Sunday, December 21, 2008
Tuesday, December 16, 2008
Thursday, December 11, 2008
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
Throughput
From THE ECONOMICS OF THE COMING SPACESHIP EARTH
By Kenneth E. Boulding, 1966
.........The gross national product is a rough measure of this total throughput. It should be possible, however, to distinguish that part of the GNP which is derived from exhaustible and that which is derived from reproducible resources, as well as that part of consumption which represents effluvia and that which represents input into the productive system again. Nobody, as far as I know, has ever attempted to break down the GNP in this way, although it Would be an interesting and extremely important exercise, which is unfortunately beyond the scope of this paper.
By contrast, in the spaceman economy, throughput is by no means a desideratum, and is indeed to be regarded as something to be minimized rather than maximized. The essential measure of the success of the economy is not production and consumption at all, but the nature, extent, quality, and complexity of the total capital stock, including in this the state of the human bodies and minds included in the system. In the spaceman economy, what we are primarily concerned with is stock maintenance, and any technological change which results in the maintenance of a given total stock with a lessened throughput (that is, less production and consumption) is clearly a gain. This idea that both production and consumption are bad things rather than good things is very strange to economists, who have been obsessed with tile income-flow concepts to the exclusion, almost, of capital-stock concepts......
Beyond GDP 2008
There are numerous new "indicators" but... 42 years...
By Kenneth E. Boulding, 1966
.........The gross national product is a rough measure of this total throughput. It should be possible, however, to distinguish that part of the GNP which is derived from exhaustible and that which is derived from reproducible resources, as well as that part of consumption which represents effluvia and that which represents input into the productive system again. Nobody, as far as I know, has ever attempted to break down the GNP in this way, although it Would be an interesting and extremely important exercise, which is unfortunately beyond the scope of this paper.
By contrast, in the spaceman economy, throughput is by no means a desideratum, and is indeed to be regarded as something to be minimized rather than maximized. The essential measure of the success of the economy is not production and consumption at all, but the nature, extent, quality, and complexity of the total capital stock, including in this the state of the human bodies and minds included in the system. In the spaceman economy, what we are primarily concerned with is stock maintenance, and any technological change which results in the maintenance of a given total stock with a lessened throughput (that is, less production and consumption) is clearly a gain. This idea that both production and consumption are bad things rather than good things is very strange to economists, who have been obsessed with tile income-flow concepts to the exclusion, almost, of capital-stock concepts......
Beyond GDP 2008
There are numerous new "indicators" but... 42 years...
Monday, November 24, 2008
System breaks and positive feedback as sources of catastrophe
Kenneth £. Boulding - 1986
IV. VULNERABILITY IN SOCIAL SYSTEMS
Social systems can exhibit nearly all these different kinds of system breaks
and catastrophes. Positive feedback may be
more common in social systems than it is in other systems. A quarrel is a good example:
A does something that is offensive to B, so B does something that is offensive to A, so A does something more offensive to B, and B something still more offensive to A, and so on, until the situation explodes in a fight, a law suit, or even a murder. The arms race is another very good example: A feels insecure and increases its arms, which makes B feel less secure and therefore it increases its arms, which makes A feel still less secure, so it increases its arms, which makes B feel still less secure, so it increases its arms, and so on. Sometimes these positive feedback processes can reach an equilibrium. Very often, however, they go on until there is a system break. A great many wars indeed are a result of the breakdown of systems of
deterrence that have led into arms races.
In economic systems, we see many examples of positive feedback. Inflation
is often a good example, particularly where it is the result of an inadequate
tax system leading to budget deficits, which are financed in part at least by the
creation of money, which increases the price level, which increases the government
expenditures. Often receipts do not catch up, so that the deficit increases, which
leads to more inflation, which leads to still further deficits, more inflation, and
so on. This process sometimes ends up in hyperinflation, as in Germany in 1923
or Hungary in 1946, in which the price level can double every week or even every
day. This, however, eventually becomes intolerable and the old currency is called
in, a new currency is-estabhshed, with an improved tax system that creates much
greater stability.
The Great Depression of 1929 to 1933 was another very good example of positive feedback. It started with a speculative collapse in the Stock Market, which diminished and also redistributed net worth on a very large scale, driving many people into bankruptcy, which led to widespread pessimism, which diminished investment. This in turn diminished profits, which confirmed the pessimism and led to more pessimism, less investment, lower profits, still less investment, still lower profits, and so on, until by 1932 and 1933 profits were negative, net investment was virtually zero, interest had about doubled as a proportion of the national income, unemployment was 25 percent of the labor force. Then, for some reason that is still not wholly clear, although related in time to the election of President Roosevelt, whose charismatic personality seemed to
cheer many people up, investment recovered, profits recovered, investment recovered
still further, profits still further, until 1937. The process was interrupted by a
small depression in 1938, possibly related to the government cash surplus prod-
uced by the introduction of Social Security. Then, of course, comes rearmament
and the Second World War, which reduced unemployment virtually to zero, but
also severely diminished gross private domestic investment and state and local
government. These processes are very complex and it is often hard to distinguish
between positive and negative feedback. One of the saddest examples of positive
feedback is the development of cultures of violence, such as we see in Northern
Ireland, Lebanon, Sri Lanka, the Sikhs in India, and so on. Here again, violence
produces more violence, which produces more violence, and so on. Sometimes
this stabilizes out at a certain level; sometimes it degenerates into general civil
war.
V. DEVELOPMENT AS POSITIVE FEEDBACK:INTERRUPTIONS AS SYSTEM CHANGE
Economic development is another positive feedback process, much more be-
nign than most social processes. It is a process essentially in human learning and
know-how. There is a level of poverty which can be very stable simply because
no resources can be spared either for human learning or for the accumulation
of physical goods which supplement and express the human learning. Beyond a
certain point, however, resources can be devoted to human learning and to the
accumulation of goods, and the more we know, often the easier it is to learn. The
more goods we have, the easier it is to add to them. This process may eventually
reach some sort of equilibrium in a stationary state, either because with the exi-
sting techniques for adding to knowledge learning becomes increasingly difficult
and the increase in knowledge slows down, or because other factors develop,
such as war, which destroy the capital accumulations, or even because of the
development of widespread unemployment and the failure to utilize resources.
It is often hard to distinguish what turns out to be an interruption in the
system from what turns out to be a fundamental system change. Economic
development is a good example. It is frequently interrupted by wars or by
depressions, yet these have a relatively short lifespan relative to the total process,
and once they are over and peace and prosperity are restored, development begins
again, and very often indeed at an accelerated pace. The ultimate result is then
not very different from what it would have been if the interruption had not
taken place. We see this, for instance, in a country like Japan, which started
on a process of economic development about 1870, interrupted a little by the
Korean Empire, and severely interrupted by the Second World War, which was
utterly devastating. After the war recovery took place at even an accelerated
pace, until by about the 1970s Japan was economically about where it would
have been if it had not been to war and had continued to grow at its pre-war
pace.
The Great Depression likewise can be seen as an interruption in the develop-
ment of most of the countries of the Western world. In the communist countries
likewise we see a similar phenomenon. Stalin and the "First Collectivization"
was a very serious interruption in the development of the Soviet Union, one in-
deed from which they are still not fully recovered. The "Great Leap Forward" in
China turned out to be a leap backward. The "Cultural Revolution" similarly
was an interruption in Chinese development. The growth of human knowledge,
however, on which development depends, is a process of positive feedback that
seems remarkably hard to stop, although there are examples of economic stag-
nation, for instance, in the Islamic world after about 1300, which can only be
explained by political repression of the human learning process.
The "strain-strength" model is of great importance in social systems, which
often suffer very sudden transitions when the strain on the system is greater than
its internal strength. The outbreak of war is almost always such an occasion,
which is one reason why it is so hard to predict and why the concept of the
"causes" of war is a very unsatisfactory one. A revolution is another example.
Just exactly what it is that gives a social system strength to resist a sudden strain
is by no means always clear. Certainly in the case of war the "strength" of the
system is often quite inverse to the amount spent on armaments, which easily
leads to a weakening of the overall system and a diminution in overall security.
Just what it is that makes some marriages survive until the death of one of the
partners, whereas others end in divorce, is, again, often very puzzling. The causes
of marital breakdown are almost as complex as the causes of the breakdown of
international peace. Sometimes it is an almost imperceptible boundary between
the negative feedback processes which lead to stability and the positive feedback
processes which lead into catastrophe. Here again, the structure of systems
is often a very poor guide to their dynamics. All complex systems can get into
patterns that lead to their destabilization and move them into extreme positions,
like Hitler's Germany or Cambodia's Khmer Rouge. It is all the more important,
particularly at the present, that we develop negative feedback processes in the
system of unilateral national defense which can reduce the strain on the system
and diminish the likelihood of catastrophe.
http://www.esee2009.si/
A Matter of Opinion - How Ecological and Neoclassical Environmental Economists
think about Sustainability and Economics
IV. VULNERABILITY IN SOCIAL SYSTEMS
Social systems can exhibit nearly all these different kinds of system breaks
and catastrophes. Positive feedback may be
more common in social systems than it is in other systems. A quarrel is a good example:
A does something that is offensive to B, so B does something that is offensive to A, so A does something more offensive to B, and B something still more offensive to A, and so on, until the situation explodes in a fight, a law suit, or even a murder. The arms race is another very good example: A feels insecure and increases its arms, which makes B feel less secure and therefore it increases its arms, which makes A feel still less secure, so it increases its arms, which makes B feel still less secure, so it increases its arms, and so on. Sometimes these positive feedback processes can reach an equilibrium. Very often, however, they go on until there is a system break. A great many wars indeed are a result of the breakdown of systems of
deterrence that have led into arms races.
In economic systems, we see many examples of positive feedback. Inflation
is often a good example, particularly where it is the result of an inadequate
tax system leading to budget deficits, which are financed in part at least by the
creation of money, which increases the price level, which increases the government
expenditures. Often receipts do not catch up, so that the deficit increases, which
leads to more inflation, which leads to still further deficits, more inflation, and
so on. This process sometimes ends up in hyperinflation, as in Germany in 1923
or Hungary in 1946, in which the price level can double every week or even every
day. This, however, eventually becomes intolerable and the old currency is called
in, a new currency is-estabhshed, with an improved tax system that creates much
greater stability.
The Great Depression of 1929 to 1933 was another very good example of positive feedback. It started with a speculative collapse in the Stock Market, which diminished and also redistributed net worth on a very large scale, driving many people into bankruptcy, which led to widespread pessimism, which diminished investment. This in turn diminished profits, which confirmed the pessimism and led to more pessimism, less investment, lower profits, still less investment, still lower profits, and so on, until by 1932 and 1933 profits were negative, net investment was virtually zero, interest had about doubled as a proportion of the national income, unemployment was 25 percent of the labor force. Then, for some reason that is still not wholly clear, although related in time to the election of President Roosevelt, whose charismatic personality seemed to
cheer many people up, investment recovered, profits recovered, investment recovered
still further, profits still further, until 1937. The process was interrupted by a
small depression in 1938, possibly related to the government cash surplus prod-
uced by the introduction of Social Security. Then, of course, comes rearmament
and the Second World War, which reduced unemployment virtually to zero, but
also severely diminished gross private domestic investment and state and local
government. These processes are very complex and it is often hard to distinguish
between positive and negative feedback. One of the saddest examples of positive
feedback is the development of cultures of violence, such as we see in Northern
Ireland, Lebanon, Sri Lanka, the Sikhs in India, and so on. Here again, violence
produces more violence, which produces more violence, and so on. Sometimes
this stabilizes out at a certain level; sometimes it degenerates into general civil
war.
V. DEVELOPMENT AS POSITIVE FEEDBACK:INTERRUPTIONS AS SYSTEM CHANGE
Economic development is another positive feedback process, much more be-
nign than most social processes. It is a process essentially in human learning and
know-how. There is a level of poverty which can be very stable simply because
no resources can be spared either for human learning or for the accumulation
of physical goods which supplement and express the human learning. Beyond a
certain point, however, resources can be devoted to human learning and to the
accumulation of goods, and the more we know, often the easier it is to learn. The
more goods we have, the easier it is to add to them. This process may eventually
reach some sort of equilibrium in a stationary state, either because with the exi-
sting techniques for adding to knowledge learning becomes increasingly difficult
and the increase in knowledge slows down, or because other factors develop,
such as war, which destroy the capital accumulations, or even because of the
development of widespread unemployment and the failure to utilize resources.
It is often hard to distinguish what turns out to be an interruption in the
system from what turns out to be a fundamental system change. Economic
development is a good example. It is frequently interrupted by wars or by
depressions, yet these have a relatively short lifespan relative to the total process,
and once they are over and peace and prosperity are restored, development begins
again, and very often indeed at an accelerated pace. The ultimate result is then
not very different from what it would have been if the interruption had not
taken place. We see this, for instance, in a country like Japan, which started
on a process of economic development about 1870, interrupted a little by the
Korean Empire, and severely interrupted by the Second World War, which was
utterly devastating. After the war recovery took place at even an accelerated
pace, until by about the 1970s Japan was economically about where it would
have been if it had not been to war and had continued to grow at its pre-war
pace.
The Great Depression likewise can be seen as an interruption in the develop-
ment of most of the countries of the Western world. In the communist countries
likewise we see a similar phenomenon. Stalin and the "First Collectivization"
was a very serious interruption in the development of the Soviet Union, one in-
deed from which they are still not fully recovered. The "Great Leap Forward" in
China turned out to be a leap backward. The "Cultural Revolution" similarly
was an interruption in Chinese development. The growth of human knowledge,
however, on which development depends, is a process of positive feedback that
seems remarkably hard to stop, although there are examples of economic stag-
nation, for instance, in the Islamic world after about 1300, which can only be
explained by political repression of the human learning process.
The "strain-strength" model is of great importance in social systems, which
often suffer very sudden transitions when the strain on the system is greater than
its internal strength. The outbreak of war is almost always such an occasion,
which is one reason why it is so hard to predict and why the concept of the
"causes" of war is a very unsatisfactory one. A revolution is another example.
Just exactly what it is that gives a social system strength to resist a sudden strain
is by no means always clear. Certainly in the case of war the "strength" of the
system is often quite inverse to the amount spent on armaments, which easily
leads to a weakening of the overall system and a diminution in overall security.
Just what it is that makes some marriages survive until the death of one of the
partners, whereas others end in divorce, is, again, often very puzzling. The causes
of marital breakdown are almost as complex as the causes of the breakdown of
international peace. Sometimes it is an almost imperceptible boundary between
the negative feedback processes which lead to stability and the positive feedback
processes which lead into catastrophe. Here again, the structure of systems
is often a very poor guide to their dynamics. All complex systems can get into
patterns that lead to their destabilization and move them into extreme positions,
like Hitler's Germany or Cambodia's Khmer Rouge. It is all the more important,
particularly at the present, that we develop negative feedback processes in the
system of unilateral national defense which can reduce the strain on the system
and diminish the likelihood of catastrophe.
http://www.esee2009.si/
A Matter of Opinion - How Ecological and Neoclassical Environmental Economists
think about Sustainability and Economics
Thursday, November 13, 2008
Environmental documentary at DokMa and guests..
My guests - from left Ray McCormack from Ireland (A Crude Awakening / The Oil Crash) and on the right Fulvio Montano from Italy (La Fiuma - Incontri sul Po e Dintorni). Missing Gaetano Capizzi (CinemAmbiente) who had to leave earlier.
Below Lars Oxfeldt Mortensen (The Cloud Mystery) from Denmark in front of The Oldest Vine in the world.
Thinking about the problems? On my right, Tomo Križnar (Darfur -war for water)
Is media really interested in environmental topics? Perhaps - 2 minutes from 19th minute on. Kratek članek v Večeru in nekaj iz posveta o vodi ter linki do ostalih okoljskih filmskih festivalov (environmental film festivals).
Wednesday, November 05, 2008
Resilience video school
Zanimiva predavanja o naravnih in socialnih kompleksnih sistemih in njihovih povezavah. V Sloveniji lahko kot takšen sistem prepoznamo poseljena gozdnata območja - več o adaptivnem gospodarjenju - dr. Bončina
Resilience is the capacity to deal with change and continue to develop.
ecological resilience can be defined in two ways. The first is a measure of the magnitude of disturbance that can be absorbed before the (eco)system changes its structure by changing the variables and processes that control behaviour. The second, a more traditional meaning, is as a measure of resistance to disturbance and the speed of return to the equilibrium state of an ecosystem
Več o tej temi Buzz Holling, ki ga imajo za očeta teorije povratnosti (resilience), vendar pa je spoznanje o tem pri upravljanju gozdnih ekosistemov v SLoveniji že dolgo - glej prispevek Bončine.
About the system analysis - nice article by Donella Meadows
Lepe definicije določenih pojmov:
Social-ecological systems are linked systems of people and nature. The term emphasizes that humans must be seen as a part of, not apart from, nature — that the delineation between social and ecological systems is artificial and arbitrary. Scholars have also used concepts like ‘coupled human-environment systems´, ‘ecosocial systems´ and ‘socioecological systems´ to illustrate the interplay between social and ecological systems. The term social-ecological system was coined by Fikret Berkes and Carl Folke in 1998 because they did not want to treat the social or ecological dimension as a prefix, but rather give the two same weight during their analysis.
Ecosystem resilience is a measure of how much disturbance (like storms, fire or pollutants) an ecosystem can handle without shifting into a qualitatively different state. It is the capacity of a system to both withstand shocks and surprises and to rebuild itself if damaged.
Social resilience is the ability of human communities to withstand and recover from stresses, such as environmental change or social, economic or political upheaval. Resilience in societies and their life-supporting ecosystems is crucial in maintaining options for future human development.
Ecosystem Services are the benefits people obtain from ecosystem processes. These include water and air purification, flood control, erosion control, generation of fertile soils, detoxification of wastes, resistance to climate and other environmental changes, pollination, and aesthetic and cultural benefits that derive from nature.
Vulnerability refers to the propensity of social and ecological system to suffer harm from exposure to external stresses and shocks. Research on vulnerability can, for example, assess how large the risk is that people and ecosystems will be affected by climate changes and how sensitive they will be to such changes. Vulnerability is often denoted the antonym of resilience.
Institutions are the norms and rules that shape human interactions. They can be formal (such as rules and laws) or informal (such as norms, conventions and self-imposed codes of conduct). Institutions, such as property rights, can be used to link society to nature with the aim to control people´s use of the environment for both ecological and human long-term objectives.
Complex Adaptive Systems (CAS) include companies, the weather, our immune systems, the economy, ecosystems, single cells and brains. In these CAS simple rules of cause and effect do not apply, they are complex, unpredictable and constantly adapting to their environments. Hence, they are far from being machines that you can take apart and investigate the parts to understand the whole.
Response diversity refers to the multitude of responses to environmental change and disturbances, among species contributing to the same ecosystem function. This kind of diversity plays a crucial role in sustaining the resilience of ecosystems to cope with disturbance and change. If all species within a functional group (e.g. pollinators, seed dispersers or decomposers) are equally sensitive to a particular disturbance the system will have low response diversity and be vulnerable to that particular disturbance.
Anthropocene is a term coined in 2000 by the Nobel Prize winning scientist Paul Crutzen. It describes the most recent period in the Earth's history, starting in the 18th century, when the activities of humans first began to have a significant global impact on the Earth's climate and ecosystems.
Natural Capital is an extension of the traditional economic notion of capital. The term was coined to represent the natural assets that economists, governments, and corporations tend to leave off the balance sheets. Natural capital can be non-renewable resources, like fossil fuels and mineral deposits; renewable resources, such as fish or timber; or ecosystem services (for instance the generation of fertile soils, pollination, or purification of air and water).
Social Capital is a concept used in various fields, from economics and political science to sociology and natural resources management. Broadly, it refers to social relations and among individuals and the norms and social trust which they generate and which facilitate coordination and cooperation for mutual benefit.
.
Adaptive co-management is an approach based on collaboration among multiple actors, for instance agencies, researchers and local resource users. Management of everything from local fisheries to global climate change is regarded as controlled experiments, with the consequent need for monitoring, evaluation and constant improvement. According to a growing number of scholars such management that is flexible and open to learning stimulates a sustainable development by enhancing resilience in coupled human and natural systems.
Blue and green water: ‘Blue water´ is the liquid water in rivers, lakes and ground water. ‘‘Green water´ is the water that feeds the system as rain and forms soil moisture that is absorbed by plants (and then exhaled as vapour flow). When discussing the water needed to produce food for an expanding human population we tend to neglect the green water flows even though most food production comes from rain-fed farming, not least in hunger and poverty stricken areas with rapid population growth.
Urban sprawl is a phenomenon that plagues cities in both developing and industrial countries. It is an uncontrolled or unplanned extension of urban areas into the countryside that tends to result in an inefficient and wasteful use of land and its associated natural resources.
Resilience is the capacity to deal with change and continue to develop.
ecological resilience can be defined in two ways. The first is a measure of the magnitude of disturbance that can be absorbed before the (eco)system changes its structure by changing the variables and processes that control behaviour. The second, a more traditional meaning, is as a measure of resistance to disturbance and the speed of return to the equilibrium state of an ecosystem
Več o tej temi Buzz Holling, ki ga imajo za očeta teorije povratnosti (resilience), vendar pa je spoznanje o tem pri upravljanju gozdnih ekosistemov v SLoveniji že dolgo - glej prispevek Bončine.
About the system analysis - nice article by Donella Meadows
Lepe definicije določenih pojmov:
Social-ecological systems are linked systems of people and nature. The term emphasizes that humans must be seen as a part of, not apart from, nature — that the delineation between social and ecological systems is artificial and arbitrary. Scholars have also used concepts like ‘coupled human-environment systems´, ‘ecosocial systems´ and ‘socioecological systems´ to illustrate the interplay between social and ecological systems. The term social-ecological system was coined by Fikret Berkes and Carl Folke in 1998 because they did not want to treat the social or ecological dimension as a prefix, but rather give the two same weight during their analysis.
Ecosystem resilience is a measure of how much disturbance (like storms, fire or pollutants) an ecosystem can handle without shifting into a qualitatively different state. It is the capacity of a system to both withstand shocks and surprises and to rebuild itself if damaged.
Social resilience is the ability of human communities to withstand and recover from stresses, such as environmental change or social, economic or political upheaval. Resilience in societies and their life-supporting ecosystems is crucial in maintaining options for future human development.
Ecosystem Services are the benefits people obtain from ecosystem processes. These include water and air purification, flood control, erosion control, generation of fertile soils, detoxification of wastes, resistance to climate and other environmental changes, pollination, and aesthetic and cultural benefits that derive from nature.
Vulnerability refers to the propensity of social and ecological system to suffer harm from exposure to external stresses and shocks. Research on vulnerability can, for example, assess how large the risk is that people and ecosystems will be affected by climate changes and how sensitive they will be to such changes. Vulnerability is often denoted the antonym of resilience.
Institutions are the norms and rules that shape human interactions. They can be formal (such as rules and laws) or informal (such as norms, conventions and self-imposed codes of conduct). Institutions, such as property rights, can be used to link society to nature with the aim to control people´s use of the environment for both ecological and human long-term objectives.
Complex Adaptive Systems (CAS) include companies, the weather, our immune systems, the economy, ecosystems, single cells and brains. In these CAS simple rules of cause and effect do not apply, they are complex, unpredictable and constantly adapting to their environments. Hence, they are far from being machines that you can take apart and investigate the parts to understand the whole.
Response diversity refers to the multitude of responses to environmental change and disturbances, among species contributing to the same ecosystem function. This kind of diversity plays a crucial role in sustaining the resilience of ecosystems to cope with disturbance and change. If all species within a functional group (e.g. pollinators, seed dispersers or decomposers) are equally sensitive to a particular disturbance the system will have low response diversity and be vulnerable to that particular disturbance.
Anthropocene is a term coined in 2000 by the Nobel Prize winning scientist Paul Crutzen. It describes the most recent period in the Earth's history, starting in the 18th century, when the activities of humans first began to have a significant global impact on the Earth's climate and ecosystems.
Natural Capital is an extension of the traditional economic notion of capital. The term was coined to represent the natural assets that economists, governments, and corporations tend to leave off the balance sheets. Natural capital can be non-renewable resources, like fossil fuels and mineral deposits; renewable resources, such as fish or timber; or ecosystem services (for instance the generation of fertile soils, pollination, or purification of air and water).
Social Capital is a concept used in various fields, from economics and political science to sociology and natural resources management. Broadly, it refers to social relations and among individuals and the norms and social trust which they generate and which facilitate coordination and cooperation for mutual benefit.
.
Adaptive co-management is an approach based on collaboration among multiple actors, for instance agencies, researchers and local resource users. Management of everything from local fisheries to global climate change is regarded as controlled experiments, with the consequent need for monitoring, evaluation and constant improvement. According to a growing number of scholars such management that is flexible and open to learning stimulates a sustainable development by enhancing resilience in coupled human and natural systems.
Blue and green water: ‘Blue water´ is the liquid water in rivers, lakes and ground water. ‘‘Green water´ is the water that feeds the system as rain and forms soil moisture that is absorbed by plants (and then exhaled as vapour flow). When discussing the water needed to produce food for an expanding human population we tend to neglect the green water flows even though most food production comes from rain-fed farming, not least in hunger and poverty stricken areas with rapid population growth.
Urban sprawl is a phenomenon that plagues cities in both developing and industrial countries. It is an uncontrolled or unplanned extension of urban areas into the countryside that tends to result in an inefficient and wasteful use of land and its associated natural resources.
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Here comes the Sun (2008)
Sun the Energy Solution??? Click here to see the documentary or compare it to the Lovins on the Soft Path guide or film (1982).
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
CinemAmbiente
CinemAmbiente is the documentary festival in Torino, Italy. Must see and a must be there festival. It is the oldest documentary festival dealing with environmental topics in Europe. Great program, organization and people. An event, where you can see deeply into the problems&solutions and where the children (future generations) are as important as the adults. There is also a cooperation with the various environmental experts.
Pictures from the left:
1 The whole city is supporting the festival, as you can see the green posters also in many of the private stores.
2 The queue in front of the cinema - entrance is free of charge and the demand is huge
3 All the crew is very nice&helpful and fluent in English, so you can get all the info you need quite fast
We hope for the same response from the public with DokMa 2008 festival.
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
The old new story
also see the BBC documentary The course of oil
Ups and Downs, and Mostly Ups - What Drives the Price of Oil? by Michael Akerib:
The recent major increases in the price of oil and its derivatives such as gasoline, have affected all businesses. If fishermen and lorry drivers have been the most vocal in their protests, the tourism industry is just as likely to suffer from these new price levels. Higher airfares threaten to severely affect both airlines and the hospitality industry - particularly if predictions of further rises to $250 per barrel turn out to be correct. Airbus and Boeing are already feeling the sting with fears of postponement or cancellation of orders.
It is therefore important to understand the drivers behind the recent price movements.
Traditionally the factors affecting the price of oil have been grouped into fundamental, geopolitical and 'other' categories.
The two most important fundamental factors at present are the demand and supply balance and the value of the US dollar.
Supply and demand
While the market appears to be balanced today, the US government is convinced that an increased production would lead to lower prices. However, the Saudi government's announcement that they would increase production from 9.5 million to 10 million barrels a day did not contribute to any dampening of the prices.
The world's largest producer and exporter fears that if the prices maintain themselves at levels above $100/barrel, that the present recession will deepen leading to a downward price spiral that would lead to a significantly lower income for the producing countries. They also fear that a further drop in the American currency would severely affect the Saudi kingdom's reserves. An even worse threat is that a stabilization of oil prices at a high level would spur the introduction of biofuels that would replace oil in a significant manner.
Not everyone, though, is convinced of the ability of the Saudi kingdom to increase its production levels in a sustainable manner.
The country has, until recently, been loath at opening new deposits as forecasting market demand is extremely difficult in the oil market. Some of the Saudi deposits may well contain high sulphur or heavy crudes that are difficult to sell.
Saudi Arabia plans to open the Khurais complex by 2010 - the first major oil field opened in the last 40 years - at a cost of $15 billion. This sum is small compared to the investment that would be required to develop Saudi's potential offshore field.
Other countries too have difficulty in increasing, or even maintaining, their capacity. Thus, Russia, which accounted for 80% of the growth of supply from non-OPEC countries over the last few years, seems unable to maintain its present production level and, for the first time in the last ten years, production in the country fell. Mid-term prospects, however, are optimistic as new Siberian fields are put into production. However, global warming is affecting drilling activities in Siberia as the lack of ice makes it difficult to transport equipment as roads are non-existent on many areas.
Major investments are required to keep production at present levels. They are estimates at $1 trillion over the next 20 years for Russia alone.
Other non-OPEC countries, such as Mexico and Norway, have also been unable to sustain production levels.
More generally, production in a large number of countries is decreasing due to the age of the wells. This has led to a widespread belief in the theory of a peak in crude oil production and discovery.
The peak oil theory was first expounded in 1956 and its inventor, Mr Hubert, stated that US oil production would peak in 1970 - and it did.
Not everyone agrees, and among them the world's leading oil consultancy - CERA. Some experts believe we are not running out of oil, but out of production capacity for a variety of reasons such as lack of investments and trained manpower.
Another important set of actors weighing on the crude oil market, and they are new compared to the traditional actors in previous oil crises, are the car drivers of the emerging economies, such as China and India, that have access to subsidized gasoline and who are therefore relatively unaffected by major rises at the pump and have thus no incentive to save fuel. Demand is increasing faster in countries with high subsidies. China alone will spend this year around $40 billion to subsidize the price of gasoline.
Indeed, the major imbalance today is on gasoline rather than crude. Refineries prefer light oil - used to produce petrol and diesel - to heavy oils that goes into the production of fuel oil used mainly for heating.
Iran, for instance, a major producer of heavy oil, stocks large quantities, that they are unable to sell, in vessels moored offshore.
Price increases in the retail market will probably lead refiners to increase their investments to treat heavy oils, and this may well decrease prices by increasing availability at the pump.
As prices of oil rise, oil producers invest some of the funds locally, expanding the economy, and thus their own oil consumption, leaving a smaller part of their output available for export. This, in turn, leads to price increases.
Prices at the pump in oil-producing states, with the notable exception of Norway, is usually tax free - it is, for instance, of US$0.20 per gallon in Venezuela - and this leads to a fairly unrestrained consumption, further reducing quantities available for export.
Even though China and India have recently increased the domestic sales price of petrol which remains, however, highly subsidized.
The elements above are exacerbated by more fundamental issues such as a lack of qualified petroleum engineers and a need for new infrastructure. Recent graduates from emerging countries are arriving on the employment market but essentially join national companies in their own countries rather than joining one of the majors.
The actors
Among the biggest players on the oil market today, are the so-called 'new 7 sisters' which are Aramco, CNPC, Gazprom, NIOC, Petrobras, Petronas and PdVSA.
Banks and other financial institutions such as hedge funds are also major players on the futures markets with the oil producers accounting for less than half the volume. More specifically, index funds attempt to beat certain indexes and therefore need prices to increase. The total volume invested in index funds has grown 20 times over the last five years. They see oil as a refuge from a weak dollar.
This has led some political leaders from US presidential candidate Barack Obama to India's Petroleum Secretary to ask for the halting of oil futures trading, which they believe to be manipulated by the speculation from large institutional players. This, however, is most unlikely to happen. US regulators also consider imposing limits to trading positions, including on those taken by US investors on foreign markets.
A number of politicians have blamed 'speculators' who are switching their holdings from traditional assets such as stocks and bonds to oil futures, particularly on the NYMEX - the New York Mercantile Exchange. Indeed, the number of trades is twenty times bigger than it was five years ago. This represents eight times the imports of the US. However, it is not clear if speculative action is responsible for the increase in prices or rather if the increase in prices has driven speculators to the market.
The US is about to introduce legislation that would limit the positions that investors can take on futures markets.
Comparisons have been made with other commodity markets where increased activity is uncorrelated with price movements. Further, some commodities that are not traded on futures markets have risen even more abruptly than oil. Oil future traders do not take delivery of physical product and therefore cannot weigh on prices as they do not hoard product.
The US dollar
US imports and consumption are responsible for a massive transfer of capital from the US to the oil producing countries, in particular to OPEC countries which supply 40% of the world's oil.
The drop of the US dollar against all convertible currencies has been a contributor to the price increase of the barrel of oil, producers seeking to maintain a stable price in their domestic currency.
Every increase in interest rates on the Euro led to an almost immediate increase in the price of oil, in parallel with a drop in the dollar.
The OECD scenario forecasts that the share of OPEC countries in global production will increase from the present 40% to 52% by 2030. Should the price of oil keep rising, this would translate into substantial increases in the flow of funds towards the member countries.
The fall of the dollar translates into lower income in national currency for the producing countries. Nevertheless, the rise of the oil prices has fueled an economic expansion in the Gulf and attracted more foreign workers. Due to a shortage of living space, this has, in turn, driven up rents and consequently inflation.
Since the currencies are pegged to the dollar, the oil producers in the Gulf are not free to apply an anti-inflationary policy as it would increase the value of their currency.
Kuwait has already pegged its own currency to a basket. The risk is a run on the dollar as sentiment against the currency builds.
Seen from the eyes of buyers, countries with currencies appreciating against the dollar may well be tempted to build stocks.
A global economic crisis would reduce oil needs and dollar flows from the US, thus strengthening the currency.
For the present, however, gold, which has traditionally been the traditional investment product that acts as a refuge against a falling dollar, fear of political disruption and inflation has been replaced replaced, by oil.
Geopolitical factors
The geopolitical factors include the political situation in Iran, Iraq and Nigeria, resource nationalism, sea lane security, the risk of terrorism as well as climate change.
The major fears are, of have been, in the recent past:
*
the disintegration of the Middle East, whether by Turkish incursions into Iraq or by an all-out war between Shias and Sunnis
*
more specifically the fragility of the Saudi monarchy, seen as the insurer of world oil production in case of shortfalls, and the possibility that Al Qaeda may gain power in that country and stop oil exports. The geographic concentration of both production (in a single large facility) and shipment (two oil terminals) makes disruption of the flow of oil possible
*
supply disruptions in Nigeria
*
supply disruption from Venezuela
*
the fact that the vast majority of the large oil suppliers are politically unstable
*
a US military intervention in Iran. The country is the world's fourth largest oil producer but also could take action to block the Hormuz straits through which a major part of the world oil trade is channeled.
Analysts calculate that these fears have put a premium of $25 to 50 on the barrel.
Whenever fears drive markets, the latter tend to become unreasonable particularly when stocks are low and producers are unlikely to significantly increase production short term.
The future
Forecasts on the price for the next year or two vary considerably depending on the assumptions made by the forecasters, and any way forecasting the future price of oil is a perilous exercise at best. Historically, attempts at prediction have lacked precision.
The world's population will certainly continue to increase and their mobility needs are not likely to decrease. The International Energy Agency forecasts a 35% increase in oil consumption by 2030, which translates in additional requirements of 11 billion barrels of oil.
Saudi Arabia is presently restructuring its economy to become a major producer of energy-intensive industrial products. Its energy consumption has increased by nearly 25% over the last 3 or 4 years.
It is unlikely that the uncertainty surrounding international relations will decrease and this votes in favor of sustained prices.
While the majority of the players, including the futures markets, forecast continuing price increases, some of the best known experts believe the price will inevitably drop to below $100 as recession settles in, leading to reduced demand, coupled with the introduction of biofuels and of other sources of alternative energy on a major scale. Changes in the behavior of consumers, particularly in the US, would also go in the same direction.
Further, high oil prices should encourage research for new wells and technological progress in reducing extraction costs of deposits that presently are not economically exploitable.
Another effect of high oil prices would be the slowing of the globalization process with preference given to local products which would not reflect higher transport costs.
The tourism industry has therefore entered an era of increased uncertainty calling for a wait-and-see attitude regarding new investments.
Ups and Downs, and Mostly Ups - What Drives the Price of Oil? by Michael Akerib:
The recent major increases in the price of oil and its derivatives such as gasoline, have affected all businesses. If fishermen and lorry drivers have been the most vocal in their protests, the tourism industry is just as likely to suffer from these new price levels. Higher airfares threaten to severely affect both airlines and the hospitality industry - particularly if predictions of further rises to $250 per barrel turn out to be correct. Airbus and Boeing are already feeling the sting with fears of postponement or cancellation of orders.
It is therefore important to understand the drivers behind the recent price movements.
Traditionally the factors affecting the price of oil have been grouped into fundamental, geopolitical and 'other' categories.
The two most important fundamental factors at present are the demand and supply balance and the value of the US dollar.
Supply and demand
While the market appears to be balanced today, the US government is convinced that an increased production would lead to lower prices. However, the Saudi government's announcement that they would increase production from 9.5 million to 10 million barrels a day did not contribute to any dampening of the prices.
The world's largest producer and exporter fears that if the prices maintain themselves at levels above $100/barrel, that the present recession will deepen leading to a downward price spiral that would lead to a significantly lower income for the producing countries. They also fear that a further drop in the American currency would severely affect the Saudi kingdom's reserves. An even worse threat is that a stabilization of oil prices at a high level would spur the introduction of biofuels that would replace oil in a significant manner.
Not everyone, though, is convinced of the ability of the Saudi kingdom to increase its production levels in a sustainable manner.
The country has, until recently, been loath at opening new deposits as forecasting market demand is extremely difficult in the oil market. Some of the Saudi deposits may well contain high sulphur or heavy crudes that are difficult to sell.
Saudi Arabia plans to open the Khurais complex by 2010 - the first major oil field opened in the last 40 years - at a cost of $15 billion. This sum is small compared to the investment that would be required to develop Saudi's potential offshore field.
Other countries too have difficulty in increasing, or even maintaining, their capacity. Thus, Russia, which accounted for 80% of the growth of supply from non-OPEC countries over the last few years, seems unable to maintain its present production level and, for the first time in the last ten years, production in the country fell. Mid-term prospects, however, are optimistic as new Siberian fields are put into production. However, global warming is affecting drilling activities in Siberia as the lack of ice makes it difficult to transport equipment as roads are non-existent on many areas.
Major investments are required to keep production at present levels. They are estimates at $1 trillion over the next 20 years for Russia alone.
Other non-OPEC countries, such as Mexico and Norway, have also been unable to sustain production levels.
More generally, production in a large number of countries is decreasing due to the age of the wells. This has led to a widespread belief in the theory of a peak in crude oil production and discovery.
The peak oil theory was first expounded in 1956 and its inventor, Mr Hubert, stated that US oil production would peak in 1970 - and it did.
Not everyone agrees, and among them the world's leading oil consultancy - CERA. Some experts believe we are not running out of oil, but out of production capacity for a variety of reasons such as lack of investments and trained manpower.
Another important set of actors weighing on the crude oil market, and they are new compared to the traditional actors in previous oil crises, are the car drivers of the emerging economies, such as China and India, that have access to subsidized gasoline and who are therefore relatively unaffected by major rises at the pump and have thus no incentive to save fuel. Demand is increasing faster in countries with high subsidies. China alone will spend this year around $40 billion to subsidize the price of gasoline.
Indeed, the major imbalance today is on gasoline rather than crude. Refineries prefer light oil - used to produce petrol and diesel - to heavy oils that goes into the production of fuel oil used mainly for heating.
Iran, for instance, a major producer of heavy oil, stocks large quantities, that they are unable to sell, in vessels moored offshore.
Price increases in the retail market will probably lead refiners to increase their investments to treat heavy oils, and this may well decrease prices by increasing availability at the pump.
As prices of oil rise, oil producers invest some of the funds locally, expanding the economy, and thus their own oil consumption, leaving a smaller part of their output available for export. This, in turn, leads to price increases.
Prices at the pump in oil-producing states, with the notable exception of Norway, is usually tax free - it is, for instance, of US$0.20 per gallon in Venezuela - and this leads to a fairly unrestrained consumption, further reducing quantities available for export.
Even though China and India have recently increased the domestic sales price of petrol which remains, however, highly subsidized.
The elements above are exacerbated by more fundamental issues such as a lack of qualified petroleum engineers and a need for new infrastructure. Recent graduates from emerging countries are arriving on the employment market but essentially join national companies in their own countries rather than joining one of the majors.
The actors
Among the biggest players on the oil market today, are the so-called 'new 7 sisters' which are Aramco, CNPC, Gazprom, NIOC, Petrobras, Petronas and PdVSA.
Banks and other financial institutions such as hedge funds are also major players on the futures markets with the oil producers accounting for less than half the volume. More specifically, index funds attempt to beat certain indexes and therefore need prices to increase. The total volume invested in index funds has grown 20 times over the last five years. They see oil as a refuge from a weak dollar.
This has led some political leaders from US presidential candidate Barack Obama to India's Petroleum Secretary to ask for the halting of oil futures trading, which they believe to be manipulated by the speculation from large institutional players. This, however, is most unlikely to happen. US regulators also consider imposing limits to trading positions, including on those taken by US investors on foreign markets.
A number of politicians have blamed 'speculators' who are switching their holdings from traditional assets such as stocks and bonds to oil futures, particularly on the NYMEX - the New York Mercantile Exchange. Indeed, the number of trades is twenty times bigger than it was five years ago. This represents eight times the imports of the US. However, it is not clear if speculative action is responsible for the increase in prices or rather if the increase in prices has driven speculators to the market.
The US is about to introduce legislation that would limit the positions that investors can take on futures markets.
Comparisons have been made with other commodity markets where increased activity is uncorrelated with price movements. Further, some commodities that are not traded on futures markets have risen even more abruptly than oil. Oil future traders do not take delivery of physical product and therefore cannot weigh on prices as they do not hoard product.
The US dollar
US imports and consumption are responsible for a massive transfer of capital from the US to the oil producing countries, in particular to OPEC countries which supply 40% of the world's oil.
The drop of the US dollar against all convertible currencies has been a contributor to the price increase of the barrel of oil, producers seeking to maintain a stable price in their domestic currency.
Every increase in interest rates on the Euro led to an almost immediate increase in the price of oil, in parallel with a drop in the dollar.
The OECD scenario forecasts that the share of OPEC countries in global production will increase from the present 40% to 52% by 2030. Should the price of oil keep rising, this would translate into substantial increases in the flow of funds towards the member countries.
The fall of the dollar translates into lower income in national currency for the producing countries. Nevertheless, the rise of the oil prices has fueled an economic expansion in the Gulf and attracted more foreign workers. Due to a shortage of living space, this has, in turn, driven up rents and consequently inflation.
Since the currencies are pegged to the dollar, the oil producers in the Gulf are not free to apply an anti-inflationary policy as it would increase the value of their currency.
Kuwait has already pegged its own currency to a basket. The risk is a run on the dollar as sentiment against the currency builds.
Seen from the eyes of buyers, countries with currencies appreciating against the dollar may well be tempted to build stocks.
A global economic crisis would reduce oil needs and dollar flows from the US, thus strengthening the currency.
For the present, however, gold, which has traditionally been the traditional investment product that acts as a refuge against a falling dollar, fear of political disruption and inflation has been replaced replaced, by oil.
Geopolitical factors
The geopolitical factors include the political situation in Iran, Iraq and Nigeria, resource nationalism, sea lane security, the risk of terrorism as well as climate change.
The major fears are, of have been, in the recent past:
*
the disintegration of the Middle East, whether by Turkish incursions into Iraq or by an all-out war between Shias and Sunnis
*
more specifically the fragility of the Saudi monarchy, seen as the insurer of world oil production in case of shortfalls, and the possibility that Al Qaeda may gain power in that country and stop oil exports. The geographic concentration of both production (in a single large facility) and shipment (two oil terminals) makes disruption of the flow of oil possible
*
supply disruptions in Nigeria
*
supply disruption from Venezuela
*
the fact that the vast majority of the large oil suppliers are politically unstable
*
a US military intervention in Iran. The country is the world's fourth largest oil producer but also could take action to block the Hormuz straits through which a major part of the world oil trade is channeled.
Analysts calculate that these fears have put a premium of $25 to 50 on the barrel.
Whenever fears drive markets, the latter tend to become unreasonable particularly when stocks are low and producers are unlikely to significantly increase production short term.
The future
Forecasts on the price for the next year or two vary considerably depending on the assumptions made by the forecasters, and any way forecasting the future price of oil is a perilous exercise at best. Historically, attempts at prediction have lacked precision.
The world's population will certainly continue to increase and their mobility needs are not likely to decrease. The International Energy Agency forecasts a 35% increase in oil consumption by 2030, which translates in additional requirements of 11 billion barrels of oil.
Saudi Arabia is presently restructuring its economy to become a major producer of energy-intensive industrial products. Its energy consumption has increased by nearly 25% over the last 3 or 4 years.
It is unlikely that the uncertainty surrounding international relations will decrease and this votes in favor of sustained prices.
While the majority of the players, including the futures markets, forecast continuing price increases, some of the best known experts believe the price will inevitably drop to below $100 as recession settles in, leading to reduced demand, coupled with the introduction of biofuels and of other sources of alternative energy on a major scale. Changes in the behavior of consumers, particularly in the US, would also go in the same direction.
Further, high oil prices should encourage research for new wells and technological progress in reducing extraction costs of deposits that presently are not economically exploitable.
Another effect of high oil prices would be the slowing of the globalization process with preference given to local products which would not reflect higher transport costs.
The tourism industry has therefore entered an era of increased uncertainty calling for a wait-and-see attitude regarding new investments.
Tuesday, October 07, 2008
Saturday, September 20, 2008
Nature Inc.
Zanimivo, vendar vprašljivo. V US so se močvirja vseeeno zmanjšala, saj so jih delali tam, kjer je bila zemlja poceni, se pravi nekje daleč v naravnih območjih, ki niso bila primerna za močvirja, vodo so speljali tja od daleč, uničili naravni habitat ki je vladal tam prej, skratka, mnogo teh nadomestnih močvirij ni opravljalo svojih naravnih funkcij, zaradi katerih so pomembna. Tudi živali, povezane s takšnim specifičnim ekosistemom, se v mnogih primerih ne morejo prilagoditi na to okolje, na katerega niso prilagojene.
Podobno kot pri avtocestah v Sloveniji, saj mostovi za prehod divjadi vedno ne uspejo. Živali se enostavno ne navadijo nanje, populacijam se tako prekine njihove poti in stike, se pravi tudi parjenje.
Vsekakor zanimiv prispevek - vredno ogleda!!!!
KEEP STIRRING
Robert Lamb, producer of dev tv’s Nature Inc. on the background to the series.
“When I hear that a meteorite is on its way to obliterate humans, and give life on earth a chance to start over, I shall raise my glass,” the former British Labour Minister, Tony Banks told me in an interview shortly before he died. At least James Lovelock of Gaia fame says we have 20 years to go out and enjoy ourselves. His contention is that the juggernaut of climate change and species extinction is unstoppable…whatever we do.
Some scientists are, indeed, deeply pessimistic about our chances of keeping the living fabric of life sufficiently intact to avoid economic and social breakdown.
Take population. Our human numbers increase by 200,000 a day. The biggest growth by far takes place in the desperately poor places of our world. Poor people are – unwittingly – as destructive as the rich. A billion people – one in every six – depend directly on their environment for energy (wood or charcoal), water (from a river or a village well) and sustenance (soil and fish). These desperately poor people are living a lifestyle of self-immolation.
Add on predictions from serious quarters of a 4 per cent increase in global temperature and the loss of 150 species a day, and my goodness, the outlook is bleak.
Are we to be the locusts who gobble everything in sight and then perish? Where can the dramatic, ‘to scale’ change – impossible to attain according to those like Lovelock – come from?
Oddly enough, the dismal science, economics, might come to our collective rescue.
There is a new breed of economist beginning to be heard in serious places such as the World Bank.
Five years ago Professor Robert Costanza and his team at the University of Vermont priced the services that nature provides to the global economy at around US$33 trillion – at that time, more than the combined wealth of every economy on earth.
Costanza and the ‘eco-economists’ are criticised by those who believe that putting a price tag on ecosystem services is political correctness gone crazy. Others say it’s counterproductive to reduce nature to economic good – what do we do about the services that have no value?
Underestimating Nature
When I interviewed Costanza recently he told me the calculation is a serious underestimate. Nature’s services, he says, are a public good… “We do need to recognise they are valuable relative to a private good and if we don’t recognise that we over-exploit and deplete them to our social dis-benefit”.
In this view, we have left nature off the books. And some might argue that this is possibly the greatest white collar crime of the last century. But is it feasible to put a price on nature’s services? And if our way of assessing “wealth” embraces ecosystems and their services would it make any difference to the pace of environmental destruction?
That’s what we asked in the first series, of Nature Inc.
Bloom or bust
In our first programme we featured the honeybee and showed how utterly dependent the $2 billion Californian almond crop – source of 80% of the world’s almonds – is on the pollinator-in-chief. Its annual services to US agriculture alone are worth between US$15-20 billion. In 2006 a phenomenon called colony collapse disorder resulted in the desertion of 800,000 hives.
It’s happening in other parts of the world as well and scientists cannot pinpoint the cause. Heading an investigation into the disorder, Dr Gordon Wardell of the US Department of Agriculture concludes it is our love-fest with intensive agriculture that has pushed the bees too far “Like people, they thrive on diversity” says Wardell.
It’s not just bees. All kinds of pest devourers and seed spreaders like frogs and bats contribute trillions of dollars to the world economy.
A whole programme was given over to the devastating impact of alien species such as the cane toad in Australia or the Burmese python in the USA. One assessment is that the damage caused by alien species costs the global economy US$1.4 trillion every year.
Another story featured the victimised fruit bat in West Africa. In Ghana it finds refuge from the bush meat hunters in military barracks. And yet the Shea tree which yields the butter for chocolate and cosmetics needs the bats to spread its seeds.
So what is the value of the fruit bat to Ghana? No-one has worked it out, but it’s more that the 60 cents it costs to buy a roasted one in the markets of Accra.
Shrimps vs Mangroves
At present most governments deliver projections of wealth where an oil spill would show up as generating wealth (the extra economic activity of salvage, chemicals, over-time etc). But the damage to the local marine ecosystem just doesn’t appear. Nature has no value, in this method of calculation.
Imagine that you are a manager for a Pension Fund. Imagine, too, there is an investment opportunity to turn a slice of mangrove swamp into an industrial shrimp farm that will, over ten years, bring in a handsome profit. The swamp brings in nothing. You will invest in shrimps. Meanwhile the country has lost a valuable fish nursery, a barrier against hurricanes and sea level rise and a biodiversity pool.
A comparative study in Thailand found that shrimps were worth $5.443 per hectare, meanwhile the true value to society of the mangrove was $35,696 per hectare.
Multiplied a million times a day, eco-economists argue that investing short instead of long is what is at the base of the planetary green asset stripping.
Green shoots
So should we be welcoming that meteorite or whooping it up until the green doomsday?
Perhaps not, not yet at any rate. There are some green shoots out there.
Real change, several contributors argued, has to come to come from governments pressured by the public. The final episode of Nature Inc underlined this, showing that governments are crucial in creating markets for environmental assets such as wetlands.
Most of us may not want new laws or taxes, but we can use our voting power to push for change for long-term common good, of the not-so-painful, politically acceptable variety. Cap and trade; bio-credits; paying directly for ecosystem services; trusts that enable private investment for public good. These are all being tried out. And we reported on the ups and downs of the new approaches.
In Costa Rica the government pays farmers to conserve or replant forests rather than use land for cattle and maize, with income from freshwater users such as breweries or HEP dams. It’s an environmental policy that safeguards water supply, biodiversity and tourism.
In our edition on the economic return on preserving watersheds, we found that New York has one of the cheapest and cleanest water supplies in the USA because in the 1970s it was decided to keep the Catskill mountains undeveloped.
Other countries – Norway and Canada for instance – are making serious attempts to reassess the way they measure national wealth, to include ecosystem services.
Wanted: New Stories.
I started making environmental films in the 1980s. Then we had no problem in finding sceptics to balance programme output. Many so-called “environmentalists” were angered that a film on environmental issues would not take the orthodox green line. The big difference nowadays, is that its next to impossible to find any established economises or scientists or even businessmen who will not agree that the planet is being asset-stripped at a truly alarming rate.
There is new green thinking out there and some of it is grappling with pricing renewable assets. As such we felt it was a legitimate new area to take as an organising theme for the new series.
We had an overwhelmingly positive reaction to the first series, but there were a small minority who wrote in to say they hated the premise of the whole series. That’s good, we want to foster discussion in Nature Inc. which is why we are encouraging viewers to contribute ideas for the next series.
In the opening programme, Professor Bob Watson, chief scientific adviser to the UK’s environment ministry pretty much dismissed Dr Co stanza’s calculations but added that what he had done was stirred up a debate about an important issue. And that’s we intend to do – to keep stirring up by giving airtime to the best scientific and economic sources we can find.
Friday, September 19, 2008
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
Pošteno, zdaj gre zares - Green Bible
Citation from "Environmental Ethics: the main approaches (Sigrid Sterckx):
According to some commentators, our exploitative and destructive attitude towards nature originates in an ‘anthropocentric’ attitude, widespread in Western societies. Hence, they argue, we need a fundamentally new ethic (or some even say a new religion) in order to introduce a new way of interacting with nature. This view can be labelled an ‘idealistic’ approach to the origin of the environmental problem and its potential solution(s).
Others defend a ‘materialistic’ approach. They argue that science, technology and capitalism, rather than cultural factors, are the major causes of the undesirable developments we are witnessing. They do not deny the importance of cultural factors, but consider them as consequences rather than causes. An example of a materialistic approach will be discussed in the next section.
In his famous article The historical roots of our ecologic crisis, the historian Lynn White argues that Christianity bears a heavy responsibility for the environmental crisis because it has promoted the domination of nature. White is representative of the abovementioned ‘idealistic’ approach. He assumes that all species disturb their environment (and have done so in the past), but notes that since the 19th and 20th centuries, something fundamentally new has been occurring: a world-wide destruction of nature. The proximate cause of this development, according to White, is the interaction of modern science with technology in the 19th century.
But the origin and development of science and, particularly, technology, have been
determined by a specific pattern of values, which he calls the typically Christian ‘arrogant’ attitude towards nature. White asserts that this arrogance is the result of a particular view of the relation between God, man and nature a view typified by the book of Genesis, the first book of the Bible.
"And God blessed Noah and his sons, and said unto them, Be fruitful and multiply, and replenish the earth. And the fear of you, and the dread of you, shall be upon every fowl of the air, upon all that moveth upon the earth, and upon all the fishes of the sea; into your hand are they delivered. (Genesis, 9, 1-2)".
In Genesis, the earth is neither sacred nor divine. Earth is merely a creation, and so is man, but he is made in the image of God. It is not nature that is holy, but Man, to the extent he resembles the Maker. In this creation, Man is central and dominates the animals. Through this conception, White argues, constraints on intervening in nature – which are typical, for instance, of the animistic religions – are removed and, Man is encouraged to exploit nature. Christendom is said to be the most ‘anthropocentric’ religion in the world. In White’s view we need a fundamentally new cultural attitude:
"More science and more technology are not going to get us out of the present ecologic crisis until we find a new religion, or rethink our old one … We shall continue to have a worsening ecologic crisis until we reject the Christian axiom that nature has no reason for existence save to serve man."
The importance of White’s paper can hardly be overestimated. His main thesis regarding the impact of value-systems on our interaction with nature has been taken over by many environmental ethicists, particularly by representatives of the so-called ‘deep ecology’ movement. White’s claim that our attitude towards nature is determined primarily by religion stimulated the interest in searching for alternative religions, including a search within Christianity
for a new and more ‘environment-friendly’ interpretation of the Bible.
Lewis Moncrief wrote a reply to White (also in Science), entitled “The cultural basis of our environmental crisis”.He observed that cultures which have not been influenced by the Judaeo- Christian attitude also had, and increasingly have, a destructive impact on the environment. The only decisive factor seems to be that modern science and technology developed in the West. However, this fact may be unrelated to the Christian attitude towards nature. According to Moncrief, the real explanation can be found in political and socio-economic developments
primarily the French Revolution and the Industrial Revolution.
John Passmore presented yet another vision in his book Man's Responsibility to Nature
(1974), one of the earliest major books on environmental ethics. He justly remarks that for a correct understanding of the West, one must take into account the two important inspirational sources of this culture, namely, the Judaeo-Christian and the Greek. The fact that nature has no sacred status in the Old Testament is not sufficient, according to Passmore, to explain the exploitative attitude with respect to nature. He believes that the clearly anthropocentric character of Christendom is co-determined by the influence of Stoicism. In the Stoic philosophy, Man is the only rational creature and the ultimate goal of nature. All other creatures are at Man’s service.
However, two interpretations remain possible. The first is that God has created nature for the sake of Man, and hence everything in nature is as it should be. The other interpretation emphasizes the creativity of Man – here Man is seen as a creature that intervenes in nature and ‘cultivates’ it through technical interventions. This view gained grounds in Western Christianity during the 17th century. It was shared, inter alia, by people like Francis Bacon, Rene Descartes and Robert Boyle.
Passmore’s contribution to the debate is not limited to comments on White’s thesis. He mentions the tradition of ‘man as despot’, which he considers to be the ‘Graeco-Christian’ arrogance, but he also refers to a minority opinion about ‘stewardship’, which dates back to the post-Platonic philosophers. This current of thought, however small it was in the West, gave rise to two traditions:
"The first is, in feeling, conservationist. It emphasizes the need to conserve the earth's fertility, by culling and pruning and good management. The second is rather bolder: it looks to the perfection of nature by man, but a perfection which always takes account of nature’s own resources and of what man has already achieved in his civilising of the world."
Passmore favours the notion of stewardship to that of a despotic attitude towards nature; he suggests a few minor revolutions in science, such as more interdisciplinary research and more respect for scientists working outside laboratories. As to the political and socio-economic problems related to the necessity of reducing economic growth, he has no clear solution.
Robin Attfield, in his book The Ethics of environmental Concern (1983),11 claims that
Christianity is much richer than authors like White and Passmore presume. In his view, there is no need for a fundamentally new ethics as our traditions are sufficiently rich to teach us “that all worthwhile life is of intrinsic value”. According to Attfield, the ecological problem is basically a problem of exponential growth. Judaeo-Christian views cannot be blamed for this phenomenon:
its cause is rather a more recent tradition, the belief in progress:
"[R]ather than the beliefs of Judaism and Christianity, the attitude in large measure responsible for environmental degradation in East and West has been the belief in perennial material progress inherited from the Enlightenment and the German metaphysicians, as modified in the West by classical economists and sociologists, by liberal individualism and social Darwinism, and in Eastern Europe by the unquestioned deference to Marx and Engels."
Attfield’s view on the impact of Christian teachings is that:
"There has been a strong tradition in Europe and lands of European settlement, a tradition of Judeo-Christian origins but not confined to adherents of Judaism and Christianity, of belief that people are the stewards of the earth and responsible for its conservation, for its lasting improvement, and also for the care of our fellow creatures, its non-human inhabitants."
Source: http://www2.agrocampus-ouest.fr/scripts/fr/bioethique/pdf2007/52EN.pdf
Monday, September 15, 2008
Encyclopedia of life support systems EOLSS and Encyclopedia of Earth
"A life support system is any natural or human-engineered (constructed or made) system that furthers the life of the biosphere in a sustainable fashion. The fundamental attribute of life support systems is that together they provide all of the sustainable needs required for continuance of life. These needs go far beyond biological requirements. Thus life support systems encompass natural environmental systems as well as ancillary social systems required to foster societal harmony, safety, nutrition, medical care, economic standards, and the development of new technology. The one common thread in all of these systems is that they operate in partnership with the conservation of global natural resources."
Encyclopedia of Earth, a new electronic reference about the Earth, its natural environments, and their interaction with society. The Encyclopedia is a free, fully searchable collection of articles written by scholars, professionals, educators, and experts who collaborate and review each other's work. The articles are written in non-technical language and will be useful to students, educators, scholars, professionals, as well as to the general public.
Encyclopedia of Earth, a new electronic reference about the Earth, its natural environments, and their interaction with society. The Encyclopedia is a free, fully searchable collection of articles written by scholars, professionals, educators, and experts who collaborate and review each other's work. The articles are written in non-technical language and will be useful to students, educators, scholars, professionals, as well as to the general public.
Tuesday, September 09, 2008
DARWIN ONLINE
http://darwin-online.org.uk/
Watch evolution online: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/id/program.html
or http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/evolution/
A collection of historic and modern biology books
or try new advances in biology - Faculty of 1000
The Darwin Project
Monday, September 08, 2008
Joshua Farley - ekološka ekonomija
Ecological Economics: An Interview with Joshua Farley
Joshua Farley is a professor at the Gund Institute for Ecological Economics home of the original $33 trillion estimate for ecosystem service value. Joshua co-authored the recent textbook Ecological Economics: Principles and Applications,which reconceptualizes economics with a few key new axioms: ecosystem and resource limits, distribution issues, and broader definitions of human well-being. He's in the vanguard of a growing movement to get economics right - with sustainability and human well-being as core principles.
Hassan Masum: Josh, thanks for agreeing to do this interview. 'Ecological Economics' sounds like an odd combination the first time one hears it. What exactly is Ecological Economics, and why is it important?
Joshua Farley: Ecological economics has been defined as the science and management of sustainability. There are lots of things that distinguish ecological economics from more conventional approaches to economics. First, ecological economists assume the human economic system is a subset of the sustaining and containing global ecosystem. The laws of thermodynamics tell us that matter-energy cannot be created or destroyed. This means that everything the economic system produces must come from the raw materials provided by nature.
The same laws tell us that entropy increases in an isolated system, and an energy differential is required to perform work. From the perspective of economics, entropy can be thought of as disorder, or uselessness. This means that all economic production uses high quality energy, which is used up and returned to the ecosystem as waste. In fact, everything the economic system produces ultimately returns to the ecosystem as waste. Humans, like all biological organisms, depend for their survival on the goods and services provided by healthy ecosystems. When we extract raw materials from nature to make things and we spew waste back, we degrade the life support functions of the planet’s ecosystems.
All economic production bears an opportunity cost measured in the loss or degradation of ecological life support functions and other ecosystem services. Unique among the planet’s species, humans have the capacity to irreversibly degrade these life support functions. Ecological economists assume a moral obligation to future generations and other species. The first task of an ecological economist is therefore to make sure that the physical size of the economic system — the rate at which it takes resources from the ecosystem and spews them back as waste — never exceeds the capacity of the ecosystem to sustain it.
The economy can’t grow for ever. If the economy can’t keep growing indefinitely, then the solution to poverty is not simply more growth. It makes no sense to care about the well-being of future generations not yet born and not care about those around today. The second task of an ecological economist is therefore to pursue a more just distribution of resources. Ecological economists also care about economic efficiency, but sustainable scale and just distribution take precedence.
Second, ecological economists assume we live in a world of extreme complexity and uncertainty that is constantly changing, and the economic system must also change in response. As our society evolved from hunter-gatherers to farmers to industrialists, our economic systems changed as well, and they continue to change. Ecosystems respond to change through unpredictable evolutionary processes. Economic systems develop unpredictable new technologies, then change in fundamental ways in response to those technologies. Human behavior evolves as cultures evolve. Both evolutionary and technological changes are unpredictable.
Ecosystem goods and services used to be extremely abundant relative to human made objects. If we want more fish on our dinner plates, the scarce factor of production is fish, not fishing boats. If we want more timber, the scarce factor is trees, not sawmills. Some of the most important issues we face today are climate change, biodiversity loss, ozone depletion and other environmental problems that are completely ignored by market forces. Our economic system has to evolve to respond to these new scarcities. Nobody could have predicted these problems two hundred years ago when market economies were first evolving, yet addressing them has become the key to our survival.
Third, ecological economics is explicitly transdisciplinary. Economics is the allocation of scarce resources among alternative desirable ends. Defining the desirable ends requires insights from ethics, philosophy, religion and psychology at the very least. Understanding the nature of the scarce resources requires insights from physics, chemistry, biology and ecology. Figuring out how to allocate requires insights from economics, sociology, political science and psychology. Disciplines impose narrow blinders that keep us from seeing the problem as a whole. This doesn’t mean that ecological economists must master a variety of disciplines, but rather that they learn to communicate and synthesize across disciplines.
The dominant economic paradigm strives for ever-increasing economic growth. Not only is this impossible on a finite planet, but growing evidence suggests that beyond a certain point, more material consumption does nothing to make us better off. Ecological economists seek to adapt our economic system to the increasing scarcity of ecosystem goods and services in order to create a more sustainable and desirable future.
HM: That's an impressive list of goals, which will be a challenge to live up to. You outline the necessity for our economic system to evolve in response to new scarcities - how do you see this evolution happening? What's an example where ideas from ecological economics have been successfully adopted?
JF: Living up to these goals may be a challenge, but if we fail to live up to them, we face insurmountable challenges - if the global economic system continues to grow and encroach upon the global ecosystem that sustains it, both will collapse. Fortunately, in many important areas, the economics system is already evolving to meet these challenges, though as of yet not as quickly as it needs to. Take the cap and trade policy on sulfur dioxide in the US as an example. Sulfur dioxide is emitted by coal fired power plants and other industries. In the US, we capped the amount of sulfur dioxide that industries are allowed to produce. Though the cap may be higher than many of us would like, at least in principle it follows the ecological economic rule of limiting the amount of waste emissions to a quantity that can be safely absorbed by our ecosystem.
The right to pollute was then distributed to the existing polluters, who were allowed to trade the permits. Markets in permits help minimize the financial costs of meeting pollution targets. The policy follows the ecological economic approach of scale first, distribution second and efficiency third. The policy was actually designed by conventional economists, which is why it perversely rewarded those industries that polluted the most. Ecological economists would favor a more just distribution - for example, auctioning off the right to pollute to industries, then using the revenue to replace regressive taxes. For cap and trade policies to be truly just, they must also prevent the concentration of pollutants in Žhot spotsŽ. The basic approach is a good one, however, and can be applied to resource extraction as well as to pollution.
Perhaps the biggest challenge we face is how to deal with complex systems. We don't really know what impacts our activities have on ecosystems, and when decisions are urgent and stakes are high, we rarely have the time or resources to make sure of our facts before we act. Because uncertainty affects future generations, we always confront the ethical issues of our obligations to future generations, so facts aren't enough anyway. We have to make the best choices we can under these circumstances, and avoid irreversible outcomes that will limit our future options.
As an example, we did a workshop/field-course a couple years ago looking at the conversion of mangrove ecosystems to shrimp aquaculture. We did a case study of a site on Palawan Island in the Philippines where mangroves were being illegally cleared as we worked, so decisions were urgent. Few studies had been done in the region, so facts were highly uncertain. The local villagers depended on the mangrove ecosystem to sustain their fisheries, protect their communities against storms, absorb silt and wastes washing the land that would otherwise damage the offshore coral reefs and so on, so stakes were high.
Ecological economists and scientists from various disciplines worked closely with several NGOs, the local government and local community members to learn as much as we could about the local system in the time available. We supplemented this information with scientific studies done in other locations. Guided by our NGO partners (Earth Economics in particular) we presented our findings on the potential ecological, economic and social impacts to the local government and the press.
The local Mayor, Edward Hagedorn, decided that the mangrove deforestation must be stopped before it caused irreversible damage. He not only got permission from the federal government to halt the deforestation, but helped organize the local community to actually tear down the existing dikes. Once people are presented with a bigger picture, integrating both ecological and economic issues, solutions are often obvious.
Unfortunately, universities too often teach people to focus on only one side of a problem, leading to distorted analyses. One way we're trying to advance ecological economics is by changing the way students learn and think. Many ecological economists therefore design transdisciplinary, transinstitutional courses that focus on real life problems, with real life constraints. We have a long ways to go before we accomplish our goals, but when the world finally recognizes that our economic system depends on a healthy ecosystem, we'll be ready with the necessary policies.
HM: Let's explore the question of education. As a university professor and author of the textbook 'Ecological Economics', you have experience on the ground in 'changing the way students learn and think'. How do students react to the broader ecological approach to economics? And what methods have you found to be effective outside academia, e.g. in talking to policy-makers and the public?
JF: In my experience, students react very favourably to ecological economics, especially those students who have some background in the natural sciences or in environmental studies. Occasionally I do find some resistance to the ideas from students who have background in neoclassical economics, but in compensation, when these students do come around, they really seem to get it.
I find more resistance to the methods I use to teach ecological economics. When I learned neoclassical economics, it was taught as revealed wisdom, with no historical context, and with no discussion of the obvious shortcomings of the discipline. I hated that approach - it doesn't teach students to think for themselves. I always tell students that I don't know all the answers, and no economist does. Other professors teach neoclassical economics, and both approaches can't be entirely correct.
I like to teach the theory and have students work with a community partner on some real life problem to which they can apply that theory. If the theory helps them understand the problem they are working on and provide solid solutions, they learn the material better, and have some empirical support for the theory. If instead what they learn from a real life problem contradicts the theory, then they learn the theories are inadequate and must be improved - and it's their job to improve them. That's the scientific method.
The problem is that it's a lot more challenging to apply theories then it is just to memorize and regurgitate. Lots of students are used to being spoon fed, and hate problems with a more applied approach that exposes them to messy, complex real life situations. By the mid-point in a typical semester, most students are intensely frustrated as they try to get their minds around the problem and think about how they can make a meaningful contribution to solving it. They complain if I can't tell them the answers, but I point out that none of them will ever have a job where the boss knows all the answers. Fortunately, by the end of the semester most of the students have made some real progress, and appreciate the approach I use.
I still don't have as much experience as I would like talking to policy makers and the general public, but in the experience I do have, I find the best approach is just to speak in clear, straightforward language anyone can understand. If I canŽt explain something clearly, it's probably because I don't understand it well enough myself. I certainly won't be able to convince policy makers to pay attention to what I have to say if they can't understand it.
I think a lot of economists use jargon and language that no one but other economists can really understand. The reason I got a PhD in neoclassical economics was so that I could understand that language, and when I did, I learned that much of what was being said made no sense at all. It's actually a lot easier to explain ecological economics to the general public than it is to explain neoclassical economics precisely because it's solidly grounded in the laws of physics and ecology, is explicit about its ethical assumptions, and shares those ethical assumptions with the majority of society.
HM: Thanks for the insight! Bringing our economic theories into harmony with broadly-accepted ethical assumptions is a challenge for all of us.
This suggests a final question: what would you like to see replace GDP in policy-making and public discourse? As a de facto proxy for progress, it is deeply flawed, since it doesn't account for externalities, many components of human welfare, and so forth. But wouldn't "green GDP" get into tremendously complex and uncertain calculations in, for example, accounting for ecosystem services?
Maybe GDP isn't even the right mental model to use. If not, then what alternate or complementary system(s) would you like to see implemented, that would measure sustainable progress yet be simple enough to be commonly referred to in the media and everyday discussions?
JF: GDP is actually even more absurd than most people think, as it uses economic values in ways they were not meant to be used. The price of something is its value at the margin, the value of one more unit. This is why diamonds are extremely valuable while water is cheap. It doesn’t really make sense to multiply the price (marginal value) of something by total quantity to get total value.
For any resource that is essential and has few substitutes, such as food and energy, when the amount available falls by 10%, the price rises by more than 10% - the less we have, the more GDP grows, and vice versa! This is why Exxon made more profits this year than any corporation in history, not because they produced more oil, but because they produced less. When economists forget this, they draw absurd conclusions. Take for example the recent Nobel prize winner in economics, Thomas Schelling, who says that global warming won’t harm the US much since it will mainly affect agriculture, and agriculture only accounts for 3% of our GDP! When you measure everything in dollars, one dollar is as good as another — better computers are a substitute for food.
Fortunately the various Green GDP measures don’t make such a stupid mistake. Rather than trying to add in the total value of ecosystem goods and services, they subtract the value of what we degrade or use up. This is appropriate, since what we use in one year is more or less a marginal value. The Index of Sustainable Economic Welfare and the Genuine Progress Indicator include other factors on top of this, such as income distribution, non-marketed labor, and leisure time, but the base of all of these is still GNP, so more is always better.
What we really want is a measure of Quality of Life, not consumption. Almost by definition, quantifying quality of life represents a real challenge. We have proposed a measure of quality of life that includes subjective estimates of well-being (basically just surveys asking people how satisfied they are with their lives) as well as objective measures of opportunities available for satisfying the entire range of human needs. Drawing on the work of Manfred Max-Neef, we have proposed a list of human needs that are stable across time and cultures, including subsistence, reproduction, security, affection, understanding, participation, leisure, spirituality, creativity/emotional expression, identity and freedom.
To satisfy these needs, we need much more than just economic output — we also need the goods and services provided by healthy ecosystems, healthy social relationships and healthy minds and bodies, which we refer to as natural, social and human capitals. We also believe our real human needs are satiable. The reason people believe our demand for consumer goods is insatiable is because we use consumer goods to try and satisfy needs they are not capable of satisfying.
While it is a serious challenge to come up with some quantifiable index of human need satisfaction and subjective well-being, an imprecise measure of the right goals is much better than a highly precise measure of the wrong ones. Just thinking about how to measure the right things will get us thinking carefully about how to provide them. For simplicity, we could refer to the measure as gross national happiness, which they use in Bhutan, or something similar.
As long as we continue to accept ever increasing material consumption as the central goal of society and pursue it blindly, oblivious to ecological, social and human costs, we are unlikely to improve our quality of life. Even in countries like India, where increasing levels of material consumption remains extremely important, states like Kerala show that society can do a much better job of meeting human needs with the resources already available.
The problem is that people obsessed with consumption look at all talk of sustainability as a sacrifice. In reality, those of us in the richest countries are sacrificing our quality of life on the altar of ever-increasing consumption, and through the ecological costs this consumption imposes, we are sacrificing the well-being of the rest of the world as well. What we need to do is develop a positive, shared vision of what life would look like in a more sustainable and just world. Sustainability and just distribution does not require sacrifice — in reality it is the only path available to a better quality of life for us all.
Source: WorldChanging
interesting links: Biodiversity economics
EVRI
The solutions journal
Thursday, August 28, 2008
Orangutani - medvrstna interakcija ali kaj se lahko naučimo od pastirjev
Zrcalo človeštva - ampak, nas se to ne tiče. Mar ne?
Vprašanje za vse, ki si kupujejo nov indonezijski ali kakšen krasen eksotičen les za svoje lepe terase. Bi bilo drugače, če bi kupili slovenski visokogorski macesen? Vsekakor direktnih posledic ne bi čutili orangutani, temveč morda kar mi sami. In to bi bolelo - nekatere.
Tako kot boli samo nekatere predele v Sloveniji, da se ni vlagalo v preventivo in so potem cela mesta plavala. Najbolj mi je v spominu ostala povodenj v Celju v 90tih - predvsem volj po kurilnem olju in fekalijah ter gore smeti, ki so nastale ko je voda odšla. Z njmi so odšle tudi vse fotografije otroštva, porok, smrti, skratka dokazi našega bivanja, družinskega življenja. V tem primeru so posledice naših dejanja bile občutene in direktne, pa se kljub temu ni nič spremenilo. Še je poplavljalo in še bo in zdaj že vemo, da je dobro fotografije in ostale "vredne" stvari spraviti na "varno". In če nas to ne skrbi, zakaj bi nas nek indonezijski les in oddaljeni orangutani, za katere večino ljudi ve le to, da jih lahko vidiš v živalskem vrtu v mali mali mali mali ječici, ki ji rečemo kletka.
Lahko pa na svoji novi terasi iz tropskega lesa v miru sedaj pogledate dokumentarec,se nasmejete vaši sreči, da imate lepo teraso in nesreči, ki je hvalabogu nekje daleč stran in z vami pač nima nič skupnega.
Klikni na:
http://www.zdf.de/ZDFmediathek/content/525084?inPopup=true
in poglej v zrcalo.
Nekaj informacij:
BOS
WWF
Tukaj pa si oglejte njihovo pravo podobo:
Saturday, August 23, 2008
Friday, August 22, 2008
Easter Island's End
By Jared Diamond, in Discover Magazine
August 1995
In just a few centuries, the people of Easter Island wiped out their forest, drove their plants and animals to extinction, and saw their complex society spiral into chaos and cannibalism. Are we about to follow their lead?
Among the most riveting mysteries of human history are those posed by vanished civilizations. Everyone who has seen the abandoned buildings of the Khmer, the Maya, or the Anasazi is immediately moved to ask the same question: Why did the societies that erected those structures disappear?
Their vanishing touches us as the disappearance of other animals, even the dinosaurs, never can. No matter how exotic those lost civilizations seem, their framers were humans like us. Who is to say we won't succumb to the same fate? Perhaps someday New York's skyscrapers will stand derelict and overgrown with vegetation, like the temples at Angkor Wat and Tikal.
Among all such vanished civilizations, that of the former Polynesian society on Easter Island remains unsurpassed in mystery and isolation. The mystery stems especially from the island's gigantic stone statues and its impoverished landscape, but it is enhanced by our associations with the specific people involved: Polynesians represent for us the ultimate in exotic romance, the background for many a child's, and an adult's, vision of paradise. My own interest in Easter was kindled over 30 years ago when I read Thor Heyerdahl's fabulous accounts of his Kon-Tiki voyage.
But my interest has been revived recently by a much more exciting account, one not of heroic voyages but of painstaking research and analysis. My friend David Steadman, a paleontologist, has been working with a number of other researchers who are carrying out the first systematic excavations on Easter intended to identify the animals and plants that once lived there. Their work is contributing to a new interpretation of the island's history that makes it a tale not only of wonder but of warning as well.
Easter Island, with an area of only 64 square miles, is the world's most isolated scrap of habitable land. It lies in the Pacific Ocean more than 2,000 miles west of the nearest continent (South America), 1,400 miles from even the nearest habitable island (Pitcairn). Its subtropical location and latitude-at 27 degrees south, it is approximately as far below the equator as Houston is north of it-help give it a rather mild climate, while its volcanic origins make its soil fertile. In theory, this combination of blessings should have made Easter a miniature paradise, remote from problems that beset the rest of the world.
The island derives its name from its "discovery" by the Dutch explorer Jacob Roggeveen, on Easter (April 5) in 1722. Roggeveen's first impression was not of a paradise but of a wasteland: "We originally, from a further distance, have considered the said Easter Island as sandy; the reason for that is this, that we counted as sand the withered grass, hay, or other scorched and burnt vegetation, because its wasted appearance could give no other impression than of a singular poverty and barrenness."
The island Roggeveen saw was a grassland without a single tree or bush over ten feet high. Modern botanists have identified only 47 species of higher plants native to Easter, most of them grasses, sedges, and ferns. The list includes just two species of small trees and two of woody shrubs. With such flora, the islanders Roggeveen encountered had no source of real firewood to warm themselves during Easter's cool, wet, windy winters. Their native animals included nothing larger than insects, not even a single species of native bat, land bird, land snail, or lizard. For domestic animals, they had only chickens. European visitors throughout the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries estimated Easter's human population at about 2,000, a modest number considering the island's fertility. As Captain James Cook recognized during his brief visit in 1774, the islanders were Polynesians (a Tahitian man accompanying Cook was able to converse with them). Yet despite the Polynesians' well-deserved fame as a great seafaring people, the Easter Islanders who came out to Roggeveen's and Cook's ships did so by swimming or paddling canoes that Roggeveen described as "bad and frail." Their craft, he wrote, were "put together with manifold small planks and light inner timbers, which they cleverly stitched together with very fine twisted threads. . . . But as they lack the knowledge and particularly the materials for caulking and making tight the great number of seams of the canoes, these are accordingly very leaky, for which reason they are compelled to spend half the time in bailing." The canoes, only ten feet long, held at most two people, and only three or four canoes were observed on the entire island.
With such flimsy craft, Polynesians could never have colonized Easter from even the nearest island, nor could they have traveled far offshore to fish. The islanders Roggeveen met were totally isolated, unaware that other people existed. Investigators in all the years since his visit have discovered no trace of the islanders' having any outside contacts: not a single Easter Island rock or product has turned up elsewhere, nor has anything been found on the island that could have been brought by anyone other than the original settlers or the Europeans. Yet the people living on Easter claimed memories of visiting the uninhabited Sala y Gomez reef 260 miles away, far beyond the range of the leaky canoes seen by Roggeveen. How did the islanders' ancestors reach that reef from Easter, or reach Easter from anywhere else?
Easter Island's most famous feature is its huge stone statues, more than 200 of which once stood on massive stone platforms lining the coast. At least 700 more, in all stages of completion, were abandoned in quarries or on ancient roads between the quarries and the coast, as if the carvers and moving crews had thrown down their tools and walked off the job. Most of the erected statues were carved in a single quarry and then somehow transported as far as six miles-despite heights as great as 33 feet and weights up to 82 tons. The abandoned statues, meanwhile, were as much as 65 feet tall and weighed up to 270 tons. The stone platforms were equally gigantic: up to 500 feet long and 10 feet high, with facing slabs weighing up to 10 tons.
Roggeveen himself quickly recognized the problem the statues posed: "The stone images at first caused us to be struck with astonishment," he wrote, "because we could not comprehend how it was possible that these people, who are devoid of heavy thick timber for making any machines, as well as strong ropes, nevertheless had been able to erect such images." Roggeveen might have added that the islanders had no wheels, no draft animals, and no source of power except their own muscles. How did they transport the giant statues for miles, even before erecting them? To deepen the mystery, the statues were still standing in 1770, but by 1864 all of them had been pulled down, by the islanders themselves. Why then did they carve them in the first place? And why did they stop?
The statues imply a society very different from the one Roggeveen saw in 1722. Their sheer number and size suggest a population much larger than 2,000 people. What became of everyone? Furthermore, that society must have been highly organized. Easter's resources were scattered across the island: the best stone for the statues was quarried at Rano Raraku near Easter's northeast end; red stone, used for large crowns adorning some of the statues, was quarried at Puna Pau, inland in the southwest; stone carving tools came mostly from Aroi in the northwest. Meanwhile, the best farmland lay in the south and east, and the best fishing grounds on the north and west coasts. Extracting and redistributing all those goods required complex political organization. What happened to that organization, and how could it ever have arisen in such a barren landscape?
Easter Island's mysteries have spawned volumes of speculation for more than two and a half centuries. Many Europeans were incredulous that Polynesians-commonly characterized as "mere savages"-could have created the statues or the beautifully constructed stone platforms. In the 1950s, Heyerdahl argued that Polynesia must have been settled by advanced societies of American Indians, who in turn must have received civilization across the Atlantic from more advanced societies of the Old World. Heyerdahl's raft voyages aimed to prove the feasibility of such prehistoric transoceanic contacts. In the 1960s the Swiss writer Erich von Daeniken, an ardent believer in Earth visits by extraterrestrial astronauts, went further, claiming that Easter's statues were the work of intelligent beings who owned ultramodern tools, became stranded on Easter, and were finally rescued.
Heyerdahl and Von Daeniken both brushed aside overwhelming evidence that the Easter Islanders were typical Polynesians derived from Asia rather than from the Americas and that their culture (including their statues) grew out of Polynesian culture. Their language was Polynesian, as Cook had already concluded. Specifically, they spoke an eastern Polynesian dialect related to Hawaiian and Marquesan, a dialect isolated since about A.D. 400, as estimated from slight differences in vocabulary. Their fishhooks and stone adzes resembled early Marquesan models. Last year DNA extracted from 12 Easter Island skeletons was also shown to be Polynesian. The islanders grew bananas, taro, sweet potatoes, sugarcane, and paper mulberry-typical Polynesian crops, mostly of Southeast Asian origin. Their sole domestic animal, the chicken, was also typically Polynesian and ultimately Asian, as were the rats that arrived as stowaways in the canoes of the first settlers.
What happened to those settlers? The fanciful theories of the past must give way to evidence gathered by hardworking practitioners in three fields: archeology, pollen analysis, and paleontology. Modern archeological excavations on Easter have continued since Heyerdahl's 1955 expedition. The earliest radiocarbon dates associated with human activities are around A.D. 400 to 700, in reasonable agreement with the approximate settlement date of 400 estimated by linguists. The period of statue construction peaked around 1200 to 1500, with few if any statues erected thereafter. Densities of archeological sites suggest a large population; an estimate of 7,000 people is widely quoted by archeologists, but other estimates range up to 20,000, which does not seem implausible for an island of Easter's area and fertility.
Archeologists have also enlisted surviving islanders in experiments aimed at figuring out how the statues might have been carved and erected. Twenty people, using only stone chisels, could have carved even the largest completed statue within a year. Given enough timber and fiber for making ropes, teams of at most a few hundred people could have loaded the statues onto wooden sleds, dragged them over lubricated wooden tracks or rollers, and used logs as levers to maneuver them into a standing position. Rope could have been made from the fiber of a small native tree, related to the linden, called the hauhau. However, that tree is now extremely scarce on Easter, and hauling one statue would have required hundreds of yards of rope. Did Easter's now barren landscape once support the necessary trees? That question can be answered by the technique of pollen analysis, which involves boring out a column of sediment from a swamp or pond, with the most recent deposits at the top and relatively more ancient deposits at the bottom. The absolute age of each layer can be dated by radiocarbon methods. Then begins the hard work: examining tens of thousands of pollen grains under a microscope, counting them, and identifying the plant species that produced each one by comparing the grains with modern pollen from known plant species. For Easter Island, the bleary-eyed scientists who performed that task were John Flenley, now at Massey University in New Zealand, and Sarah King of the University of Hull in England.
Flenley and King's heroic efforts were rewarded by the striking new picture that emerged of Easter's prehistoric landscape. For at least 30,000 years before human arrival and during the early years of Polynesian settlement, Easter was not a wasteland at all. Instead, a subtropical forest of trees and woody bushes towered over a ground layer of shrubs, herbs, ferns, and grasses. In the forest grew tree daisies, the rope-yielding hauhau tree, and the toromiro tree, which furnishes a dense, mesquite-like firewood. The most common tree in the forest was a species of palm now absent on Easter but formerly so abundant that the bottom strata of the sediment column were packed with its pollen. The Easter Island palm was closely related to the still-surviving Chilean wine palm, which grows up to 82 feet tall and 6 feet in diameter. The tall, unbranched trunks of the Easter Island palm would have been ideal for transporting and erecting statues and constructing large canoes. The palm would also have been a valuable food source, since its Chilean relative yields edible nuts as well as sap from which Chileans make sugar, syrup, honey, and wine.
What did the first settlers of Easter Island eat when they were not glutting themselves on the local equivalent of maple syrup? Recent excavations by David Steadman, of the New York State Museum at Albany, have yielded a picture of Easter's original animal world as surprising as Flenley and King's picture of its plant world. Steadman's expectations for Easter were conditioned by his experiences elsewhere in Polynesia, where fish are overwhelmingly the main food at archeological sites, typically accounting for more than 90 percent of the bones in ancient Polynesian garbage heaps. Easter, though, is too cool for the coral reefs beloved by fish, and its cliff-girded coastline permits shallow-water fishing in only a few places. Less than a quarter of the bones in its early garbage heaps (from the period 900 to 1300) belonged to fish; instead, nearly one-third of all bones came from porpoises.
Nowhere else in Polynesia do porpoises account for even 1 percent of discarded food bones. But most other Polynesian islands offered animal food in the form of birds and mammals, such as New Zealand's now extinct giant moas and Hawaii's now extinct flightless geese. Most other islanders also had domestic pigs and dogs. On Easter, porpoises would have been the largest animal available-other than humans. The porpoise species identified at Easter, the common dolphin, weighs up to 165 pounds. It generally lives out at sea, so it could not have been hunted by line fishing or spearfishing from shore. Instead, it must have been harpooned far offshore, in big seaworthy canoes built from the extinct palm tree.
In addition to porpoise meat, Steadman found, the early Polynesian settlers were feasting on seabirds. For those birds, Easter's remoteness and lack of predators made it an ideal haven as a breeding site, at least until humans arrived. Among the prodigious numbers of seabirds that bred on Easter were albatross, boobies, frigate birds, fulmars, petrels, prions, shearwaters, storm petrels, terns, and tropic birds. With at least 25 nesting species, Easter was the richest seabird breeding site in Polynesia and probably in the whole Pacific. Land birds as well went into early Easter Island cooking pots.
Steadman identified bones of at least six species, including barn owls, herons, parrots, and rail. Bird stew would have been seasoned with meat from large numbers of rats, which the Polynesian colonists inadvertently brought with them; Easter Island is the sole known Polynesian island where rat bones outnumber fish bones at archeological sites. (In case you're squeamish and consider rats inedible, I still recall recipes for creamed laboratory rat that my British biologist friends used to supplement their diet during their years of wartime food rationing.)
Porpoises, seabirds, land birds, and rats did not complete the list of meat sources formerly available on Easter. A few bones hint at the possibility of breeding seal colonies as well. All these delicacies were cooked in ovens fired by wood from the island's forests.
Such evidence lets us imagine the island onto which Easter's first Polynesian colonists stepped ashore some 1,600 years ago, after a long canoe voyage from eastern Polynesia. They found themselves in a pristine paradise. What then happened to it? The pollen grains and the bones yield a grim answer.
Pollen records show that destruction of Easter's forests was well under way by the year 800, just a few centuries after the start of human settlement. Then charcoal from wood fires came to fill the sediment cores, while pollen of palms and other trees and woody shrubs decreased or disappeared, and pollen of the grasses that replaced the forest became more abundant. Not long after 1400 the palm finally became extinct, not only as a result of being chopped down but also because the now ubiquitous rats prevented its regeneration: of the dozens of preserved palm nuts discovered in caves on Easter, all had been chewed by rats and could no longer germinate. While the hauhau tree did not become extinct in Polynesian times, its numbers declined drastically until there weren't enough left to make ropes from. By the time Heyerdahl visited Easter, only a single, nearly dead toromiro tree remained on the island, and even that lone survivor has now disappeared. (Fortunately, the toromiro still grows in botanical gardens elsewhere.)
The fifteenth century marked the end not only for Easter's palm but for the forest itself. Its doom had been approaching as people cleared land to plant gardens; as they felled trees to build canoes, to transport and erect statues, and to burn; as rats devoured seeds; and probably as the native birds died out that had pollinated the trees' flowers and dispersed their fruit. The overall picture is among the most extreme examples of forest destruction anywhere in the world: the whole forest gone, and most of its tree species extinct.
The destruction of the island's animals was as extreme as that of the forest: without exception, every species of native land bird became extinct. Even shellfish were overexploited, until people had to settle for small sea snails instead of larger cowries. Porpoise bones disappeared abruptly from garbage heaps around 1500; no one could harpoon porpoises anymore, since the trees used for constructing the big seagoing canoes no longer existed. The colonies of more than half of the seabird species breeding on Easter or on its offshore islets were wiped out.
In place of these meat supplies, the Easter Islanders intensified their production of chickens, which had been only an occasional food item. They also turned to the largest remaining meat source available: humans, whose bones became common in late Easter Island garbage heaps. Oral traditions of the islanders are rife with cannibalism; the most inflammatory taunt that could be snarled at an enemy was "The flesh of your mother sticks between my teeth." With no wood available to cook these new goodies, the islanders resorted to sugarcane scraps, grass, and sedges to fuel their fires.
All these strands of evidence can be wound into a coherent narrative of a society's decline and fall. The first Polynesian colonists found themselves on an island with fertile soil, abundant food, bountiful building materials, ample lebensraum, and all the prerequisites for comfortable living. They prospered and multiplied.
After a few centuries, they began erecting stone statues on platforms, like the ones their Polynesian forebears had carved. With passing years, the statues and platforms became larger and larger, and the statues began sporting ten-ton red crowns-probably in an escalating spiral of one-upmanship, as rival clans tried to surpass each other with shows of wealth and power. (In the same way, successive Egyptian pharaohs built ever-larger pyramids. Today Hollywood movie moguls near my home in Los Angeles are displaying their wealth and power by building ever more ostentatious mansions. Tycoon Marvin Davis topped previous moguls with plans for a 50,000-square-foot house, so now Aaron Spelling has topped Davis with a 56,000-square-foot house. All that those buildings lack to make the message explicit are ten-ton red crowns.) On Easter, as in modern America, society was held together by a complex political system to redistribute locally available resources and to integrate the economies of different areas.
Eventually Easter's growing population was cutting the forest more rapidly than the forest was regenerating. The people used the land for gardens and the wood for fuel, canoes, and houses-and, of course, for lugging statues. As forest disappeared, the islanders ran out of timber and rope to transport and erect their statues. Life became more uncomfortable-springs and streams dried up, and wood was no longer available for fires.
People also found it harder to fill their stomachs, as land birds, large sea snails, and many seabirds disappeared. Because timber for building seagoing canoes vanished, fish catches declined and porpoises disappeared from the table. Crop yields also declined, since deforestation allowed the soil to be eroded by rain and wind, dried by the sun, and its nutrients to be leeched from it. Intensified chicken production and cannibalism replaced only part of all those lost foods. Preserved statuettes with sunken cheeks and visible ribs suggest that people were starving.
With the disappearance of food surpluses, Easter Island could no longer feed the chiefs, bureaucrats, and priests who had kept a complex society running. Surviving islanders described to early European visitors how local chaos replaced centralized government and a warrior class took over from the hereditary chiefs. The stone points of spears and daggers, made by the warriors during their heyday in the 1600s and 1700s, still litter the ground of Easter today. By around 1700, the population began to crash toward between one-quarter and one-tenth of its former number. People took to living in caves for protection against their enemies. Around 1770 rival clans started to topple each other's statues, breaking the heads off. By 1864 the last statue had been thrown down and desecrated.
As we try to imagine the decline of Easter's civilization, we ask ourselves, "Why didn't they look around, realize what they were doing, and stop before it was too late? What were they thinking when they cut down the last palm tree?"
I suspect, though, that the disaster happened not with a bang but with a whimper. After all, there are those hundreds of abandoned statues to consider. The forest the islanders depended on for rollers and rope didn't simply disappear one day-it vanished slowly, over decades. Perhaps war interrupted the moving teams; perhaps by the time the carvers had finished their work, the last rope snapped. In the meantime, any islander who tried to warn about the dangers of progressive deforestation would have been overridden by vested interests of carvers, bureaucrats, and chiefs, whose jobs depended on continued deforestation. Our Pacific Northwest loggers are only the latest in a long line of loggers to cry, "Jobs over trees!" The changes in forest cover from year to year would have been hard to detect: yes, this year we cleared those woods over there, but trees are starting to grow back again on this abandoned garden site here. Only older people, recollecting their childhoods decades earlier, could have recognized a difference. Their children could no more have comprehended their parents' tales than my eight-year-old sons today can comprehend my wife's and my tales of what Los Angeles was like 30 years ago.
Gradually trees became fewer, smaller, and less important. By the time the last fruit-bearing adult palm tree was cut, palms had long since ceased to be of economic significance. That left only smaller and smaller palm saplings to clear each year, along with other bushes and treelets. No one would have noticed the felling of the last small palm.
By now the meaning of Easter Island for us should be chillingly obvious. Easter Island is Earth writ small. Today, again, a rising population confronts shrinking resources. We too have no emigration valve, because all human societies are linked by international transport, and we can no more escape into space than the Easter Islanders could flee into the ocean. If we continue to follow our present course, we shall have exhausted the world's major fisheries, tropical rain forests, fossil fuels, and much of our soil by the time my sons reach my current age.
Every day newspapers report details of famished countries-Afghanistan, Liberia, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Somalia, the former Yugoslavia, Zaire-where soldiers have appropriated the wealth or where central government is yielding to local gangs of thugs. With the risk of nuclear war receding, the threat of our ending with a bang no longer has a chance of galvanizing us to halt our course. Our risk now is of winding down, slowly, in a whimper. Corrective action is blocked by vested interests, by well-intentioned political and business leaders, and by their electorates, all of whom are perfectly correct in not noticing big changes from year to year. Instead, each year there are just somewhat more people, and somewhat fewer resources, on Earth. It would be easy to close our eyes or to give up in despair. If mere thousands of Easter Islanders with only stone tools and their own muscle power sufficed to destroy their society, how can billions of people with metal tools and machine power fail to do worse? But there is one crucial difference. The Easter Islanders had no books and no histories of other doomed societies. Unlike the Easter Islanders, we have histories of the past-information that can save us. My main hope for my sons' generation is that we may now choose to learn from the fates of societies like Easter's.
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