Jennifer Marohasy

a forum for the discussion of issues concerning the natural environment

Archives for October 27, 2006

Weekend Reading

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Following are links to some interesting opinion pieces:

1. Lessons From the Lavender Boys
Denis Avery’s Hudson Institute
Thursday October 26, 2006

Researchers have finally found the first confirmed gender-bending consumer products: natural lavender oil, natural tea tree oil, and natural soybeans. The findings strongly say consumers should stop worrying over insignificant traces of man-made chemicals and be more wary of unregulated natural products.
Read the complete article: http://www.cgfi.org/cgficommentary/lessons-from-the-lavender-boys

2. The heroes and villains in the Great Climate Debate
Monika Sarder
Thursday October 26, 2006

More than any other documentary in the last decade, An Inconvenient Truth featuring Al Gore’s slide show purporting to put forward the unadulterated facts on climate change, has galvanised mainstream political interest. Actors, British moguls and undergraduates have all jumped on the bandwagon, with the most recent development being a court challenge to a Hunter Valley coal mine development by a Newcastle student.

The documentary highlights the problems that emerge when a scientific issue is hijacked by political interests. Increasingly high profile public figures are strongly weighing in and proposing purely political solutions with limited reference to the changing state of science. Public discussion of the science is critical if we are to formulate consensus and a national response to the issue. However it is important that the evidence is not presented in a distorted way. Read the complete article: http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=5066

3. Anti-DDT Movement Killing African Babies
Fiona Kobusingye-Boynes
Tuesday October 17, 2006

At long last, the World Health Organization and Uganda’s Health Ministry are again emphasizing DDT and other insecticides to control a disease that kills 110,000 Ugandans every year.

But instead of applauding the decision, anti-pesticide activists are attacking it with scare stories and lies. Every day that Paul Saoke, Physicians for Social Responsibility, Pesticide Action Network, and their allies keep our health officials from ending malaria, another 300 babies and mothers go to their graves. It’s like sending a jetliner filled with children and mothers crashing into the Rwenzori Mountains every day. Read the complete article: http://www.chronwatch.com/content/contentDisplay.asp?aid=24388

And Pinxi had the following advice when she sent in the link to the following article: “No matter what you post they’ll end up debating climate science anyway – sumo wrestlers circling each other. It would be interesting if the usual commenters discussed AGW without arguing the finer details of the science in a futile quest for a certain position. Science flags an issue as potentially significant and science should continue to inform policy, but the policy-making process on an issue such as AGW has many considerations, of which science is only one. Now that AGW concerns are leading to a host of actions to mitigate and adapt, and now that AGW impacts are being bound up with other issues such as energy supply, water, food security, economic opportunities and international relations, we should be discussing those potential actions and their impacts, not just the narrow science.”

4. Unholy trinity set to drag us into the abyss
Ian Dunlop
Monday October 16, 2006

We are about to experience the convergence of three of the great issues confronting humanity. Climate change, the peaking of oil supply and water shortage are coming together in a manner which will profoundly alter our way of life, our institutions and our ability to prosper on this planet. Each is a major issue, but their convergence has received minimal attention. Read the complete article: http://www.smh.com.au/news/scorchedearth/unholy-trinity-set-to-drag-us-into-the-abyss/2006/10/15/1160850808623.html

5. Black and white lies
William J. Lines
Saturday October 14, 2006

AT a rainforest symposium in Cairns in 1987, Ian Lowe, head of science policy at Griffith University, argued that “there are general principles of resource management [that hunter-gatherer] societies embody, and from which we can learn if we have the perceptiveness and the humility to do so”.

Read the complete article: http://theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,20575396-28737,00.html

And brace yourself for this next week:

6. Tackle climate change or face deep recession, world’s leaders warned

James Randerson,
Thursday October 26, 2006

Climate change could tilt the world’s economy into the worst global recession in recent history, a report will warn next week. Sir Nicholas Stern, a former chief economist with the World Bank, will warn that governments need to tackle the problem head-on by cutting emissions or face economic ruin. The findings, due to be released on Monday, Read the complete article here:
http://environment.guardian.co.uk/climatechange/story/0,,1931542,00.html

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Most of the above links were sent in from readers of this blog, if you keep sending them I might try and make this a regular Friday thing.

But Farmers Are Not Meant To Grow Crops During Drought

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According to M. Chalmers from Bundaberg, “It has taken a long time, many years in fact, but the Government has finally admitted that Australia is suffering from a severe drought.” So begins this letter to the editor in Queensland’s rural weekly The Queensland Country Life. The letter goes on to explain that “lack of rain and water for irrigation means we have no way of growing crops or raising livestock.” Well yes, that’s how it is in a drought.

In fact, perhaps the take away message from this letter and everything else in the three rural papers I read this morning, is that while the government is crying drought and farmers are happy to pick up the millions and millions of dollars being thrown their way as ‘drought assistance’, some farmers haven’t really thought through the consequence of drought. It actually means that you shouldn’t be growing crops and it might be worth destocking rather than bringing those heifers into calf again.

Along the Murray River rice growers know that if there’s no water allocation they can’t grow a crop … and most of them don’t expect to. But interestingly in places like South Australia, where irrigators have mostly planted perennial crops including wine grapes and almonds …well they need water every year.

I guess this is why there is so much anguish when allocations to South Australia are cut to just 70 percent because of the drought. That’s right, South Austraian irrigators are getting 70 percent of their water allocation during what many commentators are claiming to be the worst drought on record.

According to ABC Online, “SA Minister for the River Murray, Karlene Maywald, says the situation is rapidly deteriorating, and that she will announce the new [70 percent] allocation figure early next month [down from 80 percent], but for now irrigators need to understand the severity of the situation.”

So how severe is the situation, really?

I’ve made some comment on this, and also the idea that wind and sun farms will stop climate change, in a piece published today by On Line Opinion:http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=5076 .