Jennifer Marohasy

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Kin and Country – The Cape York Indigenous Conservation Agenda (Part II)

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The progress of the Cape York Conservation Agenda is carving a deepening rift between indigenous interests and those of metropolitan-based ‘green’ groups. Whilst the former lobbies for social engagement within real economies, the latter crusades for an often over-simplified notion of environmental protection. Over-arching this ideological tussle, government verily executes authority for the political rewards of popular support.

Considered a significant conservation achievement by the Wilderness Society, Queensland’s Wild Rivers Act was declared in 2005 for the stated purpose of preserving the natural values of rivers that have all, or almost all, of their natural values intact (in Cape York could have sufficed).

The more recently introduced Cape York Peninsula Heritage Bill 2007, purports to provide for the identification and cooperative and ecologically sustainable management of significant natural and cultural values of Cape York Peninsula. It also restores rights to the exercise or enjoyment of native title, under the amended provisions of the Wild Rivers Act and establishes a new class of protected area under the Nature Conservation Act 1992; namely national parks (Cape York Peninsula Aboriginal land).

The Queensland Government has offered an indigenous economic and employment package, including confirmation of 100 indigenous ranger positions and support for indigenous arts, culture and tourism enterprises. Of course, the nature of this support will greatly influence the outcome of the package.

Current arrangements on Cape York merely provide the public with an illusion of conservation for significant natural and cultural values. Reserves have been declared and land management agencies provided with statutory authority and budgetary allocations, but much of Cape York’s natural and cultural heritage is excluded from subsidized economies and tourism markets tend to go where the getting is more profitable.

The Cape Tribulation section of the Daintree National Park is a relevant example: Half-a-million visitors per year cross the Daintree River ferry, but commercial activity entitlements are almost exclusively held by operators from the abundantly developed accommodation hubs of Port Douglas and Cairns, whilst independent travelers are completely subsidized to enjoy access entitlements without any payment whatsoever.

The full gamut of government influence, including permit allocation and moratoria, subsidization on a tenure-exclusive basis and ecologically protective development impediments on non-government tenures, ensures that very little economic benefit goes to the community within the attraction. This paradox is fundamentally important to Australia.

If isolated communities are required to conserve their natural and cultural heritage values, without reverting the landscape to the kind of conflicting development that underpins the economies of regional accommodation centres, they must be provided with prosperous conservation economies.

Such a requirement would be achieved with far greater success, with the removal of contradictory influences. Indeed, if Australia was to invert its influences, so that commercial activity entitlements were exclusively issued to local operators and full-cost-recovery was required on public reserves only, whilst off-reserve conservation land-uses were subsidized to the full extent to provide visitors with the illusion of free-entry, change in tourism economies would swiftly swing in favour of the communities at the centre of conservation significance.

Exxon Mobile Saves Tigers? A Note from Ann Novek

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Brendan Moyle has previously provided us with alternative ways to save tigers from extinction.

Now the World Federation of Chinese Medicine Societies states that tiger parts are not necessary for traditional medicines, and alternatives are available and effective. Can this statement from the organisation save tigers?

Excerpts from an opinion letter to the Los Angeles Times , by Vinod Thomas, director general of the Independent Evaluation Group at the World Bank states :

“How has the tiger’s fate come to this? The foremost reason is poaching to meet demand for tiger products used in traditional medicines in China and other parts of East Asia. The other crucial factor is the continuous loss of tiger habitat, which is down by about 40% across India in the last decade, along with which has disappeared much of its prey.

“To make matters worse, there now is relentless pressure from tiger farmers in East Asia to legalize the trade in the bones, fur, paws, penis and teeth of their animals. On the surface, the case made for legalizing the sale of tiger parts is beguiling. By flooding the market with parts from farm-raised tigers, it’s argued, prices will plummet, reducing the profitability of poaching. A cited analogy: People don’t hunt wild turkeys for Thanksgiving when supermarkets overflow with farmed supplies.

“But to reduce poaching, those who raise tigers in captivity would need to undercut the cost of supplying the parts from wild tigers. That’s improbable. Poaching in India, by poisoning or with simple steel traps, costs less than $100 a tiger (plus transport and other costs). Raising one in captivity — even three or more to a cage — costs about $3,000.

“Conservationists warn that legalizing the tiger trade would be the death knell for tigers in the wild. That’s because it will always be cheaper to hunt tigers, and poaching will be less risky if poached parts can be easily laundered — that is, passed off as coming from captive-bred animals”.

“What now?

“It is essential to deal with poaching and the demand for tiger parts in traditional medicine immediately. The World Federation of Chinese Medicine Societies states that tiger parts are not necessary for traditional medicines, and alternatives are available and effective. So there are solid reasons to strongly enforce the international ban on the tiger trade, and for China to keep its 1993 domestic ban securely in place.”

“As the symbol of countries, teams and corporations, the tiger has helped sell beer, sports goods and breakfast cereal. Now it could use some high-profile reciprocity. Support from private corporations — such as Exxon Mobil’s Save the Tiger Fund — as well as the Asian business diaspora and international agencies could prove decisive. But the moment for action is now. Without immediate financial and political commitments, it will be too late to save this mesmerizing animal”

So can the tigers survive with the help of Exxon Mobile , that Greenpeace has proclaimed as the “Criminal # 1 of the Planet”?

Ann Novek
Sweden

Another One Bites The Dust

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VA State Climatologist skeptical of global warming loses job after clash with Governor: ‘I was told that I could not speak in public’

Excerpt: Gov. Kaine had warned Michaels not to use his official title in discussing his views.

“I resigned as Virginia state climatologist because I was told that I could not speak in public on my area of expertise, global warming, as state climatologist,” Michaels said in a statement this week provided by the libertarian Cato Institute, where he has been a fellow since 1992. “It was impossible to maintain academic freedom with this speech restriction.”

Less Visibility in Store After Boss’s Departure

Global Warming Views Drew Criticism

By Jackie Spinner Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, September 29, 2007; Page B03

Maybe Patrick Michaels should apply to Soros for funding to protect free speech!?

An Inconvenient Youth

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Wall Street Journal

‘Mom, we gotta buy a hybrid!’ Kids are becoming the green movement’s stealth weapon, pressuring their parents on everything from lightbulbs to composting. Inside the push to create the littlest eco-warriors.

Inconvenient Youths: Eco-warrior kids go after parents for ‘environmental offenses’

Excerpt: In households across the country, kids are going after their parents for environmental offenses, from using plastic cups to serving non-grass-fed beef at the dinner table. Many of these kids are getting more explicit messages about becoming eco-warriors at school and from popular books and movies. This year’s global-warming documentary “Arctic Tale,” for instance, closes with a child actor telling kids, “If your mom and dad buy a hybrid car, you’ll make it easier for polar bears to get around.”

Kids on field trips to the Garbage Museum in Stratford, Conn., are sent home with instructions to recycle cans, bottles, newspaper and junk mail. The museum hosted 388 schools visits last year, 42 more than the year before. At one California elementary school, kids are given environmental activities to do with their families — including one where parents have to yank out the refrigerator and clean the coils to make it more energy efficient.

“Kids are putting pressure on their parents, and this is a very good thing,” says Laurie David, a producer of the documentary “An Inconvenient Truth.” Ms. David is the co-author of a new children’s book, “The Down-to-Earth Guide to Global Warming,” which urges kids, among other things, to petition mom and dad for recycled-fiber toilet paper.

“I know how powerful my kids are,” she says. “When they want something, forget it — all the resistance in the world isn’t going to help you.”

Read more:

Inconvenient Youths: Eco-warrior kids go after parents for ‘environmental offenses’

The Ecological Impacts of Electricity in the Daintree

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“How do you think the unique fauna of the Daintree rainforest will fare against anthropogenic global warming?”

The inquiry was put to me last night at the conclusion of a nocturnal wildlife spotting tour and such questions are becoming more frequent.

I answered that I understood that the greatest losses suffered by the inhabitants of the ancient forests of Gondwana were brought about by global cooling and drying via circumpolar currents derived from the break-up of the super-continents; particularly the separation of Australia from Antarctica. A warmer, wetter climate should favour an expansion of tropical rainforest habitat.

Renewables.jpg

Earlier in the day I was dealing with another concern that had previously compelled government intervention to purportedly protect the important ecological values of the Daintree from the adverse impacts of non-renewable electricity generation. On the 7th May 2000, the Queensland Government adopted an amended electricity policy for the area north of the Daintree River:

The extension of mains electricity supply was opposed and, as an alternative, the use of stand-alone power systems was to be supported. (Right of appeal: Not applicable).

The Daintree Futures Study 2000, states (p 99): Underlying this policy … is the belief that renewable energy generation is desirable in the Daintree as a demonstration of commitment to sustainable energy development and sensitivity to the special values of the area.

It had become apparent that our household reliance upon engine generators had increased significantly over the previous six months and solar contribution had declined through the impact of a lightning strike. I had dreaded this inevitability; large, prominent metallic structures strategically positioned to optimize unobstructed access to sunlight (and lightning). Tell-tale burns were revealed on the newer, more powerful 738 watt string of the four-string array.

The Daintree Futures Study 2000, states (p 99): Businesses in the Daintree Cape Tribulation area are currently not eligible for any subsidy programs for RAPS systems. This is despite a statement by the Minister for Mines and Energy in October, 1999 that, “A commercial rebate scheme is also to be introduced”. The lack of a subsidy has likely hampered economic development, as businesses have had to fund substantial capital to establish their generation plant, and higher operating and maintenance costs. The variable cost to generate power privately via diesel generators will be in the order of 25-35 cents/kWh compared to grid subsidised power costs of 10 cents/kWh. Businesses such as hotels and accommodation facilities will have annual power demand of between 50 000kWh and 1GWh per annum (any reasonable size business would have a power demand of 50 000kWh per annum or greater). The additional annual cost, adjusted for company tax, of self-generation versus grid will be in the range of $5 000 to $167 000.

The Queensland Remote Area Power Supplies (RAPS) Trials 1999 (Walden & Behrendorff), summarized data in the fastidiously maintained Daintree Cape Tribulation sites at 82-3% reliant upon engine generation.

Indeed, over the past seven years, not only have fuel prices skyrocketed, but residents and business-owners within the Daintree Cape Tribulation community have carried the cost of supply, maintenance and replacement of components, at as much as twenty-times the total cost per kilowatt-hour of other Queensland consumers.

It is incongruous, to say the least, that the excision from the distribution area was for the stated purpose of conforming with the government’s environmental policies, when its consequences include hundreds of concurrently running engine generators with their noise, fuel and oil spills. For a community with a regulated conservation management responsibility, generators simply do not make the grade.