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Why Protecting the World's Wildlife is Good for Our Wallets
New body aims to promote economic as well as ethical side of biodiversity
A new world body on wildlife and ecosystems protection being set up by the UN must avoid blaming developing nations, where most of the world's biodiversity loss is occurring, says a top British scientist.
In another example, the report said that the economic value of insect pollinators, such as honey bees, in global crop production was £134bn a year. (ALAMY/AP) Overconsumption by rich western nations is as big a driver of global environmental degradation as the rapidly growing populations of developing countries, says Professor Bob Watson, a leading figure in setting up the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES).
The new body – modelled on the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) – will assess how and why the natural world is being degraded, what it will cost society, and what can be done to halt the process.
But it must avoid rows between rich and poor countries, says Professor Watson, an ex-head of the IPCC, who is Chief Scientific Adviser to Britain's Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. "If they think this is just the white world, the developed world, telling them what to do, that'll be the end of it ... The climate debate has been, 'you rich countries got rich by using cheap fossil fuels, and now you're telling us not to use them.' We must not get into that," he said. Regional assessments of biodiversity problems must be "owned" by the regions concerned, he said. So if there is a regional biodiversity assessment of Latin America, scientists from Latin America will carry it out, not foreign scientists.
Professor Watson will play a key role at a Nairobi meeting today which will decide how the new body can be formed, probably next year. Hopes are high that the IPBES might help halt the loss of global wildlife and habitats.
The IPBES is based on the increasingly influential concept of ecosystem services, that forests rivers or peat bogs are not just parts of the natural world, but produce oxygen, provide food and store atmospheric carbon, vital in the fight against climate change.
The new body, which all the major global nations back, follows on the heels of two reports: the Millennium Ecosystems Assessment of 2005, which showed that most of the world's ecosystems are in serious decline, and the report on The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity released last year, which estimated that nature and the services it provides are worth trillions of dollars annually to society.
The IPBES will aim to show the value of biodiversity both in ethical or social terms, and in economic terms.
Professor Watson is seen as the ideal person to oversee the UN's biodiversity body, as he has led international environmental assessments of all major global concerns: ozone depletion, climate change, ecosystem change and agriculture and development.
In fact, the 63-year-old atmospheric chemist, from Romford, east London, who still speaks with an East End accent, is the world's leading authority on policy responses to global change. Yet he is far from being a household name in Britain since he spent 34 years of his career in the US, where he held senior positions in NASA, the Clinton White House, and the World Bank. He chaired the IPCC from 1997 to 2002.
He says global ecosystems face a "headlong assault" from five drivers – land conversion (such as deforestation), over-exploitation (such as overfishing), the introduction of exotic species, pollution, and climate change.
And he does not think climate change can be stopped at a rise of two degrees Celsius, which is the goal of most world climate policy. "We had better be prepared to adapt to four degrees," the professor commented.
What the ecosystem is worth
Ask yourself what human society gets from a forest and the obvious answer is wood. Another obvious answer might be wildlife. Or perhaps, a pleasurable stroll. But that doesn't begin to list the benefits provided to us by a great aggregation of trees.
Forests such as the Amazon are ecosystems which provide the world with tremendous services that are essential to the continuance of human life. These include vast amounts of oxygen, and fresh water, and a beneficial climate, as well as the storing of billions of tonnes of the carbon dioxide which human industry is pumping into the atmosphere and which is causing the world to heat up, with potentially disastrous consequences. And at last, the real value of these ecosystem services is being realised.
Last year the UN released a ground-breaking report on The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity which put monetary value on the benefits the natural world provides us with. It runs into trillions of dollars annually, the report said.
For example, it suggested that the value of human welfare benefits provided by coral reefs was up to £109bn annually. The destruction of coral reefs is not only damaging to marine life but also poses risks to communities, the report said. Some 30 million people around the world rely on reef-based resources for food production, and for their livelihoods.
In another example, the report said that the economic value of insect pollinators, such as honey bees, in global crop production was £134bn a year.
Damage to natural capital including forests, wetlands and grasslands was valued at between $2trn and $4.5trn annually. But these figures are not included in economic data such as GDP, or in corporate accounts.
Now the hope is that with the IPBES, they will be taken into account, and a true picture of how much biodiversity loss is costing the world will emerge.
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Show AllSince we're on the topic of ecosystem preservation and trees, I thought I'd mention something about the alternative energy source of solar power. A friend of mine (a reformed Tea Bagger who used to deny that man-made climate change was a fact, and who now acknowledges the huge public health costs of deregulation of industry) recently sent me this interesting link about how best to maximize solar power (yes, by mimicking trees! A seventh grader figured this out!):
http://www.amnh.org/nationalcenter/youngnaturalistawards/2011/aidan.html
growing buildings/villages takes about 7-10 years
http://www.ted.com/talks/mitchell_joachim_don_t_build_your_home_grow_it.html
Mr goat, interesting link. I know a guy that grows lawn furniture. He started as a bent wood artist and one thing led to another.
[deleted by author because the formatting won't work, rendering the comment ineffective]
I'll say it again.
The key to sustainable living is;
Live off the interest
Never touch the capital
Well said, Buck. An elementary, but extremely crucial point that I too think about a lot. It would also be the sign of an intelligent society. Anything else would be dangerous insanity.
>>Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES):
The new body – modelled on the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) – will assess how and why the natural world is being degraded, what it will cost society, and what can be done to halt the process.<<
Taking the stated aim at face value, I have to say that this new institution could not have come a day sooner. And the choice of Robert Watson (ex-IPCC chairman) also bodes well. I am hoping that Watson would bring his passion and talent for working with diverse "stakeholders" to this job. I have no doubt that what matters most is passion and the ability to empathize with people in the poorer nations. From his early pronouncements on this topic, I think Robert Watson gets it right.
This is only one front in the struggle to protect biodiversity. It will most definitely be useful to have scientific data and assessment to inform the debate and the fight. The major battle may still have to be fought by the activists on the ground, unfortunately.
I definitely agree that this is at least a good step in the right direction. I honestly believe the world is starting to awaken from its long slumber, and is finally learning to consider the long term consequences of it decisions... Let's hope so!
IPBES as described will only get those Third World scientists killed by First World corporate paramilitaries and Third World elite's paramilitaries and armies run by crooked crony politicians in those countries when they start trying to preserve habitats and species in areas with resources the First World wants.
Corporate power MUST BE LIMITED by global democratic scientific habitat/species sustainability/harmonization assessors. The enforcement capabilities related to their harmonization assessments must be globally agreed to and effective. Globally stripping corporations of the legal fiction of "corporate personhood" should be step one. If that can't be achieved, then stripping that legal fiction away from American corporations should be step two.
With the limiting of corporate power in that manner should come the rise of an independent media effort to educate and persuade affluent populations in First World nations to end their excessively resource & energy consumptive lifestyles, since they, per capita, consume many more of the planet's resources much faster than populations in Third World countries--whose over-population pressures on fresh water, fisheries and arable land are of a different and more traditional nature than First World industrially intensive resource plundering.
It is possible for a global, democratically chosen scientific body of non-corporate scientists (educations paid for by a progressive global tax and an anonymous donation fund) from all countries of the world to design "harmonization plans" to achieve, over 20 to 30 years, balanced, sustainable economic, environmental and human population "harmonization" goals that work with the biosphere and not against it.
These would take into account the need for: More diffuse and smaller scale green industrial areas that conserve energy and resources and focus on NEEDS--not unsustainable desires for consumer luxuries--sustainable agricultural areas, preservation of traditional fisheries and fresh water sources, wilderness areas, green buffer zones between all these regions that could be used for exercise trails and wildlife migration route-links, human community areas, etc.
I personally do not believe large multinational corporations should be suffered by humanity to continue to exist. The International Monetary Fund and World Trade Organization as they are presently conceived should also be abolished. These "legal persons" by their very economic, political and avariciously resource intensive nature will always inevitably usurp and plunder the global commons and participatory citizen governance at the local, regional, national and international levels.
I advocate a mixture of modified participatory economic agricultural and industrial concerns with representatives in local and regional production and consumption committees that coexist and co-plan with small- to medium-sized family-owned private businesses (who would also have representatives in the modified parecon production and consumption committees to coordinate balanced and sustainable local and regional production and consumption goals).
Those goals would be constrained to operate within the scientific regional habitat "harmonization" limits set by the international body of scientists I described above.
Contemporary politicians and economists, most especially in the US and EU, have proven they are incompetent to make decisions about economically and environmentally sustainable resource distribution, land use and use of fresh water and ocean resources.
They regard human over-populations as commodities and markets that they can forever exploit by relying on endless resource plundering to generate limitless capitalistic "economic growth" that is destroying the biosphere.
These politicians and economists have become a direct threat to the national economic, environmental and citizen security of their own countries, let alone the rest of the world. The decision making system they represent is so extremely, often fanatically self-serving, easily corrupted and corrupting, and so wantonly subjective, arbitrary and capricious that it cannot be allowed by humanity to continue. It's up to all of us to stop business as usual to preserve our future as a viable species and to take adult responsibility to protect the continued evolution of the other species that share the planet with us in so far as we are humanly possible.
metal - copyright 2011
On to the touchiest subject of all:
Humane population reduction alone will alleviate many of the pressures on traditional resources in the Third World (aside from where they are simultaneously intensively plundered by First World corporations), whereas changing excessive First World resource consumption rates will require a comprehensive change in the prevailing cultural, economic and political mindsets within the First World.
The urgent need for planned, gradual and humane reductions in human over-population cannot be implemented by existing political structures, whose decision making process is subjective, self-seeking and controlled and driven by the "legal personhoods" called corporations.
Their political creation and implementation of human over-population reduction would most likely default into more, larger and more vicious resource wars coupled to the deliberate creation of regional economic conditions designed to kill large numbers of human beings due to thirst from lack of fresh water, hunger from unaffordable food and destruction of arable soil from climate change.
The second mostly likely approach by present political structures would be to rely on race and class-based eugenics that would include only somewhat watered-down Nazi ethnic and sectarian ghetto-ization, "cleansing" by brutal armed force of many areas and instances of outright military/paramilitary/mercenary genocide. We will probably see a proliferation of a combination of all of the above.
Only a global democratic body of non-corporate sponsored/controlled scientists chosen from all countries could intelligently and most objectively design and implement humane gradual population reductions commensurate with planned economic "down-growths" that are tailored to each country's and region's particular geography, species and habitats, available resources, existing cultures and human population levels.
The human populations in a given habitat who would participate in such planned population reductions and economic down-growths over time would be defined by the habitats and species they inhabit and interact with with regard to the environmental sustainability of those habitats and species and not based on any factors of any form of eugenics.
metal - copyright 2011
re: "Only a global democratic body of non-corporate sponsored/controlled scientists chosen from all countries could intelligently and most objectively design and implement humane gradual population reductions"
This issue must be dealt with, and to a degree, it will never occur without 'official policies' that help implement change, and a shift away from burgeoning population expansion.
But I disagree that this should be primarily undertaken by those who seek solutions from 'designed' or any type of systematic 'humane gradual population reductions'. Humane, and implemented are diametrically opposed ideas in this regard, imho.
Population reduction can and should happen naturally, and from the bottom up, exclusively — not from the top down. How this is best achieved is more simple, and proven for effectiveness than any other top-down effort specifically aimed at reduction itself:
Empowerment and education of women.
Give women a say in society. Give them due respect, allow them access to good jobs, good schools, good medicine, and importantly — control over their reproductive health, and the problem will sort itself out. It is, in my view, just that simple.
Overpopulation is another weapon of empire. They want a populace who understand intrinsically their replace-ability. They want the loss of individual value, and to undermine our perception of our power to make a difference. Overpopulation provides a low-wage workforce, a wider consumer base (for junk), a more easily manipulated society. So it will be sidelined and dismissed. If we wait for the system to address this issue, the result will be a virtual culling of the masses.
Empowering the disempowered women of the world with education and higher social standing, and simultaneously rejecting all of empire's frames will get us to our objective far more rapidly, and far more humanely, than any panel of scientists and politicians, no matter how well intentioned, ever can.
The empowerment of women in the Third World should play a key role in helping to sustainably harmonize human beings' relationships with each other and the biosphere, but I do not believe it will solve the problem of Third World over-population and related negative land, water and fisheries resource usage problems in and of itself. It would have had a much better chance doing so prior to the accelerated global spread of the Industrial Revolution in the late 1800s, but industrialization and corporations have changed too many factors on the ground.
Traumatic human induced changes are already underway in the biosphere that will demand many populations in the Third World change where they live and how they use the land, water, hunting and fishing resources available to them. This is because of the long aftermath of things like over-populations' and industries' severe depletion of fresh water sources, desertification, deforestation, global warming, dying coral reefs and over-fished fisheries. All of these human induced changes are driving the 6th Extinction Event which will itself have profound aftermaths.
People responsible for sustainably managing wildlife populations and crucial habitats in wilderness refuges, parks and preserves in the Third World often try to get the women in nearby villages on their side so that the women will get the children and men gradually on their side to do things like try to move to a tourist based economy instead of hunting endangered species as bush meat.
So would I want to empower women to, in addition to help them in the ways you describe, enlist their support for my habitat harmonizations to protect the environment for their progeny going forward.
One basic example of how empowered women and my system could work together: If desertification compels a tribe to move to a new region or habitat type with which they are unfamiliar, then my system could pre-map the best village sites to build a new village on that won't contribute to soil erosion or overuse of available fresh water supply but are located close to a good sources of marine protein and arable land. We could show the possibilities of these new locations to the women and the men in the village and if the women are already sympathetic to our harmonization goals they could help persuade the other village members to consider the sites we show them as opposed to, say, sites with a temporary abundance of bush meat (until its all hunted out in a couple of years) but poor water supplies, little arable land or other food sources.
Think of my ideas as sort of a biosphere human & wildlife sustainability management system with regionally dedicated scientific habitat researchers, park ranger scientists and a much more scientifically informed geographic information management system supporting it that is capable of generating very long term sustainability/harmonization plans with the overall goal of biological, environmentally sustainable economic, and cultural stability. I want to see as much of a return to somatic evolution in the remnant natural world as possible and reclaim habitats and species into that evolution where practicable.
Not sure where to start in my response, but here goes:
I find all of your suggestions valid metal, and only find myself nodding in agreement as I read... I just wanted to add some of my own thoughts.
The main one is about framing, and why you and so many others come to the conclusion that, "these politicians and economists have become a direct threat ... [the] system they represent is so extremely, often fanatically self-serving". Indeed. For me, this frame is summed up in the article's statement, "most of the world's ecosystems are in serious decline [...] nature and the services it provides are worth trillions of dollars annually to society."
No, they're NOT, goddammit! Their value is BEYOND human estimation. Their value is not possible to delineate in terms of dollars, or any other currency for that matter. Nature's life sustaining value is infinite, and beyond comprehension!
The beginning of any effort to sustain our biosphere must move beyond the ideas of monetary, or commodity values, and over to ideas of Biological ontology, and a deep appreciation of the realities of long-term Terran existence. More than ever, or choices at this historical period will determine the fate of all future life on Earth, and we better get this right.
That is why I believe that no 'world body' meant to defend our planet's biodiversity can be effective without embracing an oath or charter such as the Universal Declaration of the Rights of Mother Earth, or very similar declaration.
Secondly, I believe a new meme must spread, and take center stage in this debate: Which resources represtent The Commons, and which are the right of corporations to privatetize?
My answer is none. I do believe in individual ownership of property, but I do not believe it is the right of any corporation to commandeer, posses, or claim for their own profit any resource which comes directly to them from Earth itself, whether this be air, water, soil, energy, precious metals, petroleum, natural gas, etc. etc. These resources belong to all Earthlings, including the plants and animals, which are denied their benefits after privatization. Private industry should be paid for their services of extraction, processing, and delivery, certainly, but the natural resources should be profitable for all in their exploitation.
How would this be handled?
I believe there must eventually be instituted an 'Earth Renewal Fund', run by responsible stewards and scientists, administered with democratic oversight in similar fashion to a national bank, which allocates funds towards an Earth preservation agenda, and ensures the prosperity of all its shareholders — the public at large, and all the biodiversity of Earth.
Consumers purchasing products at retail would pay not only the private suppliers like BP, or Bechtel et al, but also this Earth Renewal Fund in large proportion. Under this schematic, all profits accrued by private industry would be 'creative' and ecologically 'compensated' profits, rather than 'exploitative' and 'uncompensated' profits. There would be no such thing as 'ripping off the commons', because inherently speaking, all commons must be paid for upon their harvesting, by matter of law.
Undoubtedly, a deep and uncomfortable shift in consciousness would need to precede this approach. But what is better, an uncomfortable shift to avert disaster, or an uncomfortable shift being forced to deal with an inevitable disaster?
Privatization is THEFT!
Deregulation is CORRUPTION!
Corporate Personhood is A WEAPON AGAINST WE THE PEOPLE!
I think the argument "that nature and the services it provides are worth trillions of dollars annually to society" is VITAL, if only to convince the majority of the population that seems easily swayed by a bogus 'environment vs. jobs' bullshit that one sees and hears day in and day out. It is true that their "value is BEYOND human estimation" but it is a useful argument that has shown itself to be effective in some cases. It is important to make some people, well actually, a LOT of people, to understand that the value of nature is not just in the imagination of some treehuggers and that it is truly worth protecting, and that it is important to think long term and not just short term.
re: "the argument .... VITAL, if only to convince the majority"
OK. Yes, to convince the majority, at least by the majority's current standards. I agree that in the short term it is a vital argument to make.
But eventually, we as a species must come to see that 'profit' is what enriches and improves the world around us, not just our lives relative to it. Under that assumption, our riches increase as the largess of the world decreases, or when 'commodities are ideally exploited' to provide 'maximum yields'. The forces at work behind the recent speculation on food commodities displays the tendency for the investment class to see a reduction, or 'balance' in supply as a good thing.
Explaining to corporations that maintaining a robust environment provides the greatest long term profit, begs the question to the corporations: Well then, how can I *most efficiently* harness these new profits? How can I exploit 'sustainability' for my benefit, and to serve my own personal ends? There is no required shift in perspective about our place on Earth, and what role we should be playing.
Do you see, even applying the profit motive to the idea of ecological preservation and sustainability plants the poison seed in the equation? The threat to the commons AND the biosphere IS the profit motive.
Please understand, like many of my comments, this is a nuanced difference of perspective, not an outright dismissal. I applaud the effort and the ideas presented, but wanted to add what I consider an essential point, considering the long-term stakes we face being such small and arrogant beings misusing this sacred planet which supports us all.
Cheers Alcyon
I see your point, SS. None of this kind of assessment would be necessary at all if the society as a whole has not moved so far away from a sustainable way of life. This move away from sustainability started even before the current form of capitalism and the predatory corporations became dominant, but obviously the deterioration accelerated once corporations took control.
Dismantling corporate control is a separate battle that would require change at all levels, including and especially in people's understanding of nature and our place in it. Until that happens, all these little battles need to be fought. I say "little battles", but the fight to avert climate change-induced disaster is probably the biggest fight of all.
But none of these battles would be required if a majority of the population had the right kind of understanding. And I think that is what your "eventually, we as a species...." comment refers to. Until then, these other battles need to be fought. And I welcome any information and knowledge that would help in these efforts.
I am not thinking of "explaining to corporations that maintaining a robust environment provides the greatest long term profit". The people who need to understand the value of nature are the majority. Would it be better if this "value" was understood not in monetary terms? No question. But as long as there are people - a lot of them - who are confused and swayed by this 'jobs vs. environment' talk that is thrown about at the drop of a hat, we are going to need counter arguments. Unfortunately.
I meant to edit the following paragraph, and didn't get my changes in quick enough : )
This may go a ways towards clarifying my point:
No they're not! ... Their value is BEYOND human estimation, and beyond even human consideration. Their value is not possible to delineate in terms of dollars, or any other currency for that matter. Nature's life sustaining value is infinite in terms of human and market considerations. The derivatives market itself is said to be worth hundreds and hundreds of trillions... but its true value is -nothing- in ecological terms.
You say: "The main one is about framing, and why you and so many others come to the conclusion that, 'these politicians and economists have become a direct threat ... [the] system they represent is so extremely, often fanatically self-serving'. Indeed. For me, this frame is summed up in the article's statement, 'most of the world's ecosystems are in serious decline [...] nature and the services it provides are worth trillions of dollars annually to society.'"
What you are trying to say here is unclear to me.
To me, the weekly actions of Western politicians in the EU and US with respect to their politically self-serving sellouts of environmental protections, habitats and species that harm the economic common good and the human (and other species') habitability of the biosphere are self-evident. Obama's recent flip on ozone rules, which violated existing laws and has been shown that it will lead to the deaths of many thousands of Americans is a perfect example, but only one of an increasing number of such immoral decisions delivered by our amoral-to-immoral Western political decision making system, which is subjective, indifferent to science (except where it is profitable for corporate donors to political election campaigns) and proven incapable of good governance with respect to the environment, especially on the global scale now called for to confront mega-threats like global warming.
My general critique of your comments is that you seem to think too much inside the corporate, multi-national corporate, for-profit, money-based economic box with respect to the environment. I am more of a Kropotkinist influenced by some aspects of parecon, but who still believes in small and medium-sized private business ownership but only in parallel cooperation with parecon local, smaller scale industrial and agricultural worker enterprises.
Hi metal
re: "What you are trying to say here is unclear to me."
First, let me clarify that I was agreeing with you (thus the 'indeed'). My 'No they're not', was certainly not directed at you, but at those who continue to see Earth's natural resources as 'commodities' or 'riches'. I'm not sure if that was clear. I'm completely with you when you stated, "these politicians and economists have become a direct threat "
re: "a perfect example, but only one of an increasing number of such immoral decisions delivered by our amoral-to-immoral Western political decision making system, which is ... proven incapable of good governance with respect to the environment.
Again, no disagreement whatsoever.
re: "you seem to think too much inside the corporate, multi-national corporate, for-profit, money-based economic box with respect to the environment."
Well, I understand that this was the reputation I forged for myself last year, but I believe I have amply demonstrated since my upholding of the opposite convictions. Specifically here in this thread, I have boldly stated the exact opposite (see my response to Alcyon), so I honestly feel your characterization is unfair and unwarranted.
My essential point was in agreement with your original post, and was only intended to take the logical implications even further. I was speaking in support of no less than a complete overhaul of the way we view our economic relationship to the planet and it's resources.
To reiterate, I believe that in the same sense of nationalized banking systems, there needs to be established an even more fundamental resource distribution and ecological compensation body (not a bank, a syndicate of naturalists, scientists, and ecologists) which monitors and democratically regulates all harvesting of Earth's resources, to ensure these 'commodities of the commons' retain their value and availability at all times -to the commons-. It would be like a huge eco-resource 'banking' (maintenance) infrastructure intended to keep track of our ecological savings and investments; on top of which —and dependent upon the former — would rest our financial banking infrastructure.
The entire purpose of this is the reassertion of the public's, and the planet's rights-of-ownership over all natural resources, instead of allowing the ongoing Capitalist frame which facilitates private acquisition of the commons. I uphold that all the worlds petroleum belongs already to the people, but even more importantly, to the Earth. If a private company gains access to this commodity, they must FIRST pay Earth (Thus the Earth Renewal Fund), 2nd Pay the People (or don't charge them at all for the commodity — it's already theirs), and 3rd, pay the company's shareholders.
I know its 'out-there', but I hope that clarifies my idea.
Finally, I am dedicated both to a very strong decentralizing influence on gov't, and to a powerful, but transparent and democratically run centralizing influence — essentially supporting anti-authoritarian and constitutional Democratic Socialism. Additionally, I'm in the process reading Kropotkin's 'Mutual Aid', Dugatkin's 'Prince of Evolution', and Orwell's 'Homage to Catalonia' in an effort to better familiarize and take to heart the methods and ideologies behind parecon. I am certainly more inclined so support a dynamic and mixed economy which supports both anarcho-syndicalism, and regulated forms of 'compensated' capitalism.
As a final note, I'd like to thank guitarist for the book recommendations. I'm finding the reading convincing, essential and enjoyable. An intrinsic part of what I call the 'Tao of Politics'.
If I had meant to actually characterize what you said I would not have used the word "seemed." I used it to prompt you to elaborate further.
The heart of your idea as I understand it is expressed as a:
"resource distribution and ecological compensation body (not a bank, a syndicate of naturalists, scientists, and ecologists) which monitors and democratically regulates all harvesting of Earth's resources, to ensure these 'commodities of the commons' retain their value and availability at all times -to the commons-. It would be like a huge eco-resource 'banking' (maintenance) infrastructure intended to keep track of our ecological savings and investments; on top of which —and dependent upon the former — would rest our financial banking infrastructure...The entire purpose of this is the reassertion of the public's, and the planet's rights-of-ownership over all natural resources, instead of allowing the ongoing Capitalist frame which facilitates private acquisition of the commons."
[Source: Salusa Secondus, http://www.commondreams.org/comment/reply/74689/1945472]
This is not that "out there" a concept in my opinion. It goes one step further than my idea of a global body of democratically elected non-corporate scientists who generate regional habitat plans that harmonize human populations, animal and plant species populations and their habitats in a sustainable manner over time as described in my other posts on this article.
Under my system, the scientists would come up with the habitat harmonization plans--regularly updated by real time data and state-of-the-art medium and long-term computer modeling of the biosphere in depth--and set some general and some specific limits on traditional (subsistence, indigenous), parecon or small to medium-sized business resource extraction.
Those limits would be hard limits with enforcement powers to shut down any entities, traditional, parecon or private businesses who try by hook or crook to exceed them. But within those limits, those entities can operate and cooperate to achieve economic & market efficiencies. So long as they don't violate the harmonization plan parameters in terms of excessive resource pollution, extraction or destruction, I feel they should be left to provide human needs and some human wants as best as they and their communities within a given region/habitat see fit.
This system leaves the economic distribution to those good at distribution and leaves the science to those expert at science with science acting as the final arbiter and limiter on extractive and distributive excess.
The problem I have with your idea is that it splits the function of the scientist into scientist and resource banker/compensation valuer. This goes beyond the clear scientific objective of ensuring the availability of natural resources, habitats and species for future generations and requires that the scientists put on economists' hats and market traders' hats to determine compensation values of specific resources.
I think that trying to permanently wed those tasks would tend to constantly distract scientists from one task to the other and corrupt both of them over time.
As scientifically planned economic down-growths simultaneous with planned humane human population reductions begin to take place, there would be a period of several decades where the scientists would be called upon more intensively for scientific input and advice in terms of helping to balance needs-based resource utilization, relative resource values and downward population growth. But once habitats, human populations and populations of other species have been balanced for long-term sustainability by attaining the harmonization plan goals, the need to call on the scientists regarding economic questions will be less and less.
Once the biosphere is harmonized, the scientists can and should be called upon as advisors to explain relative ecological merits and values of habitats, species and other natural resources when asked, but I feel that day-to-day human/resource interactions and exchanges should be left as much as possible to those more familiar with the resource distributive process so long as it doesn't violate the hard limits of the harmonization plans.
The scientists will have a hard enough task generating, monitoring in depth and regularly updating the harmonization plans themselves to reflect constantly changing real world conditions and modeling anticipated biosphere changes reflecting climate change, human population fluctuations, and other related changes. If their harmonization plans for the world's habitats are rigorous enough and the scientifically determined limits on resource utilization enforced, the economics within traditional, parecon and small-to-medium-sized private business interactions should take care of themselves.
metal - copyright 2011
metal,
Thank you for all of your responses. I'll be quite busy today, and so won't be able to follow up most likely until this evening. Your ideas are excellent, detailed and more than intriguing, so I want to give them the time they merit before making my reply.
Until then, Peace and Resistance!
Only 9 comments so far on our race to oblivion--that says it all. Except for the few heros, the couple percent who care are so discouraged as to no longer even be capable of commenting. There are one hell of a lot of stupid people out there!
"Ask yourself what human society gets from a forest... "
I find it stunning that that in 2011 there is still not one mention of these forests BEING INHABITED ALREADY!!!!! and by peoples who are intimately familiar with them. Yet even CD is utterly blind to a journalism that needs to be looking at this.
If the author of the article were to ask the peoples who have lived for millennia in these forests, the article would be entirely different!
Anyone who believes that the crisis generated by western society is going to be resolved without full-fledged consultation with the indigenous peoples, their languages and sciences, is sound asleep at the wheel of a runaway locomotive.
Touché and great point old goat. I wish I had brought it up.
But that's why they say, 'It takes a village'... In this case, it takes a rural, indigenous village with intimate familiarity and knowledge of the ecosystem which it inhabits.
Plus you, og, to remind us of that.
"estimated that nature and the services it provides are worth trillions of dollars annually to society"
You don't measure the value of nature in dollers. And yet there is the Independent doing just that. And unfortunately, most people will accept it as 'ok' simply because it's a familiar practice. Repeated over and over in elite media until it becomes 'normal'. Obviously the elite media's repetition of lies/fallacies does not make them right. But it's less than obvious until we start thinking for ourselves. Notice the Independent isn't advocating we think for ourselves. Granted, it may do worst, by advocating planetary destruction. But the perpetrators do not promote destruction by advocating it, rather they promote destruction while pretending to be objective. Measuring the value of nature in dollers is not objective. It's bizarre.