The Future Is Haiti?
Forest Networking a Project of Forests.org, Inc.
September 24, 2004
OVERVIEW & COMMENTARY by Glen Barry, Ph.D., Forests.org
I have seen the future and it is Haiti. The consequences of deforestation, poverty and inequity, combined with changing climate, are on display. The path to avoid such a future, and achieve local and global ecological sustainability, is clear. Unfortunately, it depends upon wisdom, ecological intuition and justice - not bombing - thus current leaders may be disadvantaged. Forests.org calls for a major international program to ecologically restore landscapes whose ecosystems have been destroyed and are no longer functioning. This will involve mixed plantings of trees suitable to meeting human needs; i.e. food, shelter and fuel. It will also require assembling new natural forests and grasslands composed of native species, planted along environmentally sensitive areas such as water sources and steep slopes. Man centered and nature centered forests must be intermingled and contiguous.
Further, there will be no respite for environmental refugees until the human population is stabilized and then reduced using non-coercive means. This will require generations of one child households as the global norm. And finally, the atrocious sums of money being poured into militarism by our "leaders" must be rechanneled towards meeting basic human needs. Ecological collapse is just as real in the shiny and bright cities of the North. Imagine Phoenix in summer with no water or electricity (not impossible). I hope that you can intuit that humans are utterly dependent upon the Earth - yet we are failing Gaia and all her life badly.
g.b.
Deadly Floods in Haiti Blamed on Deforestation, Poverty
Associated Press
http://www.enn.com/today.html?id=85
Archived: http://forests.org/articles/reader.asp?linkid=35207
Russia Prepares to Ratify Kyoto Protocol
LA Times
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-092304kyoto_lat,1,3808341.story?coll=la-home-world
Archived: http://forests.org/articles/reader.asp?linkid=35193
Ecuador's Largest National Park Opened for Oil Development
Environment News Service
http://www.ens-newswire.com/login/index.asp?q=/ens/sep2004/2004-09-23-02.asp
Archived: http://forests.org/articles/reader.asp?linkid=35199
Networked by Forests.org, Inc., gbarry@forests.org
September 24, 2004
OVERVIEW & COMMENTARY by Glen Barry, Ph.D., Forests.org
I have seen the future and it is Haiti. The consequences of deforestation, poverty and inequity, combined with changing climate, are on display. The path to avoid such a future, and achieve local and global ecological sustainability, is clear. Unfortunately, it depends upon wisdom, ecological intuition and justice - not bombing - thus current leaders may be disadvantaged. Forests.org calls for a major international program to ecologically restore landscapes whose ecosystems have been destroyed and are no longer functioning. This will involve mixed plantings of trees suitable to meeting human needs; i.e. food, shelter and fuel. It will also require assembling new natural forests and grasslands composed of native species, planted along environmentally sensitive areas such as water sources and steep slopes. Man centered and nature centered forests must be intermingled and contiguous.
Further, there will be no respite for environmental refugees until the human population is stabilized and then reduced using non-coercive means. This will require generations of one child households as the global norm. And finally, the atrocious sums of money being poured into militarism by our "leaders" must be rechanneled towards meeting basic human needs. Ecological collapse is just as real in the shiny and bright cities of the North. Imagine Phoenix in summer with no water or electricity (not impossible). I hope that you can intuit that humans are utterly dependent upon the Earth - yet we are failing Gaia and all her life badly.
g.b.
Deadly Floods in Haiti Blamed on Deforestation, Poverty
Associated Press
http://www.enn.com/today.html?id=85
Archived: http://forests.org/articles/reader.asp?linkid=35207
Russia Prepares to Ratify Kyoto Protocol
LA Times
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-092304kyoto_lat,1,3808341.story?coll=la-home-world
Archived: http://forests.org/articles/reader.asp?linkid=35193
Ecuador's Largest National Park Opened for Oil Development
Environment News Service
http://www.ens-newswire.com/login/index.asp?q=/ens/sep2004/2004-09-23-02.asp
Archived: http://forests.org/articles/reader.asp?linkid=35199
Networked by Forests.org, Inc., gbarry@forests.org
Starmail - 24. Sep, 16:56
