries started to take energy conservation measures seriously for the first time. This was helped, of course, by the realisation that natural gas and oil reserves were getting low and prices were skyrocketing. Business and government stopped blaming oil producers for profiteering and instead looked realistically at their options. Businesses that had taken the matter seriously for some decades were in the best position to keep operating. Oil companies that had moved into renewable energy were able to cash in on their foresight. Others found themselves out of business as governments decided they had to conserve what reserves there were to fuel agriculture. To prevent famine, new ways had to be found to feed a world population which had depended on petrochemical inputs into agriculture for over 50 years.

As for looking to mass tourism to keep economies afloat, that was completely out of the question. By the middle of this century, the only vehicles on the road were powered by hydrogen which had been produced by electricity from a renewable resource such as solar, wind or water power. These sources were still limited, so most of the hydrogen was reserved for public transport, causing a change of pace for everyone.

The 21st Century, which had started with airlines competing for more flights, more passengers, was only half over when there was not a plane left in the sky. There was also not a polar bear left alive on the planet.

Polar Bears and Three-Year-Olds on Thin Ice

Donella Meadows' The Global Citizen, February 2, 2002
(Donella Meadows' last newspaper column before her sudden illness)

The place to watch for global warming — the sensitive point, the canary in the coal mine — is the Arctic. If the planet as a whole warms by one degree, the poles will warm by about three degrees. Which is just what is happening.

Ice now cover 15 percent less of the Arctic Ocean than it did 20 years ago. In the 1950s that ice averaged 10 feet thick; now it’s less than six feet thick. At the current rate of melting, in 50 years the northern ocean could be ice-free all summer long.

That, says an article in Science of January 19, would be the end of polar bears. In fact many creatures of the Arctic Ocean are already in trouble.

Until recently no one knew that there were many creatures of the Arctic Ocean. In the 1970s a Russian biologist named Melnikov discovered 200 species of tiny organisms, algae and zooplankton, hanging around ice floes in immense numbers, forming slime jungles on the bottoms of bergs and plankton clouds in every break of open water. Their carcasses fall to the bottom to nourish clams, which are eaten by walruses. Arctic cod live on algae scraped off the ice. The cod are eaten by seabirds, whales, and seals. The king of the food chain, hunting mainly seals, is the great white bear.

That was the system until the ice started to thin. In 1997 and 1998 Melnikov returned to the Beaufort Sea and found most of the plankton species, many named by him (and for him), were gone. The ice was nearly gone. Creatures dependent on the plankton (like the cod), or on the ice for dens (seals) or for travel (bears) were gone too.

Many had just moved north, following the ice, but that means moving farther from land, with widening stretches of open water between. Creatures like the black guillemot, a bird that depends on land for shelter and the ice floe for food, can no longer bridge the gap.

The Arctic is changing faster than scientists can document. Inuit hunters report that ivory gulls are disappearing; no one knows why. Mosquitoes are moving north, attacking murres, which will not move from their nests, so they are literally sucked and stung to death. Caribou can no longer count on thick ice to support their island-hopping in search of the lichens that sustain them. One biologist who spots caribou from the air says, “You sometimes see a caribou trail heading across [the ice], then a little wormhole at the end with a bunch of antlers sticking out.”

Hudson’s Bay polar bears are thinner and are producing fewer cubs. With the ice going out earlier, their seal-hunting season is shrinking. Hungry bears retreat to land and ransack garbage dumps. The town of Churchill in Canada has more jail cells for bears than for people. The bears are also weakened by toxic chemicals that drift north from industrial society and accumulate in the Arctic food chain.

Every five years the world’s climatologists assess current knowledge about global warming. Their latest report was just released. It erases any doubt about where this warming is coming from and warns that we ain’t seen nothing yet. If we keep spewing out greenhouse gases according to pattern, we will see three to ten times more warming over the 21st century than we saw over the 20th.

Some biologists are saying the polar bear is doomed.

A friend of mine, in response to this news, did the only appropriate thing. She burst out weeping. “What am I going to tell my three-year-old?” she sobbed. Any of us still in contact with our hearts and souls should be sobbing with her, especially when we consider that the same toxins that are in the bears are in the three-year-old. And that the three-year-old over her lifetime may witness collapsing ecosystems, north to south, until all creatures are threatened, especially top predators like polar bears and people.

Is there any way to end this column other than in gloom? Can I give my friend, you, myself any honest hope that our world will not fall apart? Does our only possible future consist of watching the disappearance of the polar bear, the whale, the tiger, the elephant, the redwood tree, the coral reef, while fearing for the three-year-old?

Heck, I don’t know. There’s only one thing I do know. If we believe that it’s effectively over, that we are fatally flawed, that the most greedy and short-sighted among us will always be permitted to rule, that we can never constrain our consumption and destruction, that each of us is too small and helpless to do anything, that we should just give up and enjoy our SUVs while they last, well, then yes, it’s over. That’s the one way of believing and behaving that gives us a guaranteed outcome.

Personally I don’t believe that stuff at all. I don’t see myself or the people around me as fatally flawed. Everyone I know wants polar bears and three-year-olds in our world. We are not helpless and there is nothing wrong with us except the strange belief that we are helpless and there’s something wrong with us. All we need to do, for the bear and ourselves, is to stop letting that belief paralyze our minds, hearts, and souls.

Cooperative Success

The story of desertification along the southern edge of the Sahara desert has been told often, but Fred Pearce found a much more hopeful story in the region. He visited an intensively farmed area in Nigeria and found that farmers were doubling and tripling their yields. They were keeping livestock confined but were spreading the manure on their fields. They were growing nitrogen fixing crops such as cowpeas, in addition to grains. The legumes and manure replaced what the grains removed from the soil and fertility was increasing.

The same story was being repeated in other countries in the region. Crop yields were up despite decreasing rainfall; good crops were growing on an annual rainfall as low as 300 mm. Soil quality was not declining.

All the improvements were the results of farmers applying traditional skills in soil and water conservation more intensively. Most importantly, the people had intensified their system of cooperation. They worked together in each others’ fields during busy times, weeding, building low walls to retain the occasional heavy rain and to prevent erosion. They lent and borrowed land, livestock and equipment. They saved and swapped seed varieties.

The result has been improved yields, enough to feed a much increased population, without land degradation. Indeed, in a formerly badly degenerated hill district of Kenya, output per hectare is now ten times greater than in the 1930s and five times what is was in the 1960s. There are more trees than there have been for a century, and tens of thousands of kilometers of terracing have cut erosion. Many hands, working together, have shown that farming does not have to destroy soils, and traditional skills can enable Africa to feed itself.

New Scientist 27 Oct 2001

A Locust Flapped its Wings ...

In 1852 a locust somehow found its way to the west of England, well outside its normal range. The unusual insect was given to 24 year old Eleanor Ormerod. She was intrigued and sent it to an expert for identification. She also bought a book on insects and started studying entomology. Her family were not happy about this new interest, but she quietly kept on with it for the next 16 years. Then an announcement in The Gardeners’ Chronicle attracted her attention: The Royal Horticultural Society asked readers to help in a study of garden insects, to find out which ones were helpful, which ones pests.

Eleanor became absorbed in the project. She got farm labourers and children to help her collect insects. She experimented with ways to control pests using simple but effective methods. She found that a few coils of hay rope around a tree trunk stopped the caterpillars of codling moth climbing into fruit trees. She would send a boy up a tree to nip out insect nests.

After her father died in 1873 Eleanor became a public figure. She pursued her interests and published her findings at her own expense. She printed “Notes on injurious insects” and sent copies to anyone who asked; she had to print 170,000 copies of her report on the warble fly. This pest burrowed deeply into the skin of cattle, and Eleanor’s cure “a dab of cart grease and sulphur applied to the infested area of the hide” was reputed to have saved half the country’s cows.

In 1881 the Royal Agricultural Society asked Eleanor to be their Consulting Entomologist, unpaid, but effectively the country’s chief entomologist. She received requests for advice from all over the world, from farmers. scientists and government officials and she answered every one.

She understood biological control. She examined the case of a watercress grower who could not pay his rent because his crop was ruined by caddis fly larvae. She found that the landlord’s wife had encouraged herons, which ate the trout that formerly kept the caddis fly population in check. She suggested that the landlord’s wife should make good the shortfall!

Later on Eleanor started getting hate mail. Her crime was suggesting that house sparrows should be culled, that the former ‘sparrow clubs’ should be revived. The clubs had existed in every parish and used to offer rewards for dead birds and eggs. Obviously in earlier times farmers had agreed with Eleanor that sparrows were pests that ate a great deal of grain and drove off the insect-eating swallows and martins. Without these birds the insect pests flourished. As the “farmers’ friend” Eleanor Ormerod was happy to take on the sentimental people who were appalled by her suggestion.

abridged from an article by Stephanie Pain
New Scientist 10 Nov 01

Island Life

The ABC is to be congratulated on its television series, Island Life. Not having seen any of the advance publicity I was expecting to see lots of lovely scenery with people snorkelling and otherwise enjoying themselves, or else a naturalist's view of the wildlife. What I had not expected was some of all that, combined with more important information on preservation of species, problems caused by introduced animals and the need for quarantine.

On Barrow Island, home to an oil company that apparently takes conservation seriously, naturalist Harry Butler has a continuing role in educating the oil company's workers in the importance of protecting the habitat, and in observing strict quarantine measures. Company policy forbids the introduction of pets, and pests are strictly excluded too. Birds are the only species that can avoid the quarantine measures.
Harry has trained several workers in the care of injured animals, a job the men have embraced with enthusiasm, but he stresses that the care of habitat is far more important in preserving the island's wildlife. He considers the latter to be quite safe while the oil company is operating, but is concerned about the future of the island after the company's work comes to an end.

Quarantine was also the focus of the episode on the Torres Strait Islands where the Australian Quarantine Inspection Service (AQIS) maintains a vigil to keep out screw worm fly and other pests. Sentinel pigs are used on some of the islands and on Cape York itself, to monitor any advance by Japanese encephalitis. Cattle herds on the Cape are also monitored on a monthly basis, to test for disease. Few Australians can have any idea of the work of AQIS and the dedication of its staff in what are beautiful but could be very trying conditions.

Kangaroo Island, on the other hand, is an object lesson of a different kind. In the early 20th Century, well meaning members of a fauna society introduced koalas, platypuses and Cape Barron Geese. All have thrived, koalas far too well. Now unfortunately the koalas need to be culled but popular conceptions refuse to permit this action. What to do is a big problem. Sterilisation has been tried but is expensive and not very effective. Meanwhile, the local black glossy cockatoo is in trouble, but here, at least, the local (human) population is willing to learn and keen to help.

Islands are wonderful places, romantic and exciting. They also show us in microcosm the effects of our actions on nature. We can learn a lot from contemplating them.

Jenny Wanless

The Business of Biodiversity

The Australian Conservation Foundation sponsors the Tela series of papers that explore relationships between the environment, the economy and society. Number 9, The Business of Biodiversity by Hugh Possingham, was issued in September last year, with the Earthwatch Institute as co-sponsor.

The paper stresses the importance of applying business-like thinking to the management of biodiversity. To date our attempts to conserve biodiversity have been well-intentioned but not very successful. To do better we need to think through the issues clearly, decide on goals, pose problems explicitly, have clearly stated objectives and use decision-making tools to decide on appropriate actions. The work in progress must be monitored and revised in light of fresh data and research.

Current practice in biodiversity conservation is to try to save every critically endangered species. This may be a waste of money and effort. A triage system could be used to save vulnerable species which can actually be saved rather than putting the money into a hopeless case.

If biodiversity conservation is treated as a business with good decision making methods and careful monitoring, then the national asset base of rich biodiversity has a better chance of survival than can be achieved by current ad hoc measures.

Tela papers are available on
www.acfonline.org.au/publications/tela/intro.htm

Nature & Society - April 2002

roba — Thu, 24 May 2012 16:17:37 +1000

Editorial

The Lord of the Rings is a sensational film in the best sense. It is a powerful story played by good actors. It is the story of small, peaceful people caught up in momentous events which will shape the whole future of their world. It is about the uncomplicated simplicity coupled with unexpected heroism of these people. It is a great adventure with lots of action. And it is set in some of the most beautiful and spectacular scenery on earth.

In one analysis of the original book, the author JRR Tolkien is thought to be commenting on the humanity and decency of the folk who were living in a peaceful part of rural England, “The Shire”, who are threatened by the twin evils of industrialisation and World War I. Tolkien loved that “backward” rural area and was worried about the encroachment of the ugly industrial cities that were advancing on it. He had fought on the terrible battle fields of the Great War and was appalled by what he had seen.

The Lord of the Rings was a parable for the 20th century, probably for many centuries. The vast industrial enterprise, the pit where Saruman’s orcs laboured, devouring the forests to fuel their furnaces, may have been more like the dark satanic mills of the 19th century rather than modern ones. Still many factories are ugly places and their workers are badly treated in some countries. We still destroy forests and rip up the ground in our modern quest for power. The mighty armies marching and the blood thirsty hand to hand combat have been replaced by long distance fighting, but still we maim and slaughter.

Look back at history and you can see the story repeated so often that it is easier to ignore than to face. Look around us now, look into the future; we see more of the same. Like the hobbits it is good to get on with our own quiet life, but the evil in the world forces itself on our attention.

The central theme in the book is the recognition that something of overwhelmingly evil power, the One Ring, has been made and peace can not come to Middle Earth until the Ring has been destroyed. In our own world there is nothing as simple as a Ring of power. Certainly humans have acquired such power, power to destroy much of nature and power to destroy themselves in the process, but the power we have is not like the Ring, it is not uniformly or inevitably bad.

What we have to do is control that power, and control those who would use it badly - the power itself cannot be destroyed. We have to recognise that though we have the power to harm we also have the power to heal, although healing is much harder than harming. It is easy to destroy a forest, very hard to restore one to its original complexity. It is easy to introduce exotic species, very difficult to remove them, and usually impossible to replace lost species. It is easy to cause massive erosion, to dam rivers, destroy wetlands. To return them to their original state of equilibrium is difficult indeed. It is even easy to alter the climate of the whole world, but next to impossible to reverse that change.
In the wonderful scenery of New Zealand it is easy to see the irreversible changes caused by human power. The Maori began the process with their extinction of the Moa, those giant chickens dispatched soon after the first humans reached the Land of the Long White Cloud. Their travelling companion, the Pacific rat, undoubtedly caused havoc amongst other bird species. This is not surprising or blameworthy. No species of plant or animal, including humans, can move into a new environment without affecting the species already there. Usually that effect will be deleterious, occasionally it is beneficial.

The only native mammals in New Zealand were a couple of species of bats, but there was a rich bird fauna and the birds occupied all available niches, including those usually held by mammals. These birds suffered greatly after European settlement, after the introduction of many mammals. The rabbit was introduced and then in an effort to control it, ferrets, stoats and weasels followed. Deer were introduced for hunting. Australian possums were added in the hope of founding a fur trade. Wallabies were brought in to add a bit of cuteness and variety, Cats, of course, came with the settlers.

All these creatures, one way or another, harmed the local bird life. Ground dwelling and flightless birds fell an easy victim to introduced predators. Most of the bird species suffered even more at the paws of the possum. New Zealand turned out to be possum heaven: they loved the trees to death. They ate the leaves and flowers, depriving the birds of food and shelter. They ate the eggs and fledglings. Some species are extinct, many endangered, and the bird song that so captivated early settlers has been replaced with near silence in the forests.

The distinctive red-flowering pohutukawa and rata trees had suffered so much possum damage that Project Crimson was initiated in the 1990s. Its aim was to re-establish them through plantings, scientific research, possum control and public education. This is having some success.
There are success stories, too, in re-establishing some bird species. The Department of Conservation has become expert in eradicating rats, mice and cats from off-shore islands so that birds can be released in safe areas and begin breeding up. There are some mainland ‘islands’, securely fenced to protect their inhabitants, even a few unfenced ‘islands’ where heavy baiting is relied on to control the ferals. All these measures take heroic efforts from their human guardians.

Still there are people who cannot or will not learn. There are hunters who move deer and wallaby to new areas, to increase their hunting options, with no thought for the effect on the forest. Someone has tried to introduce the Australian Eastern Rosella in the North Island. Just as someone has introduced foxes to Tasmania, a move that could destroy several species for which Tasmania is the last refuge.

Trying to get across to everyone the need to look after what is left, to stop selfish acts that destroy, to realise that humans have so much power that if they do not control it they can irretrievably damage the world, that is the challenge for this century.

Forthcoming NSF meetings

17 April - 7.45 pm, Heysen Street, Weston

The Australian Eco-labelling Program: a market trigger for sustainable development

Petar Johnson, President, Australian Environmental Labelling Association (AELA)

The Australian Ecolabel Program seeks to deliver to the Australian market a credible indication of the environmental performance of a product or service. By being able to recognise environmentally preferable products and services, consumers can better choose their ecological footprint and manufacturers can gain a competitive advantage on environmental performance. Environmental labelling promises to be an important market-based instrument for increasing design for environment and integrated product policy on the Australian market. Petar will present an overview of how the Ecolabelling Program works.

15 May - 7.45 pm, Heysen Street, Weston

Peter Young, Managing Director of Prime Waste Water Treatment, will talk about his company's treatment of waste water biologically, without the use of chemicals, to achieve the high standards required by Government.

19 June - 7.45 pm, Heysen Street, Weston

Anna Carr is a post-doctoral fellow at the ANU's Centre for Resource and Environmental Studies. She is the author of Grass roots and green tape: principles and practices of environmental stewardship.

Solar Energy Technology

Jenny Wanless reports on the NSF March discussion meeting featuring a talk by Dr Andrew Blakers

It was a particular pleasure to welcome Andrew Blakers, who gave up an evening (and rode his bike to Weston?) to tell NSF members about the work of the ANU’s Centre for Sustainable Energy Systems.

For a start Andrew listed the environmental problems arising from the use of fossil fuels and nuclear energy for electricity generation. These include resource depletion, acid rain, oil spills, local pollution in cities and warfare, either nuclear or non-nuclear. Loss of habitat and biodiversity, of course, are a result of the enhanced greenhouse effect, and in Australia fossil fuel usage causes half of our greenhouse gas emissions, and half of that is for electricity production. The other half of our greenhouse gas emissions is the result of land clearance.

Energy generation falls into four categories. In addition to fossil fuel and nuclear, there is the ‘solar’ sector and ‘other’. The latter includes tidal and geothermal. In general these are very restricted in location, and tidal can be environmentally destructive, damaging or destroying sensitive coastlines, as it would in the Kimberley region of Australia.

This leaves solar, which includes, wind, hydro, waves and ocean thermal. Wave power is not practical on a large scale, ocean thermal would have to be massive in scale and is in the wrong place. Hydro and wind power are the only good sources of indirect solar energy, but hydro can have high environmental costs (cf. Lake Pedder and China’s Three Gorges Dams). Wind is very efficient. The energy pay back time for the construction of wind generators is less than a year. They also provide the largest return by area of alienated land, far, far better than coal or nuclear, as farm animals can graze very comfortably amongst the wind mills. Some people think there is an aesthetic problem, but others do not agree.

Australia has very suitable areas for wind generation around the southern coast: wind speeds are generally higher on the coast, or off shore areas. This is important because as wind speed doubles, energy output is cubed. New Zealand is particularly suited to wind generation, but Australia is far better for it than Europe though some European countries are investing heavily in wind power. Scotland would be the best site for wind power in Europe.

For sunshine-blessed Australia direct solar energy should be the obvious electricity choice. Solar input occurs all over the continent. At present solar electricity can compete with high priced diesel generation in outback areas. The energy pay back time for photovoltaic cells is less than two years now.

There are two major solar energy research teams working in Australia to provide cheaper and more efficient technologies. A group of about sixty people is led by Martin Green at the University of NSW. Blaker’s own team at the ANU has forty plus workers divided into a Photovoltaic (PV) group and a Solar Thermal one.

Unfortunately the Government is taking little interest in solar energy and does not fund research. Money from the Greenhouse Office is only for commercialisation of products, research has to be funded by commercial interests, which is the reverse of former practices. Fortunately the company Origin Energy has a very enlightened management which funds research. Indeed Origin Energy is a good choice for ethical investment in the energy sector.

The ANU has the world’s biggest dish for solar thermochemical energy production and storage utilising ammonia disassociation and heat exchangers. Work is also progressing on Phase Change machines utilising the latent heat involved in phase changes.

Photovoltaic researchers are delighted to be seeing an exponential rise in the production of PV cells. Extrapolating from current rates we could see the whole surface of the earth covered with PV cells within 50 years. (That should please growth addicts!)

Current growth is partly due to the policies of governments in Germany and Japan, which, despite their unfavourable locations, are pushing PV installations on roofs. In Australia we could supply all the electricity we use by covering half of our roofs with PV cells.

The ANU PV team is working with BP Solar on microcrystalline silicon cells, and with Origin Energy on the Epilift process, which is reducing the amount of silicon in silicon wafers, and therefore their cost. Along with those reductions there will be a big increase in efficiency.

The team has also developed trough concentrators, using the mirror-lined insides of a trough to focus sunlight on PV cells along the focal axis of the trough. The mirrors track the sun all day, so collect maximum sunlight. Far fewer cells are needed, so the cells can be more expensive and more efficient.

On their roof at ANU, the team has installed a combined heat and power system (CHAPS), which again tracks the sun. It produces both hot water and electricity, giving a remarkable efficiency of 70 per cent. Because the hot water surface is much smaller than in existing systems, there is little heat loss. There are plans for a long trough CHAPS on the roof of Bruce Hall at ANU.

Despite the ongoing struggle to get research funding Andrew’s talk was remarkably positive. Industry is being helpful. Governments are tending to include PV systems in aid packages to less developed countries. Surely we in Australia could encourage governments to take solar energy seriously.

Linking the Market to Sustainable Development - the Contribution of Ecolabelling

Petar Johnson

Primary to the causes of ongoing environmental degradation are the results of market operations. Specifically the production and material characteristics of products sold on the market, how they are consumed and how they are disposed. The product life cycle within Australia for many modern products has resulted in the now well established term “the throw away society”. Sustainable consumption is the term accepted by the United Nations and many governments as a policy aim underpinning many different environmental program efforts. There is now a “sustainable consumption” program by the United Nations Environment Program. Related approaches have been the arrival of a number of other concepts including Factor 4, Factor 10 and Factor 20 each arguing that sustainable consumption requires a reduction of social metabolism of our natural environment through the economy to one quarter, one tenth or correspondingly one twentieth.

Efforts to date to facilitate this type of reduction can only be classed as emerging and in trial stages within different sectors of the Australian economy. There are now a number of scientific approaches to delivering reductions in the environmental impacts of the product life cycle. These are generally known under a number of terms:

Cleaner Production - more energy efficient and less polluting production processes;
Design for Environment - a methodology used for designing products in such a way that they perform their intended function with minimal environmental impact and includes approaches such as the use of recycled materials, less use of materials, servicisation and longer life;
Life Cycle Analysis - a scientific approach to tracking the environmental loads of each stage of the product life cycle with precision and converting these impacts to actual loads such as biodiversity, air pollution, water pollution.
Eco-Efficiency - A general term for all of the above and anything else that has the effect of more efficiently using the environment along the product life cycle.
Product Stewardship – A management approach to the environmental and community costs of the product life cycle whereby the manufacturer of the product ensures that the products environmental and community loads are effectively ameliorated by redesigning the life cycle and/or paying for rehabilitation, waste management or community costs. It is a very broad term and can be used for anything from the massive payouts by tobacco companies to governments due to the health costs their products result onto the community to companies planting trees as a way of compensating for their greenhouse gas emissions.

A recent study completed by Environment Australia showed that the financial subsidy from the community in both financial and environmental terms amounted to over $500 million per year to the electrical and electronic appliance industry by considering only the cost to the community in disposing of this equipment, greenhouse gas emissions from the use of appliances, and some limited costings of toxicological releases from the waste. It is little recognised in Australia that similar products or product services can have very different effects on the environment depending upon how their life cycle is managed.

The value of a product life cycle environmental labelling scheme is that it allows consumers of products sold on the market to differentiate between the dirty and environmentally damaging products and those developed as greener products which should have a significantly lower environmental impact.

The International Standards Organisations has developed a standard to guide environmental labelling programs classified as ISO 14 024. The standard is a useful guide to ensure credibility, transparency and due rigor in the operation of a program. The Australian Environmental Labelling Association Inc has committed itself to delivering a national full product life ecolabelling program for Australia in general conformance to this standard. The organisation is pleased to announce that it has now issued three voluntary environmental labelling standards for adhesives, recycled plastic and recycled rubber products. The organisation is seeking expressions of interest from environmental professionals to contribute to the work program of this non-profit Canberra based organisation.

Lessons from Malawi

“The people with the problem are the people with the solution” - Miles Horton, Highlander Center

Malawi is often described as a poor country and it is common to read in the introduction to any report on Malawi that: “Malawi is one of Africa’s poorest countries. The most recent poverty analysis of Malawi suggests that 65% of the population is poor.” Even a recent article in the Nature & Society journal (Oct/Nov 2001) titled ‘People, Planet and Debt’ had an accompanying commentary which ended by pointing to ‘desperately poor nations such as Sub-Saharan Africa’. The authors rightfully pointed to the many destructive aspects of the loan systems such as those that the IMF and World Bank are providing to governments, and I agree it is the heavy focus on money which is causing many of our current problems, but I don’t agree that Malawi is desperately or ‘woefully’ poor. Most people in Malawi didn’t think they were poor until foreigners came here and told them they were. Prior to the arrival of the foreigners, communities used what they needed from the environment and traded what they had with other communities who had different things or different skills.

The poverty label that the ‘developed’ world has placed on the ‘developing’ nations is extremely detrimental to the self-sufficiency that could be taking place if solutions, not problems were the focus. One of the biggest barriers I’ve seen to improving lives is a focus on what is not available, instead of what is available. This is putting so much focus on income and money that the non-cost resources right around us are overlooked, in fact they are even destroyed in the name of making money instead of being protected and utilized in the name of health & prosperity! This is not to say that money has no importance within most societies around the world, as today many bartering systems have been replaced with a monetary system of exchange. But the financial cost of living varies greatly in each area of the world and in many of the developing nations the financial cost of living is often very low – and in some areas it is non-existent.

A large part of my work with nutrition and HIV has focused on dispelling the recent myth of poverty in Malawi and reminding people of the wealth of resources in Malawi that can supply everything we need. It involves an exciting way of thinking that reverses the negative, problem-oriented view of looking at what we don’t have to a more positive, solution-oriented view of looking at what we do have, and how those resources can be utilized to meet our needs. With this focus, a new set of eyes, and creativity, riches are suddenly seen everywhere. It isn’t a skill that develops overnight, but the more it develops and the more we learn, the more riches can be found. Once we are making the most out of all of our resources and are fulfilling our basic needs, then we can branch out more and more to identify other opportunities to improve our community’s well-being and to teach others to do the same.

Health

Many development organizations focus on improving health of populations and collectively spend millions of dollars on importing medicines, health care systems, training, food aid, nutrient supplements & fortification, etc. But inside each of our bodies we have a free built-in health system to defend us from diseases that try to enter and to heal us from the ones which do make it in; this system is the immune system. People and communities with strong immune systems are able to prevent and fight many of the diseases which can afflict weaker bodies. To work properly, the immune system must have the nutrients it needs to fight, in addition to other factors like rest. In order to improve nutrition, we have to provide the body with a variety of different foods. But the food that people eat is only as healthy as the soil that it is grown in and, just like humans, the soil becomes unhealthy if it is ‘eating’ only one type of food. The soil needs a wide variety of organic matter returning to it to get all of the nutrients that it needs. This variety of organic matter can only be obtained when people are planting and growing many different things—not just one or two. As the soil improves and the organic matter is present, it also helps to allow water to sink into the ground. Water is filtered as it passes through the different layers of the earth, so that by the time it reaches our drinking water it should be free from bacteria and other things that cause illnesses. We refer to these connections as ‘The Cycle of Better Living”:
• when we have healthy soil through having a variety of plants and animals,
• it gives us healthier food and clean drinking water;
• healthier food and water give us better nutrition;
• better nutrition helps to strengthen our immune systems;
• when our immune systems are strong it helps to protect us from disease and stay healthy.

What do we have to do to improve nutrition?

Food security is generally measured by the amount of a few staple crops (often only one grain) that are available to meet a population’s calorie needs. This is unfortunate as this says nothing for nutrition security, which depends on a variety of different foods from several food groups in order to meet calorie needs. The emphasis that is placed on increasing the yields of one staple crop often results in: a diet that is low in nutrients; soil infertility; high chemical & labor input farming; higher risk of crop failures from weather, diseases and insects; destruction of natural areas for crop expansion; decreasing & contaminated water supplies; increased food aid, supplementation and fortification; and time-consuming, expensive research into problems, such as genetic engineering.

In Malawi the emphasis for about the last 50 years has been on maize, a crop which is not even native to the culture. Before maize, Malawi’s environment and diet revolved around a wide variety of local fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, millets, sorghums, roots, and various animal foods. Although many of these foods are still available, they are vanishing quickly because of the push to supply maize year-round either by forcing the land to produce it or by bringing in maize aid when the environment is unable to meet our maize demands. Maize is not the only culprit, people are becoming more interested in obtaining the foods of the west than in giving attention to the abundance of foods right around them. Expatriates who come in to ‘help’ often never take the time to learn about these valuable food resources that are already here. These local foods that are being crowded out by maize and western foods are often higher in nutrients than western foods, are available with no work or money, and are delicious! There are over 500 foods available in Malawi that are able to meet all the nutritional needs of people living here and we are trying to revive the knowledge and use of these plants as part of the diet. Even food aid and nutrition supplement programs can be provided in the form of local resources instead of focusing on the intake of one or two items. In Malawi it is feasible to provide calories in the form of local pumpkins, gourds, beans, nuts, seeds, insects, fruits, roots, etc. as part of an aid package when disaster interferes with the food supply, and micronutrient sources are in abundance through local fruits and vegetables. By including a wide variety of foods in our environment we can have better food & nutrition security, in addition to healthy soil, plants and animals.

What about disease treatment?

With the current health system, there is a lot of emphasis on medical treatments which are imported into developing nations instead of focusing on the supplies which are already available in country. Medicinal treatments have been a part of the Malawian culture for centuries, and there is a lot of accurate and inaccurate information about the cause and treatments of diseases. Around the world more people are taking heed of this knowledge, including in Malawi, to identify the accurate treatments and to promote them as part of treating diseases or symptoms. In some places, traditional and non-traditional systems are coming together to share expertise, such as western clinics offering herbal remedies or supporting traditional healers in disease identification, and traditional healers are coming together to form associations for advocacy and research documentation. Development programs can come together with each other to focus on local knowledge and assist to document & promote local medicine resources, then assist in the logistics of making them available in a safe manner to wider audiences.

What have we done?

We have been collecting plants, learning about them, sharing the seeds, teaching about their importance in nutrition and the environment, using them in our own meals, and encouraging their use for anyone living in Malawi – but not as a job, as our life! In our first two years here we established over 100 different local foods in one small half-acre plot, in addition to other plants that can be used for fuels, medicines, and building materials. Each year we have been able to add to our collection and knowledge and to establish a few more things. As of last year, we had about 150 different foods in the yard, along with numerous medicines and other supplies. We are in the process of adding up the figures for this year’s yields. The yields from this system are continuous (unlike a monocropped system with yields once a year), and our yields are also increasing every year as new trees reach maturity and more of the soil is improved to support more life.
Many places in Malawi are now establishing similar permanent gardens utilizing the principles of a way of living known as Permaculture (coined from “permanent culture or agriculture”), and taking advantage of the riches which we have here. People are utilizing grey water from washing clothes, dishes, or bathing; using water at the end of wells where water often sits in a large puddle; putting organic matter to use instead of burning it; reducing the amount of clearing that is done; observing what nature has to offer and using it wisely; and incorporating local varieties of foods and medicines along with the conventional system that is in place. Everyone is the target audience for this way of thinking and people from all walks of life in Malawi have grasped the ideas and understood the importance of using what we have available around us to the fullest potential - individuals, government ministers, business people, health centres, nutrition rehabilitation units, people living with HIV/AIDS, schools, expatriates, locals, wildlife & environmental organizations – and the list goes on.

We all have a part to play in improving the world and our thoughts, words and actions can have a lot of impact on the world around us. If we each begin thinking about local solutions to problems, and teach others to do the same, we can all make this world a much better place.

Stacia Nordin, RD
HIV/AIDS Crisis Corps Coordinator
PO Box 208, Lilongwe, Malawi, Africa
nordin@eomw.net

What Canberra Needs to Do to Become Sustainable

Janis Birkeland and John Schooneveldt, members of Nature and Society Forum’s Sustainability Science Team, spoke on the work they are doing for the ACT Government’s Planning and Land Management (PALM) at the February Meeting.

The ACT Government, like all governments in Australia, has a commitment to “sustainable development” but is having difficulty (which they would never admit) in translating this commitment into appropriate policies and action. Nature and Society Forum was commissioned by PALM to look specifically at a technique known as “materials flows analysis” (MFA) and what it can do to assist urban planners in making the built environment more ecologically sustainable.

Janis and John illustrated their talk with a power point presentation that Janis uses in her teaching. The result of their work was to propose three criteria/indicators which are both design criteria (ie future-looking decision making tools) and performance indicators (ie past assessment/ research tools). Combining these two conceptually different ideas into a single tool is a novel feature of their approach.

The three criteria/indicators are:

Resource autonomy: where individual buildings (or small clusters of them) are designed to be self sufficient in temperature maintenance, air quality, ventilation, rainwater, lighting and energy requirements and general operational performance.

Material renewability/reusability: where only materials are used that are reusable or renewable, but not recyclable (recycling involves reprocessing and high embodied energy).

Ecosystem services maintenance: where the building and its immediate surrounds are designed to maintain the same level of ecosystem services after development as was available before development. This might involve restricting the building’s footprint and other impervious surfaces, including roof top and/or balcony gardens, conservatories and other plantings or combinations of these. Where this is not possible on a specific site, additional rates should be paid to meet the cost of providing the equivalent level of eco-system services elsewhere.

More work is needed on ways of applying these criteria/indicators in practice, but Janis and John argued that they were a start and if implemented fully would ensure the sustainability of the built environment as such. It would not address the unsustainable things some people choose to carry on within that sustainable infrastructure, but that is a topic for another occasion.

Going for Zero - The Majors Creek Music Festival

Gerry Gillespie, President Canberra and South East Region Environment Centre

Majors Creek is a small former gold mining community located on the very edge of the escarpment south of Braidwood in NSW. Every year the community holds “Music at the Creek”, a music festival which attracts an audience from the surrounding community of Braidwood in Tallaganda Shire, the adjacent Canberra region and a legion of festival followers from all over Australia.

This years the organisers of the event decided to attempt something which had never been achieved before – they were attempting to have no waste go to landfill. The outcome? They achieved it. During this year's annual Majors Creek Music Festival, not one piece of waste went to landfill. All recyclable materials produced at the event were sent off to recycling markets, all food waste and packaging was placed in a windrow to be composted and used around trees in the town's recreation grounds, and the remaining mixed plastics and foils were used as aggregate in a concrete slab in a wet area, outside the hall.

The festival attendance this year was around 4,000 with approximately 3,000 people camping on the site. Campers were provided with a small bin for their organic waste which was taken after meals to larger bins placed around the site.

The express purpose was to demonstrate that achieving a Zero Waste target at such an event was achievable. Zero Waste to Landfill can be achieved at any event through the modification of a basic system that caters for all waste materials, despite the fact that differences exist between the various factors in effect at any given event. There may be a need to change packaging, information, processing and handling to suit the event but the principal change needs to occur in the minds of those conducting the event. The creation of a Zero Waste to Landfill event required all those involved to stretch both their abilities and imaginations to achieve the desired outcome.

Research showed that notable levels of recycling have been achieved at previous public events. It was also found that at some events in other areas, in order to attend the event, organisers required stallholders to use only recyclable products as packaging for their foods and beverages.

This had not been the case previously at Majors Creek Festivals, so a considerable mind shift was required of the organisers, the recyclers, the stallholders and all in attendance to deliver the desired outcome.

In addition to making this year’s “Music at the Creek” a Zero Waste to Landfill event, Resource NSW, who managed the Zero Waste system, also wanted to create a rural model, packaged so as to be readily transferred to any similar event in the area. To do this required accurate recording of all the positive and negative outcomes and the development of a full equipment ‘kit’. It was important to identify any potential or transferable faults and their potential to sidetrack any future application of the ‘kit’ as it moved from community to community.

The next event ‘going for zero’ will be the Cobargo Music Festival to be held February, then the Braidwood Show, the Back to Earth Fair in Cooma and the National Folk Festival in Canberra.

With the correct sponsor for the Recycling Lids used for collection of materials, going for zero may well become the norm at public events.

Editor's note: Now the National Folk Festival is over, The Canberra Times reported (1/4/02) that the amount of material sent for recycling this year was about double the nine tonnes recycled last year.

Nature & Society - June 2002

roba — Thu, 24 May 2012 16:17:37 +1000

Editorial

This issue of Nature and Society celebrates the tenth anniversary of the incorporation of the Nature and Society Forum. So how are we getting on? Some critics claim that NSF is simply a group of well-intentioned people, who like to talk about issues but do nothing. There is a little truth in this, but indeed we do do more.

From the beginning there have been divergent views amongst members as to the relative value of actions and words. This is natural and healthy; it reflects the wide range inherent in a human population. Without the thinking and talking we would not be human. After all most of life is involved with being whatever the organism is, doing whatever is necessary to be that organism, in that particular niche. It is only with humans that reflecting on what they have done, or thinking about what they will do, has been vitally important. This ability has put humankind into an immensely powerful position, in which our actions impinge on everything else on the globe. And it is because too many people do not think enough about what they do - or, from an environmental point of view, do not think enough about matters beyond their own immediate comfort, and give no thought to connections - that the world is in such a pickle.

The Nature and Society Forum was established to make people more conscious of the links between the health and happiness of the environment and the health and happiness of humans. From the beginning some members thought it was more important to change people’s behaviour than to talk about it, for instance the way they deal with rubbish, or how they travel. This practical approach made one member organise a bike parking area at an environmental fair, to try to winkle people out of their cars. Another practical effort was to provide reusable plastic plates and mugs for sale at the National Folk Festival, plus a washing up place, to encourage festival goers to turn away from throw-aways. After a couple of years, this approach was changed to getting the festival to purchase a large number of crockery and plastic mugs, and to provide a washing up service, hiring out the mugs to stall holders. At the same time recycling services were organised for paper, glass, cans and compost. This all worked, most stall holders cooperated, but of course it was really hard work.

Nevertheless a seed had been sown, and the washing up service continued after the NSF organisers pulled out. It is very heartening to know that a much bigger effort is now being made to introduce No Waste to Landfill festivals. There is still a long way to go, as you will see from Gerry Gillespie’s report in this issue. This is what you would expect when you see what the general public does, even with the household rubbish and recycling bins that have been standard in the ACT for years. Many householders do not use their bins properly, and some do not even understand that overfull bins are difficult or impossible for the collecting trucks to manage.
This brings us back to education and understanding. The main thrust of NSF activities has been to educate through discussion, courses, conferences and publications, with a trial run on providing speakers on energy conservation to other community groups.

In addition there is a strong group working to establish a National Biocentre, an actual physical place where this type of education could continue, but with an emphasis on displays and practical demonstrations. The aim is to show people the links between humans and the rest of nature, along with practical things individuals and businesses can do to green their lifestyle, reducing their harmful effects on the environment.
On looking at human impact on the earth, it is obvious that one of our major impacts is our built environment. Someone pointed out that for most humans our preferred habitat is cleared land. We could add, cleared land with human structures built on it. So one of our best moves would be to improve the built environment by making it use less in the way of natural resources. To this end NSF has entered dialogue with builders and the housing industry. In fact it is becoming obvious that one of the best ways to achieve anything like sustainability is to work with the people who make and build things. This does not remove the need to continue trying to get everyone else to understand the connections. Just as everyone needs more knowledge to make recycling work, so too does it take knowledge and will to live properly in a solar efficient house. A passive solar house needs an active occupant!

Humans are a funny lot, with myriad vices and virtues. No one is wholly wise or totally stupid, and all are different, There is no one way to educate everyone, no one way to change behaviour. We have to try all manner of approaches; practical actions, theory and discussion. We need displays, videos, books, radio, meetings, humour and drama. We need to lead by personal example.

Trying to get people to see and understand connections is of prime importance. When you can see links everywhere it is hard to believe they are not obvious to everyone else. When you know a debate is raging about genetic modification of crops it is a shock to find that many people are barely aware of it, or think it only matters if crops are for food. When you are painfully aware of the wide range of effects of climate change, it beggars belief to find that others think it only means they’ll have warmer winters. Or that they do not understand that their own life styles are contributing to climate change. This is why every possible approach to environmental education has to be tried.

Action-oriented environmental organisations need their theoretical and educational side. Theoretical concerns need to show practical possibilities for the future. From the Wilderness Society, to the Master Plumbers’ association, to large corporations, to political parties, all have a part to play. NSF is in there, doing its bit.

Forthcoming NSF meetings

17 July

A response to health inequalities - The Peoples Health Movement and a Peoples Health Charter — Prue Borrman, Coordinator, Health Care Consumers Association ACT

My talk will discuss the vision of the movement , begun in Savar Bangladesh in December 2000. I will talk about the impulse behind the movement, what happened at the Assembly and how it continues. I would like to explore with those present ways of working toward this vision using the charter and the idea of People Health Movement circles to share information and to support the basic ideas expressed in the Charter.
Vision
Equity, ecologically-sustainable development and peace are at the heart of our vision of a better world - a world in which a healthy life for all is a reality; a world that respects, appreciates and celebrates all life and diversity; a world that enables the flowering of people's talents and abilities to enrich each other; a world in which people’s voices guide the decisions that shape our lives. There are more than enough resources to go around.
The Peoples Health Movement is a broad movement encompassing grass roots, academic, research and campaign groups across a range of areas. e.g Dag Hammersskjold Foundation, Physicians for Social Responsibility, Consumer International, Health Action International. I work for a grass roots health consumer organisation. I attended the first Peoples Health Assembly in Bangladesh in 2000.

21 August

The Double-Edged Sword - Interactions of nature and society in response to serrated tussock in Monaro
— Alice Thompson

This presentation is based on a study examining nature and society interactions in Monaro, South-east NSW, in response to the introduction and spread of the pasture weed Serrated Tussock (Nasella trichotoma). Serrated tussock is considered to be amongst the most important weed species in Monaro, providing a significant threat to the social, economic and ecological sustainability of many landholders throughout the region, and grazing properties of South-east NSW.

On a local scale, this presentation will explore broader patterns of change over time, in the context of the biophysical, social and institutional settings of the Anembo/Jerangle region, using serrated tussock as an indicator. The relative nature, timing and scale of these changes will be discussed, in order to gain an understanding of the complex interplay of human and environmental factors leading to the spread of serrated tussock, and subsequent difficulties faced by many landholders in managing the weed. Through taking an historical and integrated perspective, this study, and presentation, provides insights into the conditions where the control of serrated tussock is possible.

18 September

NSF AGM

16 October

Report on World Summit on Sustainable Development

Interview with Stephen Boyden

Daniel Connell, former Social History Unit journalist with the ABC, talked with Stephen Boyden about his past and present roles in Nature and Society Forum

Daniel:
How was the Nature and Society Forum established? What were the circumstances that caused it to come together?

Stephen:
It all goes back to around the middle of 1991, when a small group of us got together to talk about some common interests. We found we shared the view that there is an urgent need for better understanding, throughout the community, of the processes of life, the human place in nature and the ecological and health issues facing our society today. We believed that understanding of this kind is an essential prerequisite for our society’s transition to ecological sustainability.

We recognised that there had been some improvement in the situation in recent times. There had certainly been an increase in environmental awareness in some sections of the community. But we also recognised that, as far as the community as a whole is concerned, this learning process had a long way to go - it was in need of a big boost.

Existing institutions universities, schools, the media and so on were not achieving this necessary surge in new understanding. So we felt there was a need to introduce a new element into the system a new kind of community-based organisation which would focus on life and the health of people and the natural environment, and which would provide a framework for interested people to come together, learn, discuss and debate the practical meaning of what they learn, and pass on what they have learned to others. Since no such organisation existed in our society, we decided to get one going – and after a lot of discussion we decided to call it the Nature and Society Forum – perhaps a bit of an awkward name, but it well described what we had in mind. It’s about nature, its about society and it is a forum for learning, debating and communicating.

Daniel:
One of the projects I understand you are involved with is the Australian National Biocentre. Now what is that and how is that different from some of the other national projects that we have got around Canberra?

Stephen:
I can best begin answering that by saying a little bit about the background to the Biocentre proposal. A few years ago, the Management Committee of the Nature and Society Forum decided it was time to undertake an exercise in self-examination – an assessment of the Forum’s performance, in terms of our original aims and objectives. A working group was therefore set up to do this. This group met over several weeks, and it came up with certain conclusions. One was that, while what NSF had been doing over the years was entirely consistent with its aims and objectives (that is, of improving our own understanding, and the understanding of others, of ecological and health issues), it was having no real impact on the system as a whole.

So we had to ask ourselves whether it was worth going on whether we should close down, because we were not really achieving what we set out to achieve. The group eventually decided to recommend that the Forum does continue to operate, but that it should find ways of improving its performance. It suggested that NSF could better achieve its aims and objectives of communicating this understanding to the public at large if its activities were based on what we came to call a ‘Biocentre’ that is, a place a series of buildings and some land somewhere in the ACT a physical entity which the public could identify with our theme, or slogan Healthy people on a healthy planet.

It would be a place where the NSF activities, like interactive courses, workshops, conferences, the preparation of publications and the managing of the website - a place where these activities could take place, probably more systematically and on a larger scale than at present. But it would also be a place open to the public where there would be displays and exhibitions on important and interesting ecological and health issues and themes. That was the origin of the proposal for the National Biocentre.

The working group also decided to recommend that we incorporate another proposal in the Biocentre project. At that time there was also a group in the ACT which called themselves the Australian Centre for Ecologically Sustainable Systems. Some of the members of this group were also members of NSF. They had put together a proposal for a centre where community groups - say permaculture groups, organic farming groups, as well as commercial business organizations, could showcase the various ecologically beneficial techniques or technologies that they had developed. Success stories, if you like. It would be a vehicle for encouraging industries and businesses with ecologically sustainable products to showcase them, and these demonstrations would serve as an effective marketing tool for the businesses concerned.

So NSF eventually decided to propose the establishment of a Biocentre incorporating both the education or learning component of the NSF, including courses, conferences and educational displays on important ecological and health themes, and the showcasing of ecologically beneficial technologies.

You asked how the ANB differs from certain existing organizations in ACT, such as the National Science and Technology Centre and the National Museum. In fact, the Biocentre is very different in important ways, from any existing institution in our society.

First, there is the very fact that it will focus on the processes of life and health of people and the natural environment. We have no major national institutions for the public with this orientation despite the fact that everything that goes on in society is entirely dependent on the health of these underlying processes of life.

Second, the Biocentre is different from most other institutions for the public in its emphasis on learning and thinking– and then on linking this with practice. It is also different in its emphasis on both the past and the future – asking the questions: Where have we come from? Where do we seem to be going? Where do we want to go? How do we get there?

Another difference is the involvement of the business sector, reflecting appreciation of the key role it will be playing in the transition to ecological sustainability. In fact, we see the Biocentre as providing a new framework for constructive collaboration, in the environment and health arena, between community groups, scientific and professional bodies, businesses, schools, government departments and other organizations.

And, at least as I see it, the ANB, unlike the other institutions, but like NSF, it will be characterised by a great deal of active community involvement, and it will encourage musical events, artistic displays, theatrical performances, photographic exhibitions and other activities that are in keeping with its aims and philosophy.

We believe that the Biocentre will fill a serious gap in the institutional structure of society, and that it will make an important contribution to the achievement of ecological sustainability.

Daniel:
Given the things you have been talking about, there are a number of major themes that I think are coming out. What, for you, are the key ideas that you think we should be thinking about as we think about the general very daunting challenge of how do we achieve sustainability?

Stephen:
In trying to answer that question I must go back to some things I said at the beginning of our discussion.

My work over the years has led me to appreciate the extraordinary power of human culture as a force in the biosphere. It can, of course, have some very desirable consequences. But often in the past it has also led to very undesirable situations. And I am convinced that there are aspects of our dominant culture today which are simply not consistent with the achievement of ecological sustainability. In other words, we are not going to achieve ecological sustainability until the dominant culture changes in a fairly significant way in terms of its world view, its assumptions and its priorities. And this of course, is a very serious matter, because if a society is not sustainable ecologically, it can’t be sustainable in any other way.

So, I am convinced the deficiencies, or weaknesses, of our dominant culture lie at the root of the ecological predicament, and until they are overcome, or corrected, there is little likelihood of a healthy and prosperous future for our society.

Now this is a key issue, but it is a difficult one to talk about publicly. I don’t think one will achieve anything by standing up in society and saying the dominant culture is all wrong, by telling people that their behaviours, or their values, are inappropriate.

The only hope, I believe, lies in the improvement in understanding – right across the community – of the human place in the living world – so that, on the basis of this understanding, people decide for themselves whether their world view, assumptions and priorities are appropriate.
I believe this is by far the most urgent issue at the present time. And this is where I see NSF’s and ANB’s biggest potential contribution – to play a catalytic role, in promoting /encouraging a snowballing growth in what I call ‘biounderstanding’, leading, hopefully, to changes in the dominant culture, and so to changes in patterns of human activity

To sum up: I am a moderate optimist, in that I think a transition to ecological sustainability is possible. It is within our capabilities to make this shift given the motivation. But this motivation will not come about until there is a big change in the dominant culture. And this, in turn, will not happen until there is much better understanding in all sections of society, of the human place in the living world.

NSF people

First there was Stephen Boyden, passionate about getting people to understand their place in nature, their ecology, and to get them to respect the whole of nature and live in peace with it.

Then there were numerous other people, keen to spread that message. Any attempt to enumerate them is bound to have omissions; I am not going to try to mention them all. Some I particularly remember are Robyn Manley, keen to use her artistic talents and Stephanie Williams who put her editorial skills to work. Kate Mossop enlivened the newsletter/journal with her delightful sketches for several years. Phillida Hartley was strong on practical, on the ground projects and leading by example. Marie Jamieson brought forward her empathy and community health skills.
Henry Leveson-Gower kept our financial system in order for several years. Gösta Lyngå helped in many ways and still does. He is about to represent NSF at the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg. I, in particular, have reason to thank him for his willingness and skill in keying my handwritten work for the journal. Speaking of which, Peter Farrelly gave much time and expertise to computer work and layout of magazines, papers and newsletters.

Bryan Furnass has had ideas that he turned into conferences and resultant publications. Derek Wrigley has spent much effort and thought on design, on living sustainably, on campaigns to encourage sustainability and on suggesting interesting speakers for our meetings. John Schoonevelt has held many roles, and originated various ambitious schemes, some of which are now reaching fruition.

Some of these people have since left Canberra and we have lost touch. Some have left Canberra but remain members, more or less active. Others continue to be very active.

This list could go on and on. Indeed the amount of work done has been remarkable. There are many more people currently working on the Biocentre project, the Sustainability Science team, the Metabolism of Canberra and Region, the nomination of Canberra as a UNESCO world Biosphere Reserve. To name these people would make the list too long, but you can read about their work in this issue of Nature and Society.
A special mention should be made of our benefactor and patron, Frank Fenner. Both as Director of the John Curtin School of Medical Research and as foundation Director of the Centre for Resource and Environmental Studies at ANU, Frank was a colleague and supporter of Stephen Boyden’s ideas. He has been particularly active in the Biocentre project and has also given generous financial support to NSF, enabling us to employ our invaluable office manager, Sue Gilbert.

Oh, and a final mention of Robert MacArthur, early secretary of NSF, who said to me “I’ve joined an organisation that may interest you.” So, here I am. Thank you Robert for enabling me to fulfil the only ambition I ever had as a child, to be an essayist, and to spend a decade working with such an interesting bunch of people.¹
— Jenny Wanless

¹ And from Jenny Wanless we have got all those thought-provoking editorials, those “Farrago” snippets of relevant issues and numerous reports from meetings over the years. Thank you Jenny! (typist’s comment).

Education and the Australian National Biocentre

contributed by the ANB Education sub-committee

During 2001–2002, the ANB Education Committee developed a set of educational principles and inaugurated four programs demonstrating the principles: Canberra World Heritage Biosphere Reserve; the bioregion as an educational tool; the national environmental curriculum, and the Earth Charter Learning Exchange. Members have taken part in activities connected with Bushcare, the Murray Darling Basin Committee, the National State-of-the-Environment Report 2001, the Earth Charter, and the World Summit on Sustainable Development.

EDUCATION PRINCIPLES

Sharing the Journey: Australians’ Transition to Sustainability
To promote the ANB Vision of an 'equitable, healthy and sustainable world,' the ANB Education Committee has developed educational principles for everyone involved in ANB activities, as follows:
• Everyone is both a learner and a teacher - This is about sharing in the learning process, and respecting all knowledges. It allows for valuing local knowledge, as well as specialist knowledge.
• Education means sharing power - Participatory learning involves mutual respect for each other’s learning, exchanging stories, working together on a project, listening to each other, and enjoying the learning.
• Education brings social change and transforms understanding of the world - To make the transition to more ecologically sustainable living, people and their communities can share their knowledge of what works, and what are practical social changes. The ANB can give support and resources to enable the exchange of such learning.
• Learning brings personal growth and understanding of one’s potential in the world - The ANB can provide mentors, peer support and co-counselling networks, to value people’s capacities for imagination, creativity, courage and initiative in making changes for an ecologically sustainable world.
• Education takes place in a learning community which is inter-generational and inter-cultural, and integrates the perspectives of community, specialists, government and industry - In this global information era, we can construct knowledge by sharing local community experience with specialised knowledge from research, from professions and industry, and with the strategic processes of politics and administration.
By a more holistic focus, we can initiate more effective ways to a sustainable future.
• Co-learning generates new knowledge through: inspiration and adventure, passion and contemplation, thinking and doing, challenge and security.

EDUCATION CONTENT

Where are we going and how can we get there?
In sharing the journey, and exploring the options for advancing towards sustainable development, our building structures and educational programs are designed as successive interactive experiences along themes:
• Our only home: the Biohistory in each of us; evolution; the beauty and fragility of life. Who are we now?
• Where are we now? How did we get to here? Every ecological act has ecological consequences. Our place in the world: Bioregions and our identity; regional metabolism; Sustainabilty Science; Food, nutrition and disease. Healthy people and a healthy environment
• Where could we go? How low energy lifestyles work and are attractive. Solar technologies. Waste minimisation ideas. Sustainably built structures and designs. Fuel cell cars and eco-friendly transport.
• How can we get where we want to go? Fair go for future generations. Decision making for alternative futures; personal, communal, industrial, and governmental, sustainable practices.

EDUCATION PROJECTS

Canberra Biosphere Reserve proposal
Biosphere Reserves are internationally recognised UNESCO designated areas conserving ecosystems. Australia has 12 such Reserves, at present, and the NSF is proposing that Canberra be another Biosphere Reserve.

This is as a true Bush Capital, symbolising our country’s spirit, and based on biophysical attributes together with its links to the local community and the whole country. Also, its links through being the Capital of Australia to and from the World.
The idea is a synthesis of ecosystem, economics and society, providing for all sections of the community to play a role and take on-going responsibilities for more effective and integrated use of our existing environmental knowledges, and for creative problem solving.
The proposal is to shift perceptions about Canberra as much more than just a political capital, and as a Bush Capital it represents and honours our 'Spirit of Place' as a collective identity, and our heritage links to the Australian landscape. It can promote the connection of specialist knowledges with community knowledge and strengthen community engagement in making changes needed for a sustainable future.

Bioregions, our needs and our identity
Australia can be seen as a series of biogeographical regions, or bioregions, which can form a more meaningful way that people relate to, and understand, their particular place along with other living things. We all know that as humans, like other creatures, we need to breathe clean air, drink safe water, eat good food, be sheltered, and feel we belong.

Bioregions provide a way to focus on the characteristics of where we live, our home bases whether in towns and cities or country areas, valuing each unique environment for why we like living there, and knowing the stories of the places - ours, our families’, our friends' and our neighbours’ stories and those of our workplaces. They are where we earn a living and can look after each other. They are where we understand that we are in a changing universe, and live among generations of living things. By valuing the environment in which we live, we can take actions that are sustainable for a healthy future.

These concepts and the questions arising about concerns for a healthy future, are the basis for designing a Visitors Centre and a range of outreach activities around the country.

National Environmental Curriculum
The ANB Education committee has examined the relevance of the ANB Education policy to the National Curricula of Australia. In a prepared paper, we have shown the many important and relevant outcome statements for various key learning areas, like Studies of Society and Environment, Health, Technology (Design), Science, English, and the Arts. These statements are requirements for Australian Schools, and profile over the School Years Kinder to Year 12.

For example, the English and The Arts Curricula provide for the expression of values we hold about people and the environment. These can give powerful connections in their expression, and promote changes.

The Studies of Society and Environment Curriculum gives outcomes for skills in investigating, communicating and participating, as well as concepts which include natural and social systems, resources and place and space. Each of these has detailed statements for groups of years during Primary and Secondary Education. We are opening dialogue with environmental educational avenues to link ANB activities with educational innovation in Australian environmental education.

Earth Charter Learning Exchange
The Earth Charter Learning Exchange will have its inaugural node at the Australian National Biocentre, host to the Australian chapter of the Earth Charter. The Learning Exchange is designed to be a global on-line place-based network of learning communities supporting the educational elements of practical applications of the Earth Charter (eg change agencies, formal and informal courses, community development, advocacy, research applications, etc).

The project is based on the social learning processes of open space dialogue and inquiry-based adult learning, within a framework for action developed with Australian communities. The vehicle for communication is the interactive learning community software developed by EarthTIES, a non-profit organisation teaching a Master of Integrative Studies for Endicott College, Massachusetts.

The Earth Charter Learning Exchange will have the capacity to generate self-directed learning communities in every country working on the Earth Charter, to train their qualified volunteer tutors, and to monitor continuing commitment and quality control through a team networked through the contributing countries. The aim is for the ANB node to develop a prototype, for world-wide recruitment of groups who are willing to accept dialogue-based rules for engagement, are committed to self-generated activities which further the aims of the Earth Charter’s aims, and able to nominate a volunteer tutor willing to join the support network.

Biological treatment of waste water

Peter Young, managing director of Pryme Waste Water Treatment, was the speaker at our May discussion meeting. Like most of our speakers he came across as an energetic person dedicated to doing something positive for the environment. Peter’s concern is with waste water and its impact on natural landscapes. Of course he does not believe that any water is waste, but he is very conscious that too much water, or water carrying the wrong substances, can have deleterious effects on natural systems.

Some time ago Peter met an old bushman who showed him how nature purifies the water in a creek by the combination of plant growth, aeration and sunlight, as the creek flows over rocks or rests in pools. From there on Peter worked at developing a system that uses similar methods to clean up used water.

In Pryme’s system used water is collected in an influent tank, which feeds water into two trains of biological tubes. A variety of plants is massed, suspended in baskets in the tubes, and these plants harbour colonies of bacteria and algae which are the main purifiers of the water. These living systems need light, so the tubes are made of strong, transparent plastic held in wire frames. Aerators at the bottom provide air and ensure water circulation within each tube. Water at the top flows on through a pipe to the next tube. At the end of the train is a sand filter, a UV disinfection chamber and a sludge process chamber.

One advantage of this system is that a new train can be added if an extra capacity is needed later, so the whole cost does not need to be financed at the beginning. Another advantage of the system is that (without the use of chlorine) it can deliver a zero E coli count, as required by health authorities, something nature does not achieve.

The system has also proven its adaptability, coping with freezing water, and with very variable use. A Pryme treatment system was installed for the Tidbinbilla Visitors’ Centre three years ago. It functions well despite large visitor numbers at weekends, interspersed with almost no visitors during the week.

Water treatment plants have been or are being installed at a school and at a couple of rural residential developments near Canberra. Yanchep National Park in Western Australia is installing a system, and much further afield, the Chinese are interested.
The success of such biological waste water treatment depends to a certain extent on the education of the users. People must not pour hazardous chemicals into the system: they would kill the plants. They need to moderate their use of chemical cleaners, they need to learn what the system can and cannot do, they need to treat the system with respect. Then it will serve them well.

— Jenny Wanless

Science at the Shine Dome: transition to sustainability

symposium report by Bryan Furnass

In 1992 the Rio Conference on the Environment, and the birth of Nature and Society Forum exemplified increasing awareness at the global and community levels of the impact of human activities on the natural world. One decade later, a public symposium on Transition to Sustainability has been held at the Australian Academy of Science as a preliminary to the proposed Rio+10 conference in Johannesburg.

The Academy of Science has traditionally been mainly concerned with promoting the specialist disciplines of its membership. By way of contrast, this symposium recognised the urgent need to develop a trans-disciplinary approach between the bio-physical and social sciences if sustainability is to be achieved. This will require a ‘triple bottom line’ of trade-offs between the economy, society and the environment, with efficient governance to conserve non-renewable resources and minimise pollution.

Symposium contributors were drawn from disciplines in the biological, geophysical, environmental, engineering and social sciences and economics. The topics covered included social, environmental and economic aspects of sustainability, and integrated systems related to renewable energy and water supplies. Many of the problems which were cited are familiar to NSF members — fragile ecosystems, human population increase, resource inequalities, rising atmospheric CO2 levels (the highest for 20 million years), dry land salinity, precarious water supplies and loss of biodiversity, in Australia and globally.

Economic development has hitherto tended to ignore ‘externalities’ such as resource depletion, pollution, land and water degradation and particularly inter-generational inequities. There is a need to ‘internalise the externalities’ to achieve sustainability and equity for both the industrialised and developing world, yet ESD is not yet readily embraced either by government or industry. The Natural Step and other NGOs were cited as potential contributors to long term solutions.

There is no reliable energy supply for one third of the world’s population and oil supplies are expected to plateau in 10 years time. Yet electricity demand is predicted to rise by 50% by 2020, and greenhouse gas emissions continue to increase. Hence the urgent need for a partnership between science and industry to develop large-scale renewable energy systems with low carbon emissions. Solar energy, wind power, coal liquefaction, CO2 entrapment, a hybrid car using half the fuel and producing 10% of emissions of current vehicles, with the potential development of hydrogen/fuel cell cars, were envisaged as feasible alternatives to the present high carbon fuels.

Some small scale gains in human responses to the environmental crisis were reported. These included a rise in the whale population, improvement of city air quality following the introduction of lead-free petrol, reduction in use of CFCs, and a return of native species when cats and foxes are removed from the environment. But major global problems remain unresolved.

Although no long-term goals have been formulated, symposium contributors agreed that Australia has the intellectual and material capacity to become a world leader in the transition to sustainability, in parallel with the chance to develop new opportunities for business, employment and economic growth. Much will depend on community education in applied sustainability science, and promotion of the three Rs — 're-cycle, replace, refrain'. As NGOs, NSF and ANB could support the Academy of Science in these educational initiatives, following the dictum 'when people lead, their leaders follow'.

World Summit on Sustainable Development

At the end of August and early September, delegates from the whole world will meet at Johannesburg to discuss and hopefully agree on ways to make our civilisation and our planet more sustainable. This meeting comes 10 years after the Rio Conference, in which similar issues were discussed and some decisions made. According to most environmentalists the results of that conference did not meet expectations and the world is not in a better shape environmentally and socially now than before Rio.

Johannesburg will host two conferences, one intergovernmental and one of civil society, Aug 19–Sep 4. An NGO conference will be held, presumably as part of the civil society conference Aug 19–25.

The Intergovernmental Conference
From the Johannesburg intergovernmental conference there are three expected outcomes:
(1) political declarations from world leaders on principles
(2) intergovernmental programs of action; the draft of this part has been the focus of considerable activity
(3) voluntary agreements and partnerships, ie. coalitions of those countries and organisations that are willing to take part.

Outcomes (1) and (2) are of type I meaning that they may be carefully worded but they are binding on all parties. Outcomes (3) are of type II, ie. they can be quite far reaching and do not need negotiations but are only valid for the countries and organisations that are part of the agreements.

The issues singled out for priority attention have been:
• sustainable management of the oceans;
• national level governance; this deals with combating poverty, corruption and such issues; and
• sustainable land management

The Civil Society Conference
This conference is held simultaneously but at a different venue. Organisations accredited by the UN are entitled to send delegates. NSF has achieved accreditation as one of about 700 organisations, of which around a dozen are from Australia. It is expected that about 60,000 delegates will meet at this conference of civil societies from all over the world.

NSF being the Australian host of the Earth Charter, Brendan Mackey will be working towards its endorsement.

I have taken on to represent the Forum on three other issues:
• A treaty to protect and share the global water commons
• A treaty to share the genetic commons
• Eco-labelling

What actually will happen depends very much on the agenda which is still being set, but obviously the NGOs can only expect to be part of type II outcomes, ie. agreements that are voluntary and not binding on the governments. However, there is expected to be some degree of interaction between the two conferences, so that declarations from the civil society meetings would be presented at the intergovernmental conference.

It is a great opportunity for me to represent the Forum at this conference and I hope to be able to present my impressions from it at the monthly meeting of NSF on October 16th.
— Gösta Lyngå

Population policy

— John Schooneveldt

Nature & Society - August 2002

roba — Thu, 24 May 2012 16:17:37 +1000

Editorial
The Director of the Missouri Botanical Gardens, Peter Raven, has been described by Time magazine as a hero of our planet. His is one of the major faces in the public campaign to try to stop human actions from ruining the planet by causing loss of biodiversity, climate change and the various other ills we are inflicting on the Earth.

Despite the mischief our species is causing to the planet, and the threat we pose to the survival of our own and other species, Peter Raven is optimistic that we will come to our senses. He trusts that people will act in their own best interests and those of their descendants.

If this is to happen there will have to be a major change in our culture. We will have to stop acting for immediate gratification and take a longer term view. This is a lot to ask. Too many people see the best thing they can do for themselves and their family is to make a lot of money now. At least this is the impression given by much of the news. We are told that companies do this or that; sack workers, indulge in shady deals, falsify accounts or move offshore, because shareholders (not to mention directors) are demanding bigger dividends. Government too, seem to regard this year’s accounts as paramount. It has been sad to see governments sell off assets to make the current year’s accounts look good. It is amazing to see them sell buildings then lease them back, so that in tens year’s time all the profit will have gone and the rent will be a continuing cost to public resources. It is downright weird, given that private individuals are encouraged to see rent as money down the drain, whereas paying off a mortgage will give them their own capital asset.

In fact foresight seems a very rare commodity. Governments have supported land clearing and irrigation, both seen as forward thinking in earlier times but now known to cause salinisation which has cost and will cost us dearly. Governments encouraged tobacco growers; now individuals and the medical system are paying for it. Poor quality food and bad eating habits have been promoted by advertising campaigns but again the cost is to individuals and the health care system.

So much of what we have done in developing our economies has seemed far-sighted, but has in the not–so-long term turned out instead to be short-sighted. By the time the danger has become obvious it has been very hard to turn it around, there are too many vested interests, too much at stake, for the course to be changed. Water usage is a case in point at present. For a long time the answer to living in a dry land has been to build dams, but instead of saving that water for a drought, it has been used to its maximum capacity.
Governments have given away in entitlements to irrigators more water than actually exists. Now there is a major drought, the harm caused by salinisation is being recognised, and there is a push to restore environmental flows to rivers, but governments have a fight on their hands when they try to reduce entitlements to water.

The same problem is occurring in our use of fossil fuels. There unfortunately, sheer inertia, plus the claims of doom to our economy from the fossil fuel industries, combined with people’s love affair with their cars, seems to make it impossible for government to make the only rational choice and move into renewable energies in a big way.

So it is too, with the proponents of a larger population. Every few weeks, it seems, some prominent person says we must move to increase Australia’s birthrate. Any sane appraisal of the state of the world must see that growth in human numbers cannot continue forever. No growth can go on forever, and when it stops major dislocation, or worse, could be the result. However if it is recognised that growth must stop, then with careful planning the slow down and stopping can be made much smoother. There is no reason society cannot adjust to and benefit from a birthrate below replacement level. A low birthrate is inevitable if most of the population is to live to eighty years or so. A high birthrate is only compatible with a shorter life expectancy for everyone if our world is to stay habitable. Who will volunteer to drop dead at forty?

David Pimentel, another US scientist has been in Australia recently talking about the way we are stretching the Earth beyond its limits. He, too, declares that he is optimistic about humanity’s ability to solve the current crisis. Humans have, over and over again, shown themselves capable of rising to challenge and mobilising themselves to deal effectively with it. The trouble is that this time the challenge is ourselves, our own selfishness and acquisitiveness.

Yes, there are many things humans could do that would be in our own and our children’s and grandchildren’s best interests. We could cut our fossil fuel use to almost nothing, we could use our land and water in kinder, more sustainable ways. We could learn to live with a smaller population. To do these things we first have to recognise the problems and accept that these are necessary solutions that need to be adopted now. It is unkind, unjust and extremely short-sighted to let the problems go on growing and leave them to future generations to solve.

Forthcoming NSF meetings

21 August

The Double-Edged Sword - Interactions of nature and society in response to serrated tussock in Monaro
— Alice Thompson

This presentation is based on a study examining nature and society interactions in Monaro, South-east NSW, in response to the introduction and spread of the pasture weed Serrated Tussock (Nasella trichotoma). Serrated tussock is considered to be amongst the most important weed species in Monaro, providing a significant threat to the social, economic and ecological sustainability of many landholders throughout the region, and grazing properties of South-east NSW.

On a local scale, this presentation will explore broader patterns of change over time, in the context of the biophysical, social and institutional settings of the Anembo/Jerangle region, using serrated tussock as an indicator. The relative nature, timing and scale of these changes will be discussed, in order to gain an understanding of the complex interplay of human and environmental factors leading to the spread of serrated tussock, and subsequent difficulties faced by many landholders in managing the weed. Through taking an historical and integrated perspective, this study, and presentation, provides insights into the conditions where the control of serrated tussock is possible.

18 September

NSF AGM

This is to be held at 7.45 pm, at the NSF office.

16 October

Report on World Summit on Sustainable Development

20 November

The Printing Industry - Moving to Sustainability? - Barry Neane of the Printing Industries Association of Australia

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Developmental Health

One of the faces of medical scientists on a stamp issue early this year was that of Perth epidemiologist Fiona Stanley. In an interview on the National Interest (RN 27-1-02) she talked about a new association, the National Partnership for Developmental Health and Wellbeing, bringing together experts from a number of fields of interest. The partnership has arisen from a shared concern that a range of indicators have been negative over the last 30 years; child and youth health, educational outcomes, crime rates, unemployment, youth competencies, all have been getting worse.

Irrespective of how poverty and inequality are measured, there is an increase in all the poor outcomes in young people, and greater inequality in those outcomes. It is important to find a new way to make a difference, as it is expensive and ineffective to try to address these issues at the end of the pathway. Early intervention could solve the problems at source. It is now known that giving support during pregnancy, and improving birthweights can reduce the risk of depression and suicide later on. Good parenting in the first four years of life is crucial and so, too, is success at school. It is no good waiting until later to pick up the pieces.

The problem is worldwide. The Partnership will be a clearinghouse for successful interventions from all over the world, with the information available on their website.

What is community science?

Jenny Wanless reports on the NSF June discussion meeting featuring a talk by Anna Carr.

Anna Carr invited us to have a very interactive discussion on what community science is, and why we need it. She pointed out that community science is developing rapidly, but is loosely defined. It is the intersection and interaction of globalised institutional science and community based scientific knowledge systems which often monitor, model or measure local species or the state of the environment in a particular locality.

It can be a two-way process. Locals can monitor a perceived problem then invite agency scientists in to help, or agency scientists can enlist local groups. Locals can work to establish baseline information, measure the impact of human alteration to a system, or carry out long-term monitoring.

The direction of flow can make a difference to what is found out. When professional astronomers invite amateurs to help with data collection, the problem has been defined by the professionals and it is unlikely that anything unexpected will be found. When locals think something is happening in their backyard and set out to monitor it, they may find something quite unexpected. It is worth remembering that all science has its roots in community science in that naturalists started collecting for its own sake, or experimented, observed, wondered and theorised, which led to the scientific discoveries of the last four hundred years and the birth of what we know as science today.
So why do we still need it, when science has become professional and institutionalised? Anna and the meeting considered each of the words in the question “Why do we need community science?” (in reverse order). Scientific assessments are needed to provide the information on which to plan protective or remedial action. The process of investigation empowers the community scientists, many of whom are already ‘qualified by experience’, so they can act confidently and effectively. Also past data collections have been of great value in allowing modern comparisons, and current records need to be kept for future ones.

If we do not know what we have, we do not have a good idea of what we may be losing. It is important to have data, not just guess. Agency scientists rarely have the long-term resources to enable the careful monitoring locals can provide. With the recognition that more people covering a greater area allow for economies of scale, community science projects are increasing in both number and scope.
In general community science projects are viewed favourably - and so they should be. Valuable work is being done at very little cost to governments, and valuable solutions can be implemented. Nevertheless there are tensions and some professional scientists look down on community science as not being valid or valuable.

At this point in the discussion the Machiavellian analysis was made that the best way authorities could gain control of science was to starve institutional science of funds for anything other than priority projects (which are likely to generate big profits). Leave all the monitoring and the ‘unwanted’ parts of science to the amateurs, then denigrate their efforts as unscientific. Unfortunately, of course, there are community science efforts that are of dubious quality. But much community science is valuable and indeed, vital, as governments seem less and less willing to fund curiousity-driven research, or even the absolutely essential work of entomologists, field botanists, taxonomists and other apparently humble and humdrum specialities.

Anna suggested that we should think of the practice of science as a golem, a two-faced powerful, mythical figure which is both biddable and clumsily dangerous. This she said is true of both official science and community science. It can be harnessed for specific purposes, but can be dangerous if not employed within certain political and social contexts. Scientists are not a breed apart, their knowledge is not immaculate and the expertise of the community in dealing with everyday life needs to be experienced in their relationship with the practice of science.
In conclusion, Anna suggested that NSF could have a role in explaining and educating both the public and agency scientists about golem-science. We should critically examine the conduct of science, what it is about and how it is practised. We should not parrot the content of science as it is promoted by powerful elites and professionals. As it so happens, I think that we already do query, rather than parrot - and we certainly try to see more than one side of science and always treat it with a good dose of commonsense.

The People's Health Charter

Jenny Wanless

Our guest speaker at the July meeting was Prue Borrman, coordinator of the ACT Health Care Consumers Association. She spoke of her attendance at the first People's Health Assembly, held in Bangladesh in 2000, an experience which she found very inspiring. Representatives from a thousand organisations from grassroots to national and international had come together 'to give a voice to the people and make their voices heard'. They drafted the People's Health Charter.

At the assembly they discussed the problems that are preventing a fair level of health care being available to everyone. The growing gaps between the wealthy and the poor, both within nations and between nations, result in extreme inequality in the provision of medical services. Many millions of people lack access to those basic essentials for health, clean water and adequate nutritious food.

The assembly followed from the declaration at the 1978 International Conference on Primary Health Care, held in Alma Ata, USSR in 1978, which had, optimistically, aimed for adequate health care for all within a few decades. Twenty years later many groups came together to organise the assembly, to try to move matters forward, to achieve the Alma-Ata goal.

The vision declared in the Charter is as follows: Equity, ecologically-sustainable development and peace are at the heart of our vision of a better world- a world in which a healthy life for all it a reality; a world that respects, appreciates and celebrates all life and diversity; a world that enables the flowering of people's talents and abilities to enrich each other; a world in which people's voices guide the decisions that shape our lives.

For further information, visit the website at www.phamovement.org

Letters from Africa and beyond

Change is not achieved without pain
Surely, one of the greatest democratic advances in recent years is the change to majority rule in South Africa. For me, to come back to South Africa after 42 years was an experience of cultural change. Gone are the signs in public areas reserving them for whites only, gone are the hurtful remarks “these people could not run the country”, “if majority rule come in, there will be a blood bath” etc. Instead one hears “there have been a lot of changes” with different undertones depending on who says it. Yes, changes there have been; in the democracy newborn seven years ago. People have been able to choose their own leaders, nobody is excluded because of skin colour; black and white work side by side in shops, restaurants and on the sports fields.

Democracy has come fast and it is clear that on the short time scale the economy has suffered: inflation is high, effects of poverty and unemployment are disempowering for blacks as well as whites. Undoubtedly a lot of people have a lower quality of life now than before the end of apartheid. And yet, full democracy just had to come. It was the earlier situation that was abnormal, the one where the principle of apartheid allowed a minority to run the country with efficient but unfair methods. The longer that system lasted, the more difficult became the change. Fortunately, international pressure as well as internal resistance movements brought a democratic system and now the South Africans and the world must patiently help in building a brighter future.

For me, a short term visitor, South Africa had changed a lot. Fences and guards protect the wealthy and we were warned about the pick-pockets and the risk for robbery after dark. One is inevitably making the comparison with Australia where crime also exists albeit on a smaller scale. In South Africa the need for bread rather than the price of drugs is the driving force.

A road at the back of Butare
Rwanda - green and fertile, friendly people but a frightening history which people try to come to terms with. Some things have to be forgotten, some things remembered. Visiting our daughter, who is teaching at Rwanda’s National University in the small town of Butare, I borrow a bicycle to see what the country looks like. The road is dusty and eroded, lots of people shout and stare when the muzungu comes past on a bicycle. They seldom see whites and those they do see are frequently swishing by in a car.

The volcanic soil supports a green and fertile country. Banana plantations and eucalypt avenues edge the road. In the villages children run excitedly after the bicycle, smoke is mixed with smells from refuse heaps and latrines. A young man on a bicycle catches up with me and keeps me company with many signs and smiles but no common language; in the towns many people understand French and a few of the young kids have some English phrases but in the rural areas you need to know Kinyarwanda or Swahili.

Gorillas in the Mist
The new Rwanda, coming to terms with its history, is also trying to build a future. One industry that had been sadly harmed by the genocide is tourism. And yet there are marvellous national parks, the beautiful big Lake Kivu, a delightful climate and a reliable dry season. We visited the Volcanoes National Park in the Northwest were a few groups of Mountain Gorillas live. They have been studied by Dian Fossey and are also documented in the film “Gorillas in the Mist”. It is a lovely but not entirely easy bushwalk involved to reach them. With guides previously having found their whereabouts the gorillas can be found and seem to be quite unperturbed by people watching and snapping pictures, in fact showing a curiosity matching that of the human group. The baby gorillas climb playfully in the trees, the big gorillas display strength by beating their chests and all seem to be living a normal family life.

- Gösta Lyngå

Book Review - Human Frontiers by Tony McMichael

reviewed by Keith Thomas

(An overview of this book is on the ABC’s Health Report website. My own review on the Sustainable Population Australia site focuses on the human population aspects. This review covers those other parts of the book most relevant to NSF readers.)

Tony McMichael, Director of the ANU’s National Centre for Epidemiology and Population Health, has produced a book that is a model of organisation and its theme is stated at the beginning: humankind’s long evolutionary and historical experience shows how the natural and social environments affect patterns of disease and survival. Appreciating this ecological perspective on human population health – at a time when critical stresses are appearing – is a prerequisite to achieving a sustainable future.

McMichael draws on all the life sciences and his compact style leaves readers without a life sciences background somewhat breathless and wishing there was a glossary to guide them through the underlying science. Nevertheless, the book remains comprehensible to the interested lay person and should be read by every environmental policy-maker.

The book introduces the three elements of natural selection: variation, competition and differential reproductive success, pointing out that a species does not have capabilities surplus to their current circumstances.

On that foundation McMichael traces human evolution beginning with the climatic cooling 5–2.5 mya which brought plant food species under pressure. These external influences coincided with a point where our ancestors had the opportunity to evolve rapidly. The change favoured a more complex human brain that could plan and dig, not merely gather visible and obvious foods. Survival was more likely for those with a good memory and with the greatest capacity for sharing. Charting human evolution from vegetarian, forest-dwelling Ardipithecine, through the Australopithecine to the omnivorous Homo genus, McMichael describes how humankind’s “wild Pleistocene genome” adapted to these changes: a restless species evolving at a breakneck pace. As the climate cooled, forests withdrew and there were more grazing animals which happened to be propitious food sources for our ancestors. As the Australopithecines lacked tools for catching meat live, they were originally scavengers. Later, as meat, especially bone marrow, enabled a bigger brain, they became more intelligent and more adaptable to climatic fluctuations and also able to make hunting tools and cooperate in hunting.

This larger brain came at a higher metabolic cost. But the increased intelligence made it feasible to adopt the previously too-risky strategy of sacrificing the energy-expensive colon (used to digest vegetation) for a larger brain (to hunt energy-rich meat).
Physical and mental attributes enabled non-specialized predation; each preyed-upon species was expendable. Humans were opportunistic and versatile and readily switched to other food species.

The mismatch between our Pleistocene-attuned biology and our current way of life has been amplified over the last century as urban sedentariness, dietary excesses and various socialized addictive behaviours (alcohol and tobacco) have become prominent features of modern human ecology.

McMichael shows how behavioural adaptations had social as well as physiological impacts on our species. Thus the controlled use of fire not only affected diet, it provided warmth and nocturnal security and so prolonged group interaction which, in turn, would have facilitated the emergence of language.

The detail intensifies as McMichael charts Homo sapiens through the Neolithic, from hunter-gatherer to agriculturalist, over the most recent 0.2% of our evolution as a distinct species. The more specialised and settled farming communities were dependent upon a few staples, reducing their range of nutrients and increasing their exposure to famines. Settled living, in close proximity to livestock, also enabled microbes to cross easily to humans.

The industrial revolution brought new environmental risks and occupational hazards and about a century ago the modern affluent lifestyle exchanged infectious diseases for chronic non-communicable diseases, especially those of late adulthood: dietary imbalances, physical inactivity, addictions, diabetes, heart disease – diseases which do not exert natural selection pressure.

One of the book’s clear messages, stated more clearly and comprehensively than I have seen before: healthy people need healthy food. But the food should be of Pleistocene quality, produced in a Pleistocene biosphere. We know this can no longer be. The questions are: how distant are we from our ecological inheritance? Does it matter? If it matters, what can be done about it?

McMichael uses the book to argue for a refocusing of the discipline of epidemiology to take it beyond a base in traditional germ theory (an individual-oriented cause-and-effect approach, asking why this person has pathology X?) to an ecological approach (asking why a given population has a particular rate of pathology X).

In reading through this part of the book, I found no attempt to define good health, other than negatively (as the absence of poor health). McMichael is not as direct as he could be about the prior conditions for good health: societies with a sustainable ecological footprint; stable, rational, reliable social institutions; good topsoil, water, biodiversity; materially provident governance; societal equity and ecological sustainability. Within those societies, the individuals should be fit, with good nutrition, musculature and bones; active and well-coordinated; well-educated, enquiring and critical; well-adjusted; cooperative - contributing to the creativity and well-being of the society of which they are a part. McMichael’s “health” indices are about outcomes of morbidity and mortality and inputs – nutrition, female literacy that may, at population level, lead to improved health. But what leads to the best health?

If we do not address this, are not our Health Departments going to remain Injury and Illness Departments? Will not physical health be linked - too narrowly – to sport, specialist service providers and expensive technologies? Will not diet be emphasized at the expense of ecological health and physical activity patterns, two more important factors?

McMichael draws on “post-normal science” for his critique of epidemiology and also for his wider criticism of our traditional ways of looking at the planet’s ecology. Post-normal science enables us (a) to go beyond actual, current conditions to describe plausible future conditions; (b) to accommodate complexity, multiple layers of system-based uncertainties, a high level of decision stakes and a diversity of interested party perspectives. Further, (c) post-normal science is unsettling for traditional scientists as well as for non-scientists who are accustomed to rely on reductionist explanations and simple causality.

He develops this approach to show how post-normal science enables “ecological thinking”. Ecological thinking is subversive in two ways: (a) it criticizes the consumption-driven, high throughput, environmentally damaging economy; and (b) it transcends traditional, reductionist disciplines. To an ecologist the world is one of contingent probabilities within mutually adapted, self-ordering systems; ecological ideas lack the crispness of definition, simplicity of process and precision of measurement that characterize much physical and chemical science (and popular discourse). Understanding the world requires comprehension of non-linearities and uncertainties, complexity, self-organizing properties of systems and emergent properties.

McMichael’s reach extends to globalisation and politics. He shows how free trade can reduce labours and environmental controls and lead to the spread of disease. Although he refers to land pressures, he ignores power relations that underlie systems of land tenure: willing workers are excluded from productive land, not to preserve it for ecological reasons, but to enable rack-renting of tenants and to create and maintain a class for subsistence-wage exploitation in industries supplying the affluent West.

He shows how the rich/poor gap both within and between countries is directly correlated with poor population health. However, he does not consider whether poverty necessarily leads to poor health. Tribal, fourth world people have the least money but, where traditional lifestyles survive, do not experience such poor health as third world people.

Although McMichael describes the huge ecological footprint of the food industry in Western economies – compared with, for example, China - he does not consider the immense institutional clout of that industry which militates against a wide change toward eating fresh, Pleistocene foods. If we made that change, 90% of our supermarket aisles would be empty!

McMichael does, however, provide a stimulating and informative discussion of genetic modification of food which lays out where GM is equivalent to and different from natural processes; also the benefits and hazards of GM. Using the precautionary principle, he comes down against GM - for the present.

As a member of the International Panel on Climate Change, McMichael is strong on whether climate change is a reality and how climate change increases disease risk. His conclusion is that “It will be reasonable from here on to regard each extreme weather event as containing at least some human-induced component”. He illustrates the inertia in Earth’s climate saying that if we halt the build-up of greenhouse gases by 2070, the seas will continue to warm and expand for another thousand years, rising 1.5m. He adds that “As a culture medium, the world today is more conducive to the spread and circulation [of disease] than in the past”.

At this point I became impatient with the author’s call for more research and modelling – is more needed? We know we have to act; we know we have to change. Will yet more research convince more people? We can fine-tune our responses but McMichael is really telling us we need simple, significant measures now, not fine tuning over the decades to come. Surely there is a danger that further research excuses procrastination while more bizarre and desperate “patches” are proposed and evaluated (e.g., the proposal earlier this year to dump iron into the Indian Ocean to absorb CO2).

The later parts of the book are interwoven with insights from evolutionary psychology: “The task of achieving sustainability does not easily fit into our usual frame of social and political decision-making.” The changes required to achieve sustainability are immense. However, we have a brain that can contemplate the future and plan to influence it. Are these human intellectual powers a match for our “short-termist” heritage, manifest in selfish competitiveness? One of McMichael’s big questions concerns the way the tension between two evolutionarily-determined human mental attributes is played out: given our long standing expertise at dealing with urgent crises, flight-or-fight, which has brought us to our present environmental predicament, can we use our more recently acquired abilities for long-term planning, sophisticated scientific reasoning and information technology to rescue us from the short-termism of flight-or-fight?

McMichael illustrates this problem most clearly with his model which shows how (a) unsophisticated low-income economies produce environmental pressures (smoke, garbage, sewage) which are amenable to solutions of the flight-or-fight kind; (b) later industrialization produces pressures that are less apparent but more sinister (air pollution, heavy metals, poor water quality); (c) late industrial and population pressures (biodiversity loss, global warming, fresh water depletion, CO2) impact on the entire biosphere and our flight-or-fight short-sightedness, which leads to treatments which manifest the “tragedy of the commons”, and militate against effective global solutions. More recent pressures are difficult both to understand and to comprehend, more expensive to treat and the time required for remediation extends beyond the timeframes humans have needed to consider in the past.

Perhaps falling victim to his own evolutionary psychology, McMichael is somewhat anthropocentric. His account of biodiversity, for example, explains how biodiversity is required for human health - excellent so far as it goes. But, given the book’s ecological and evolutionary underpinnings, this begins to jar as the book progresses. His best possible future appears to be one of a planet in which the domination by humankind can continue with sustainable good health and well-being for the species Homo sapiens. His past is one of human kind living and evolving with an “eternal frontier”; his future is one where forests, wildernesses, the oceans, Antarctica, the atmosphere – all will need precision management so human populations can be sustained healthily. For McMichael biodiversity is desired to sustain Homo sapiens’ domination of the planet.

Throughout, McMichael uses the useful concept of the ecological footprint. But is this too benign a term? Perhaps “monopolized destruction zone” or “planetary damage area” would be better.

What are the author’s conclusions? He does his best to end with optimistic words. But his optimism requires that we resolve the many problems he has outlined. This implies the coordination of people and governments, altruism, priority to decision making with very long-term time horizons, subjugation of short-termism and irrationality (which lead to conflict and huge opportunity costs of human and natural resources).

And his practical solutions? Education is an answer: from increased female literacy in third world societies through to an understanding of science, especially the natural causes of natural events including evolution and ecology. This would mean confronting creationism among Christians, Muslims and indigenous peoples alike. Perhaps a Biocentre, not “more research”, to convince more people in our open democracy.
McMichael seems to shy away from confronting his predicted massive environmental catastrophe which is so complex and so far outside our historical experience that we are unlikely to act soon enough to avert it. He struggles with the political reality that the criteria of efficiency, fairness and environmental sustainability each have to be met for any solution to be politically achievable before a disaster can be avoided. He treads gingerly so as not to offend rather than address patterns of future planetary governance for sustainability.
While the science points to ecological crisis, politicians look to the next election and economists assume there is no future worth considering beyond a generation. This leaves only the ecologists and spinners of speculative fiction with a time horizon stretching thousands of years into the future.

Having thus criticized the book, I should add that the author himself gave me the tools to make these criticisms in ways I would not have been able to manage before reading it. Although the book lapses into anthropocentrism, other books are totally anthropocentric and it is rarely remarked upon.

So, I’ll end with five positives about the book.

Although the book was put together quickly, its logical sequencing, easy flow and cumulative explanations are remarkable.
McMichael makes his points with well-chosen illustrations. One this reader found most striking was the difference in timescale between nature and the political decision-makers: we learn that Finland is slowly rising above sea level: it is actually bouncing back after being compressed by the polar icecap during the last ice age. Another example: humans consume 40% of terrestrial photosynthetic product by way of plant foods, clearing land and forest, degrading land and building over land. For a quick taste of his compact and entertaining style, read his account of Lyme disease on page 117.

His graphs, also, are brilliantly selected and very telling – powerful examples of a picture being worth a thousand words. Each repays careful study.

Each chapter ends with a 2-3 page summary and conclusion. How did the author find time to be so well organized with such a short gestation time for the book? Many of the references in the annotated bibliography of 36 pages are from 2000, even 2001. (Stephen Boyden’s concept of evodeviationary behaviour is among the references).

With its effective presentation of the pros and cons of topical, controversial issues, this is a resource book for activists. I indulged myself by giving copies to my close relatives last Christmas!

Osteoporosis and Diet
Back in the 1920s doctors found that patients whose kidneys were failing had bloated stomachs caused by build-up of acid. They also had unusually fragile skeletons. When patients were given bicarbonate to counter the acid, their bones unaccountably grew stronger.
In 1968 two Harvard researchers published a letter in the Lancet suggesting that an acid-forming diet would weaken bones. The body maintains a pH of 7.4, just on the alkaline side of neutral. If the pH falls to 7.38 the body breaks down bone and muscle to release carbonates, phosphates and ammonia to neutralise the extra acid.

Now two University of California researchers, Anthony Sebastian and Deborah Sellmeyer, are planning a large controlled study into the effects of giving elderly people a daily dose of bicarbonate for five years, to see what it does for their bones. They already know that feeding a high-acid producing diet to rats causes osteoporosis, and this can be reversed by a change in diet. A pilot study on women found that potassium bicarbonate significantly improved bone density.

As for the researchers themselves, rather than taking biocarbonate, they are advocating a diet high in vegetables and fruit. Although many fruits are acid, they actually produce bases in the body, because organic salts such as citrates metabolise into bicarbonate. On the other hand grain foods such as pasta, bread and rice produce lots of acids because they are high in phosphorus which metabolises to phosphoric acid. Meat produces sulphuric acid when digested.

Milk contains about equal proportions of acid and base-producing substances, but the base-producing ones are in the liquid, which is removed during processing into cheese. So although hard cheese is a good source of calcium, and is recommended in anti-osteoporosis diets, it is a major suspect in the corrosion of bones and muscle.

In a study of Osteoporosis Fracture which has followed nearly 10,000 elderly women since 1986, many risk factors have been studied. But too little calcium or protein in the diet, menopause and a couch potato lifestyle between them account for less than half of all hip fractures. It looks as though dietary acid load may be at the top of the list of risk factors.

New Scientist, 15 December 2002

Top Watching

The Department of Education in the Northern Territory has distributed a storybook about Gutsy Gorenji to its schools. Gutsy is a giant African snail, living in Timor, who stows away in a container and lands in Arnhem land. After many adventures Gutsy is recognised by some Aboriginal children and reported to the Quarantine Service. The children are made Top Watchers.

The story was written by Kay Carvan, a Public Awareness officer for the Northern Australian Quarantine Strategy. Local aboriginal children drew many of the illustrations for the book. It is one of the educational strategies being used to give local people a feeling of ownership in the Quarantine effort to prevent pests entering northern Australia by sea or air.

The northern quarantine zone runs from Broome (WA) to Cairns, QLD. In the Northern Territory and Western Australia three quarters of it is owned by aborigines. The only way to police it is be recruiting the locals to help. That strategy has really worked in the Torres Strait, where each island has its own local officer.

The Canberra Times, 27 April 2002

Good Grub

The problem of acid formation in the body provides an added reason to revise the current food pyramid in the Australian dietary guidelines, as suggested by Michael Djordjevic in the Food for Healthy People and a Healthy Planet internet conference.

Djordjevic proposed reducing the emphasis on grains in the current pyramid, and giving fruit and especially vegetables-greens, roots and tubers pride of place. This was based on the high glycaemic load produced by grains, and the low glycaemic load of vegetables. You can read about the proposed dietary guidelines in the book of the conference, Good Grub, out this month!

Nature & Society - October/November 2002

roba — Thu, 24 May 2012 16:17:36 +1000

Editorial
The newspapers seem to serve up alternating offerings from those who believe that humanity is doomed if we do not restrict our growth and learn to live sustainably, and those who believe that any restriction on growth is impractical, unaffordable and disastrous. What the latter group does not seem to realise is that the opposite of sustainability is unsustainability. By definition if something is unsustainable it will come to an end. So really the argument is about what is sustainable. Can growth be sustainable?

In strictly physical terms, in growth of absolute size of an organism (or a population), in consumption of resources, in damage to an environment, all growth must eventually cease. A living organism will die, resources will run out, an environment will die. It is probably true that life would continue in that environment, but it would be a different kind of life and from our point of view a lot less pleasant although the cockroaches and rats might not agree with us.

Growth that is sustainable could occur in more intangible things such as social capital, kindness, good health, knowledge and even wisdom. At present these desirable qualities and goals seem to be getting more remote. The daily news is full of disasters, threats of wars, sale of community assets and downgrading of many things on which, until recently, Australians prided themselves. Wisdom seems to be in particularly short supply worldwide.

There is some hope in that more people are noticing these deleterious trends and saying so. There is hope in that some people are actually doing something about them. The movement to ethical investment and the inception of community banks show that there is the possibility of a move away from the domination of market forces at any cost. The actions of some local and state governments in both Australia and the USA, to take greenhouse abatement seriously, could drag reluctant national governments in that direction, They might also recognise the growth potential in doing so.

Some business executives are realising that the way forward involves care of the environment and the nurturing of employees. Their efforts appear puny beside the corporate malpractice and greed of recent days, but that big business fraud may prove to have been a turning point. It has sickened and annoyed so many people that reform may happen and the public may turn to more worthy businesses.
Hubbard Foods, a New Zealand producer of breakfast cereals, is showing that business does not have to be ruthless to make money. The founder works an occasional shift on the factory floor and is on first name terms with all employees. He shares ten per cent of the profits amongst the staff, apportioning it according to length of service, not according to the status of the job. He shuns advertising as unethical. He pays medium, not top, wages and keeps the operation labour intensive so he can employ more staff. Most of the workforce are Samoan and the factory is located in an area of high unemployment with concomitant social problems. Yet the firm makes money with a satisfactory bottom line in all three areas, financial, social and environmental. Other companies in other countries also work in this way.

Another rather surprising area of hope for a sustainable future is that people around the world are having fewer children., Indeed the birthrate per woman is gong down so much that many countries, not only Australia, are worrying about a looming population crash. They should not worry. If the world’s population peaks at about seven and a half billion in 2050 and then declines to five billion in 2150 (New Scientist 20 July 02) surely this will be good news. It would give whatever other species that have survived human depredation a chance to reclaim parts of the earth - just as the decline caused by the Black Death gave Europe’s forests a breather in the 14th century. In another century there will be very little of the natural world left unless we come to our senses in the very near future. Even if we do that, if the human population keeps growing our sheer numbers will put too much strain on soils, water and biodiversity for much to survive. A smaller population can only be to the good, and far better that it comes about voluntarily than through war, famine and pestilence.

Once humans discover that happiness does not depend on ever larger disposable incomes and ever more consumption of energy and material goods, there will be time for people to decide that a few more children would be a good idea. But for the world’s sake each human must cut their ecological footprint back to some small fraction of that current in the USA or Australia now, even with a reduced population.

It does not take a great deal to provide happiness. One fascinating example in Australia is the development of a few community sheds. It has been said that every man needs a shed, but sometimes, where many retired or unemployed men have been transplanted, they have no shed. The men have no occupation, no purpose, and feel frustrated, useless and depressed. In some places, somehow a community shed has grown up. Men can get together and work together; with whatever tools and skills they possess, they make things, repair things.
In one area the men have taken on helping the local youth who also felt alienated. High school boys in danger of dropping out have been invited to join the shed, where they work with the men and learn skills and the joy of accomplishment. The men learn that the youths are valuable individuals, the boys gain a sense of competence and worth, as well as respect for the older men. Developments such as this could have an enormous impact on the drop out rate, the crime rate, the suicide rate. This is a way in which communities could grow, and the stock of satisfaction and happiness in the population could increase. This is an example of sustainable growth.

Forthcoming NSF meetings

16 Oct.

Report on the World Summit for Sustainable Development.

Gösta Lyngå, Janis Birkeland, Brendan Mackey, Rolf von Behrens attended WSSD on behalf of NSF. Some of them will report at this meeting.

20 Nov.

Barry Neame of the Printing Industries Union of Australia, on modern developments in the industry.

The printing industry has a long history of environmental pollution, with high energy usage, much wastage and the release of toxic chemicals. How is the industry changing to achieve better practices?

Dec - Jan. No meetings

19 Feb.

Murray May - Unpacking aviation travel futures - a global/local take on the issue

Back to Top

Good Grub

The book from the conference is out.

From a biased perspective (after all I had something to do with its production) I must say it looks good and is chock full of interesting information.

If you are interested in what you eat, or your health, or in what food production and distribution do to the planet, or in the ethics or social justice of the same, then this is the book for you. Yes, it is educational, but not dull. It would even make a good present for someone who is concerned about any of the topics above.

Just a little disclaimer. Bryan and I, Sue and Gabrielle and several other people went through the text with combs of various fineness (we are sensitive to and ashamed of mistakes and misprints). Despite our combs some errors slipped through. For these we apologise, and recommend the book none the less.

Conference participants get a free copy. For others the price is $20, but NSF members pay only $18 and multiple orders (10 or more copies) are $15 per book. Postage is extra.Good Grub is Good Value.

Jenny Wanless

Population Trends

The replacement reproduction rate is considered to be 2.1 children per woman. Italian women are now producing 1.2 children on average and Spain, Greece, the Czech Republic, Russia and Armenia are about the same. Over sixty countries have fertility rates below 2.1 children, including much of the Caribbean, Japan, Korea and China, with Thailand, Sri Lanka and Iran likely to reach that level soon.

Almost all countries have fertility rates heading down. It does not matter whether they are rich or poor, socialist or capitalist, Muslim or Catholic.

New Scientist 20 July 02

Smart Thinkers

Abel and Betty, two New Caledonian crows, are hard at work in Oxford challenging the idea that it was either their big brains or adaptable hands that enabled early humans to become toolmakers.

Back home on the New Caledonian islands of Grand Terre and Maré crows habitually use a range of tools and also make them. They not only use sticks to poke or fish insects out of cracks, but they carefully cut stepped probes out of pandanus leaves, and fashion hooks from vines and twigs. They adjust their grip on their tools, depending on whether they need force or precision to achieve their goal.

Human researchers at Oxford have tested their feathered subjects in a range of novel situations and in turn the birds have challenged the humans. Betty and Abel are insatiably curious and investigate every possible crevice, including electrical sockets, fire alarms and wiring cases. In experiments, if the humans think they have allowed the birds two possible courses of action the crows often find another way.
Once, when Abel carried away the wire hook that had been provided in the birds’ tool rack, Betty made her own one. She wedged one end of a straight piece of wire in a crack, then pulled on the other end until she had fashioned a hook suitable for use in the task she was engaged on.

New Scientist 17 Aug 02

Annual General Meetings - NSF & ANB

There was an excellent turn out to the combined AGMs for NSF and the Biocentre (ANB).

NSF
In his annual report for NSF John Schoonevelt described the past year as one of consolidation, with much effort going into the Biocentre project. With Sue Gilbert as Office Manager there was a focus on improving NSF’s administrative and financial systems. The major projects for the year were the internet Food conference originated and coordinated by Bryan Furnass, and two major consultancy reports produced by the Sustainability Science Team. A new project is an investigation into the possibility of nominating the ACT as a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve.

The new NSF management committee is as follows:

Coordinators: Stephen Boyden,David Eastburn
Treasurer: John Schooneveldt
Secretary: Jenny Wanless

Committee members:
Rory Eames, Kala Perkins, Alice Thompson, Alice Kingsland & Dierk von Behrens

ANB
Moss Cass reported on progress on the Australian National Biocentre. Several exciting possibilities are opening up Enough money has been obtained to allow a feasibility study to go ahead. Until that has been completed the ACT Government has agreed to make no decisions on the use of our preferred site at Kingston, between the Kingston Foreshores Development and the Jerrabombera Wetlands. Canberra Nature Park is interested in cooperating with ANB over the management of the wetlands, if we get the site. The ANB board is also having discussions with other possible neighbours, the Railway and ACTEW.

The ANB board elected at the meeting consists of:

President: Moss Cass

Vice President: John Harris & Valerie Brown

Treasurer: John Schooneveldt

Assistant Treasurer: David Eastburn

Secretary: Petar Johnson

Committee members:
Gerry Gillespie, Rob Gourlay, Brendan Mackey, Wendy Rainbird, John Reed, Jacqui Russell & Derek Wrigley

Some WSSD Issues

Gösta Lyngå

The World Summit for Sustainable Development in Johannesburg was a disappointment in many respects. The back pedalling of USA and Australia on alternative energy and the Kyoto protocol, the lack of cooperation between the industrial countries, sometimes called “The North” and the developing world, “The South”, all that has been reported in the papers.

However, at the same time there was another summit at a different venue. Almost symbolically, the governments met in the North of Johannesburg, under the crystal chandeliers of Sandton’s hyper-elegant halls, while Civil Society met South of the city at NASREC, a converted sports arena.

At Sandton well trained diplomats, politicians and high ranking public servants delivered speeches in which words served the purpose of hiding content. At NASREC the 20,000 delegates of NGOs discussed problems and solutions, established networks and planned for the future. Dozens of meetings were going on simultaneously.

Between the two venues was Ubuntu, the place where people could meet, watch cultural shows, take part in discussions and visit handicraft shops and restaurants. There was the world’s largest movable structure, an enormous tent with exhibitions from different countries and of different environmental activities. At Ubuntu you could have coffee and a piece of cake or a meal, all cooked using solar heating.
Of all the topics addressed during those weeks, I will highlight three that had positive outcomes.

The OECD panel member pointed out the importance of prices including the environmental costs of production of an item. Verification of labelling is also important.

A delegate from Bangladesh made the observation that there is a difference in length of use of products in the North and in the South: much longer usage times in the South make for more sustainability.

TCO is a blue collar union with 1.2 million members in Sweden; for 10 years they have tested and labelled computers, computer screens and now also mobile phones. The labelling is voluntary and market driven. Users’ demands are the guide. The TCO95 standards address four Es:
Ecology: chemical emissions, including manufacturing; also deals with recycling options.
Energy: low use of energy; availability of stand-down mode.Emissions: in particular the emissions from Cathode Ray Tubes.
Ergonomics: occupational health safety; screens should not be tiring to look at.

TCO now has contracts with 120 computer equipment manufacturers, all the big ones. The contracts concern displays, system units, keyboards, laptops, printing machines, photocopiers and now also mobile phones. The latter are one of the biggest experiments ever made on human brain cells: 60% of the radiation goes into the user’s head and it is unknown whether and when brain tumours are caused. Manufacturers are not sure if they should bother changing things; one might have thought that the precautionary principle should be applied here.

Secretary General visiting
A few thousand people in the Nelson Mandela hall stood up, clapped and cheered when Kofi Annan visited NASREC and the Civil Society.
Kofi Annan said that NGOs have always been part of the UN; Rio was a turning point when the civil society became much more deeply involved. He feels affinity with NGOs in regretting the slow pace, in particular when those countries with power to do the maximum actually do the minimum. He said: You must challenge “business as usual”. Your initiatives hold the keys to the future because in civil society things get done.

The question was put to Kofi Annan: Should the UN not change its governance and give veto in the Security Council to those states that have the highest population rather than those with the strongest economy? He answered that he has indeed worked hard with reform but reform is a process, not an event. Member states agree that the Security Council should be reformed but have not yet agreed how. It is for them to decide.
He added: we now have priority actions:
• war on poverty;
• halve the number of people without access to clean water by 2015; and
• fight AIDS.

So: How did it all go?
At NASREC a lot of contacts were made, dreams were dreamt and plans were made.
At Sandton some type I outcomes agreed between all governments were recorded and altogether several useful type II partnerships were made, poverty reduction was planned and environmental reforms discussed, but in most cases without setting clear targets.

The Kyoto protocol will now be signed by Canada, China and Russia, so the magic 55% has been achieved and USA and Australia have been made irrelevant.

Altogether, the outcome in the form of the summit statement is better than it could have been but also a lot worse than it could have been. It certainly falls short of what is needed to change the disastrous global trends for society as well as for the environment.

The outcomes from the Civil Society meetings were most encouraging. That is where the hope for the future lies.

Why are developers' houses so old fashioned?

Derek Wrigley

If you think that is provocative consider this: If you compare the enormous strides in car design which use the results of research into wind resistance, fuel, economy, exhaust pollution etc, with the way in which houses are being built today you will realise that the housing industry is living in the Dark Ages with its head in the sand.

Cars now have much less wind resistance, have more efficient combustion in order to reduce their consumption of fuel, and exhaust pollution has been significantly reduced-in short, the vehicle industry has (somewhat belatedly) woken up to the fact that our fossil fuels are now running in Europe, as are compressed air and electric cars, even solar energised cars and we will all see increasing numbers of these in the next few years.

Developers and builders, however, seem to be unaware of research work that shows there are better ways of building, but, other than concrete slabs on the ground very little attempt has been made by the housing industry to use CSIRO research findings.

Over the last 50 years a lot of research has been carried out to take advantage of free solar heat and psychologically beneficial sunshine to warm our houses in winter, take advantage of internal mass, use natural ventilation methods instead of reliance on air conditioners as well as the use of internal skylights to reduce the need for artificial lighting.

External sunshading of windows is almost unknown and buyers are left to find out that they will have to rectify developer’s poor designs.
Houses being built today will be almost unliveable in the Canberra Winter when the fossil fuels of oil and gas start to run out and although coal is still plentiful in Australia to produce our electricity, thinking globally, can we condone the enormous atmospheric pollution?

Research into the thermal characteristics of external walls has shown that the traditional brick veneer wall is the wrong way round - it should have the bricks on the inside to give better thermal conditions inside in winter and summer. No evidence of this application of research is demonstrated in current housing stock. Why?

Despite the fact that Australia was a leader in the development of solar water heaters in the 50s and 60s there are still only a sprinkling of these enormously useful devices on suburban roofs. Even cold and cloudy Denmark has more on show. Why?

The housing industry has instead tended to go in the opposite direction - looking backward to meaningless Victorian pastiche of porticos, and pediments instead of investing that money into better living. Internal spaces have grown larger, there is little internal mass to keep houses warmer in winter and cooler in summer and natural ventilation is almost unheard of. Air conditioning is quite an unnecessary expense in a well-designed house, yet many of the current house designs will be inadequate without it.

E.F. Schumacher said in the early 1970s that “the west has never learned when enough is enough” and this certainly applies to the housing market.

Large houses cost more to build, they cost more to furnish and they cost more to heat and to insure. Environmentally sensitive (eco-logical) houses on the other hand not only help to reduce all these costs, they are more sustainable in the long run, leaving that little bit more of the world’s resources to be enjoyed by our grandchildren in years to come. Or is it developers and builders don’t think about grandchildren?
Todays housing will be seen by future citizens as pompous, selfish, illogical and certainly against the public interest. Witness the way in which smoking has come to be regarded with public disfavour in recent years. Public attitudes can, and must, change if we are to have a future which is sustainable. The building industry has an enormous role to play in achieving a state of sustainability.

Just suppose you had a choice of two houses - one has a grand portico at the front, giving an impression of opulence to the street, it has ducted heating, carpet throughout, lots of space, an impressive kitchen with dishwasher, a mortgage you can’t really afford plus running costs to keep you poor for the rest of your stay, plus a freezing house when the gas runs out or simply gets too expensive to use, hot in summer (no sunshades and no natural ventilation) -and the final straw - a house you will find hard to sell.

That is your first and (usually) only option in the current market.

Your second option (if you are lucky) will be one that has a pleasant, simple entrance, natural noise-free ventilation which keeps the house cool in summer, carpets in the cooler rooms but harder floor surfaces in the sunny areas which help to heat the house in winter, adjustable sunshades to keep out all the summer sun yet allow all the winter sun to penetrate, smaller but adequate rooms, no dishwasher, very small running costs, photovoltaic panels on a simple pitched roof which supply most, if not all of your electricity, rainwater tanks to conserve water for your garden and supply your WC’s, plus a conservatory which helps to heat your house, plus a state of the art reflecting system which will help you to provide warming sunshine in your southern rooms - and, at the end of your stay (if you ever want to leave) a very attractive, readily saleable (at a good profit) in a future, energy hungry market - all at approximately the same cost.
These are comparable, feasible options - which would you choose?

Unpacking aviation travel futures

Murray May will speak on this topic at our February meeting. Here he gives some background information.

The growth of air travel
Air travel has grown at an average annual rate of 9% since 1950, and is predicted to grow substantially in the decades ahead. Consider some examples of the current trends:

Between 1950 and 1999, the number of international tourist arrivals worldwide grew from 25 million to 664 million. The World Tourism Organization expects the numbers to reach 1 billion by 2010 and 1.6 billion by 2020. Such growth is closely linked to the expansion of air travel.

Macquarie Bank recently purchased Sydney Airport for the sizeable sum of $5.4 billion. The price is equal to 14.3 times the forecast gross earnings for 2003 of $377 million. The bank views it as a 100 year asset with 100 years of investment life. Boeing predicts that airlines will spend US$1,800 billion buying 24, 000 new aircraft over the next 20 years, as a result of the increased demand for air travel.

Paul Dempsey’s Airport Planning and Development Handbook (2000) includes a global survey of new airports and airport expansion projects. His survey is representative, not exhaustive he says, but still catalogues US$200 billion of projects worldwide, including $98 billion for the fast growing Asia-Pacific region.

The above “growth forever” scenario, if you like, is one linked strongly to the globalisation of tourism and trade, a strong driving force for the substantially increased use of aviation worldwide.

An interconnected web of businesses and organizations operate within this economic globalisation scenario. They include for example, alliances of airlines, travel agents and tour operators, international hotels, theatres and entertainment, car rental companies, credit cards, and the list goes on. The values underlying this scenario are well represented in the label of the so-called “freedom to fly” coalition in the UK representing a network of aviation industry, business, trade union and tourist groups. As Sir Richard Branson, chairman of Virgin Atlantic, recently summarised the matter: “A no-growth solution is simply unacceptable”.

Aviation under challenge
Such a vision of the future is increasingly being challenged on a range of ecological, resource, capacity and safety grounds. There are the broad ranging challenges relating to the unsustainable patterns of consumption and production involved. In addition, more targeted critiques are coming from Green politicians and environmental NGOs with interests in sustainable transport such as the Green Skies Network. Generally, these alternative scenarios challenge both the notion of “hypermobility” and the numbers of people on the move, and envisage long-distance travel in the future as being much reduced.

Aviation’s environmental, energy, pollution and noise impacts are considerable and growing. They include the effects of emissions on global climate change, local environmental impacts such as the effects of aircraft noise on people living near airports and under flight paths, as well as the local air quality effects of emissions, many of which are known potent carcinogens. Add to this the intensive use of a non-renewable resource (oil), the impact on biodiversity and communities of airports’ voracious appetite for land, the raw materials used for producing aircraft, and so on…

With respect to climate change, aviation is the fastest growing segment of the transport sector, with the transport sector as a whole being the fastest growing source of carbon dioxide emissions. A pivotal report, Aviation and the Global Atmosphere, appeared in 1999 for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). It concluded that while the contribution of aviation to human induced climate change was about 3.5% of the total in 1992, by 2050 this is projected to be 7% of the total for the mid-range scenarios, and up to 15% of the total global warming for the high-range scenarios. These projections take into account improvements such as more fuel-efficient engines and better airframe designs.

For Australia, carbon dioxide emissions have been projected to more than double for domestic air services from 1995 to 2015, and to triple over the same period for its international air transport contribution.

To concretise the issue further, the Centre for Sustainable Transportation in Canada gives an example of a person flying from Toronto to Paris and back. The global warming impact of emissions at the level subsonic aircraft normally fly, 10 to 11 kilometres above ground, is about three times that of carbon dioxide alone. The Centre thus concludes that one trans-Atlantic round trip would be equivalent in global warming impact, per person, to more than two years of typical car usage (assuming average occupancies of cars and aircraft).

These upward trends in greenhouse emissions are clearly way out of kilter with what is needed for ecological sustainability. A couple of years ago, the UK Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution recommended “deep cuts” in emissions, of the order of 60% by 2050.
Projected technological improvements and efficiencies are swamped by the massive forecast increases in the consumption of air travel. Even “substitution” strategies such as hydrogen-powered aircraft - a good way off yet - may still have significant global warming effects, as the water vapour contrails act as a greenhouse gas too.

For aircraft noise similarly, the air traffic growth projections point to increasing noise at large airports, and also at smaller, regional airports. In spite of quieter aircraft engine technology, the weight of sheer numbers wins out. The concerns have now moved beyond just noise per se, to include respite or rest from noise events, given the higher movement numbers. Some people have likened this aspect of the intrusion to that of a dripping tap.

Where are we headed?
There is no easy “technical fix” for air travel. Different values underlie the different futures conceptions. Lewis Mumford’s words describe the “growth forever” scenario well: “There is only one efficient speed, faster; only one alternative destination, farther away; only one desirable size, bigger; only one quantitative goal, more.”

Ecological scenarios on the other hand speak to slower, saner ways – even “inner travel” as more productive than “outer travel”. Fundamental redesign to satisfy ecological limits is called for – whether is it is video-conferencing or tele-immersion to create a three dimensional interactive environment in real time across space. Engineers, scientists and doctors can then collaborate across the globe on design projects, with much reduced need for physical travel.

In a “redesign” scenario, investment and production could be much more locally focused, so that the international movement of goods and materials is greatly reduced, as is the need for much long distance business travel. Imagine advertising slogans for demand management approaches to aviation travel, akin to water conservation programs: “Do you really need to take that extra trip?” “Can you holiday locally this year?” “Take the train instead”.

How might the aviation industry contribute to the shift that’s needed? One example is investment in fast train services that are more greenhouse friendly than aircraft, particularly for short haul travel.

Politicians and policy makers involved in the rapid expansion of airports and airport developments around the world might look again at whether economies and airport developments must become increasingly integrated. What if world oil production peaks around 2010, as many experts think? Aviation is still very much tied to oil, and there do not appear to be any practical alternatives to kerosene-based fuels for several decades. Many of the infrastructure developments may turn out to be unwise investments. “Crash” scenarios are clearly not out of the question either.

For further information: See the Green Skies website at www.greenskies.org and also
May, M. & Hill, S. B. (2002). Unpacking aviation travel futures – an application of causal layered analysis. Journal of Futures Studies. Vol 7 No 1, pp 41-65.

Greenfleet

The Victorian Government has a 59 point plan to meet its own emission target under the Kyoto Protocol. The plan includes committing $420,000 over three years to pay for tree planting to offset the emissions from government cars. The Queensland government has also signed up its whole fleet of over twelve thousand vehicles.

Both Governments chose Greenfleet, a five year old company which promotes cleaner fuels, more efficient cars and tree planting, to reduce emissions. They calculate that the average car will put 4.3 tonnes of carbon into the atmosphere each year and that an average native tree will sequester 268 kg in its lifetime, so each car needs seventeen trees planted each year.

Individuals can sign up their own car for $30 per year. Fleet rates are calculated on whether they are used for long, heavy hauls or for running around town. About 12,000 individuals and forty fleets, totalling about 36,000 vehicles are on Greenfleet’s books.

The company is currently planting in five states. The aim is to get maximum environmental benefit from the trees, so most planting will be in the Murray-Darling Basin where it will improve water quality, reduce erosion and provide wildlife habitat . In partnership with Scouts Australia Greenfleet is running Murray River Rescue, with the aim of planting at least ten million trees in the next decade. Essentially they are trying to restore ecosystems. They choose local varieties and tend them so they will grow successfully.

Earthbeat, Radio National 8 June 02

Note:
It is gratifying to observe the emphasis on tree planting as a benefit to water quality, erosion control and wildlife habitat. However, the point about planting trees to provide carbon sinks is correct only if the total amount of forest is increased. A mature forest will absorb as much carbon dioxide when trees are growing as it emits when trees are decomposing or burning, providing equilibrium as far as the atmospheric composition is concerned. The burning of fossil fuel will, on the contrary, increase the carbon dioxide content of the atmosphere.

Gösta Lyngå

Farrago

Back to Minamata
Decades ago Japan was shocked by the occurrence of a dreadful disease of the nervous system occurring in both humans and cats in the Minamata region. Investigation showed that mercury from industry was flushed into the bay and returned to the land by fish, which formed a major part of the local diet.

If Japan succeeds in reversing the ban on commercial whaling, and in promoting the consumption of whale meat by the Japanese, they may be in for another epidemic. Tests on products from small toothed whales and dolphins, which are not covered by the International Whaling Commission’s ban, show alarming levels of mercury. Out of 26 liver samples two showed over 1970 micrograms of mercury per gram of liver, compared with the official limit of 0.4 micrograms. There were very high levels in kidneys and lungs and even muscles were from two to 25 times the limit. Whales accumulate mercury from eating contaminated fish and squid.

New Scientist 1 June 02
[According to the ABC’s Health Report (16/9/02), mercury contamination is very wide spread, and is particularly bad in the Arctic regions.]

Saline Solutions
Enterprising people at Pyramid Hill, in central Victoria, decided to turn a liability into an asset. They have been reclaiming farm land by pumping out saline water, then precipitating the salt and selling it. Their products include high quality salt for use in food processing and also salt blocks for cattle. At this stage demand is outstripping supply.

Their latest venture is to extract heat from the bottom of a solar pond and use it to dry their salt, thus reducing electricity consumption. Future developments will see the use of heat trapped by solar ponds to actually generate electricity. They expect to be able to power the whole salt works and sell surplus electricity to the grid. They also see potential for exporting their technology.

ABC TV Landline 14 Sept 02

More Good Oil
Psychiatrist Joseph Hibbeln thinks that dietary changes could be a cause of the epidemic of depression in the western world. When humans ate wild game, plenty of leafy greens and seafood, they consumed a lot of poly-unsaturated omega-3 fatty acids, which are important in brain chemistry. Over the last century our diet has contained increasing amounts of omega-6 fatty acids from soy, corn, palm and cottonseed oil. These are favoured by manufacturers of longer shelf life foods. If these oils are hydrogenated to give an even longer shelf life, they are worse for the consumer.

Hibbeln reasoned that the brain is largely fat, the contents of which can be altered by diet. The balance between omega-3 and omega-6 oils is important. He also noted that as populations switch to eating more processed and fried foods, depression rates rise.
Omega-3 fatty acids are recommended for heart health and are also thought to help minimise arthritis. Now psychiatrists are investigating their role in depression, schizophrenia and attention deficit disorders, with at least ten clinical trials in progress. The US National Institute of Mental Health would like more trials to take place.

Fish and shellfish are excellent sources of omega-3, and capsules of fish oil are popular over the counter medicine. Other sources of omega-3 are olive oil, linseed and walnuts.

New Scientist 26 Aug 02

Biorock Reefs
An engineer, Wolf Hilbertz, and a marine biologist, Thomas Goreau, teamed up ten years ago to grow artificial reefs. They have artificial coral reefs growing in nine sites spread through the Caribbean and the Indian and Pacific Oceans. The reefs consist of a framework of steel girders electrified by a current powered by solar cells on a raft floating overhead, or on nearby land. The structure electrolyses sea water depositing aragonite, a very hard rock, on the cathode. The anode is titanium mesh covered with a layer of ruthenium oxide which resists corrosion.
The aragonite continues to grow up to five centimetres per year. Chunks of living coral are attached to the frame with wire. Coral polyps seem to love the biorock, and happily settle on the frame. After a few years the diversity of creatures living on and around the frame appears to match that on natural reefs.

Corals on the frame seem to be more resistant to pollution and global warming than are natural reefs, with growth times three of four times greater on the biorock than on ordinary rocks. In the catastrophic bleaching event of 1998 less than five per cent of natural corals in the Maldives survived, but eighty per cent of the ones on biorock continued to thrive.

Biorock could be a cheap way to build sea walls, breakwaters and jetties for nations threatened by rising sea levels.

New Scientist 6 July 02

Coral Bleaching
The Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority (GBRMPA) is asking for community input into plans to rezone the reef. Currently less than five per cent of the Great Barrier Reef is protected in no-take zones and GBRMPA wants to increase these Marine Protected Areas to 25%. The authority needs volunteers to report on the health of the reef: it is important to know where bleaching has or has not occurred, to guide decisions on which areas to conserve. Where there are corals tough enough to survive bleaching and also where the currents keep the water cool enough to prevent bleaching protection could maintain living reefs.

Unfortunately surveys show that early this year the Great Barrier Reef suffered its worst ever bleaching. Nearly 60% of the reef suffered, with 90% mortality in some areas.

There is one hopeful sign; some corals contain fluorescent pigments that, like a sunblock, form a shield around the zooanthellae, the plants which live inside the corals, providing them with energy. The pigments transform harmful wavelengths of light, like UV and blue, to lower energy green and yellow. The plants can continue to live so bleaching does not occur. If more corals develop fluorescent pigments then a greater proportion of corals could survive.

Australasian Science Sept 02

Life Saving
In 1999 66,000 people died of sleeping sickness in Sub-Saharan Africa. The disease could have been treated with Eflornithine, but production of this drug had ceased in 1995, because it was not profitable.

Now an alternative use of the drug has been found and it is back in production. The manufacturer, Aventis, has donated supplies of this life-saving drug to African countries. So what use is Eflornithine to wealthier people? Women can use it to remove facial hair.

Australasian Science Sept 02