|
The Future Is
Brown?
There has been much criticism over environmental groups turning
every
ecological problem into a disaster movie and there is some truth
to it when
one examines the opportunism of libertarians or former greenpeace
members
with books to sell. There's even a web site (or many) debunking
environmental problems - see www.junkscience.com
The report highlighted
here is from UN, no guarantee in itself of much more cred that
the
libertarian, however the report has added weight given that it
has details
published in Nature - ie its been peer reviewed by fellow scientists.
But,
no doubt, a visit to junkscience.com in the next couple of weeks
will find
it all refuted.
From the UN Wire ECOSYSTEMS: Global Systems Susceptible To Catastrophic
Change -- Study [See #1 below] should be read with reference to
a recent
landmark comprehensive study commissioned by the Secretary General
of the
UN for the Millenium Summit, and conducted by UNEP, UNDP, World
Resources
Institute and the World Bank which is part of a Pilot Analysis
of Global
Ecosystems. The initial report "People and Ecosystems: The Fraying
Web of
Life" concluded that the broad and devastating decline occurring
in all
but one of the earth's major ecosystems must be reversed or there
could be
devastating implications for human development.
See Condition Critical: The Fraying Web of Life. Time Magazine.
Special
Edition. Earth Day Spring, 2000. [See #2 below]
http://www.time.com/time/reports/earthday2000/assessment01.html
"People and
Ecosystems: The Fraying Web of Life": http://www.wri.org/wri/wrr2000
[1] UN WIRE An Independent News Briefing about the United Nations
http://www.unwire.org/
An international consortium of scientists has found that many
global
ecosystems -- such as coral reefs, tropical forests, and northern
lakes and
forests -- are vulnerable to sudden catastrophic change as a direct
result
of decades of continuous pressures from human activity. The findings
were
published Oct. 11 in the
scientific journal Nature. "Models have predicted this, but only
in recent
years has enough evidence accumulated to tell us that resilience
of many
important ecosystems has become undermined to the point that even
the
slightest disturbance can make them collapse," said Marten Scheffer,
lead
author of the study and ecologist at the University of Wageningen
in the
Netherlands.
Co-author Stephen Carpenter, a limnologist at the University of
Wisconsin-Madison, said the scientific community is beginning
to realize
that stressed ecosystems under a negative influence can suddenly
slip from
a seemingly stable state to a more endangered one. "We realize
there is a
common pattern we're seeing in ecosystems around the world," Carpenter
said. "Gradual changes in vulnerability accumulate and eventually
you get
a shock to the system, a flood or a drought, and boom, you're
over into
another regime. It becomes a self-sustaining collapse."
Normally ecosystems are able to withstand change, the scientists
say, but
increasing levels of human exploitation and the ever- growing
problem of
global warming are destabilizing factors. "All of this is set
up by the
growing susceptibility of ecosystems," Carpenter said. "A shock
that
formerly would not have knocked a system into another state now
has the
potential to do so. In fact, it's pretty easy" (Environmental
News
Network, Oct. 12).
[2] http://www.time.com/time/reports/earthday2000/assessment01.html
Time
Magazine. Special Edition. Earth Day Spring, 2000. Condition Critical
By
Eugene Linden
For more than 40 years, earth has been sending out distress signals.
At
first they were subtle, like the thin shells of bald-eagle eggs
that
cracked because they were laced with DDT. Then the signs were
unmistakable,
like the pall of smoke over the Amazon rain forest, where farmers
and
ranchers set fires to clear land. Finally, as the new millennium
drew near,
it was obvious that Earth's pain had become humanity's pain. The
collapse
of the North Atlantic cod fishery put 30,000 Canadians out of
work and
ruined the economies of 700 communities. Two years ago, deforestation
worsened China's floods, which killed 3,600 people and left 14
million
homeless. Population pressures and overcrowding raised the toll
from last
year's rains in Latin America, which killed more than 30,000 people
and
created armies of environmental refugees.
And how have we responded to four decades of ever louder distress
signals?
We've staged a procession of Earth Days, formed Green parties,
passed
environmental laws, forged a few international treaties and organized
global gabfests and photo ops like the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio
de Janeiro.
All the while, the decline of Earth's ecosystems has continued
unabated.
What will it take for us to get serious about saving our environment?
When
will environmentalism move from being a philosophy promoted by
a passionate
minority to a way of life that governs mainstream behavior and
policy? How
can we understand that Earth is one big natural system and that
torching
tropical rain forests and destroying coral reefs will eventually
threaten
the well- being of towns and cities everywhere?
One crucial step is a true accounting of the state of the planet,
a
thorough assessment of the health of all Earth's major ecosystems,
from
oceans to forests. Only a comprehensive global survey can show
how damage
to one system is affecting other systems and can determine whether
Earth as
a whole is losing its ability to nurture the full diversity of
life and the
economies of nations. That was the thinking behind the launching
of the most
ambitious study of global ecosystems ever undertaken. In September,
at a
special millennial session of the U.N., four of its agencies and
partners—the World Bank, the U.N. Development Program, the U.N.
Environment
Program and the World Resources Institute—will present the first
results of
this project, a Pilot Analysis of Global Ecosystems. The findings
of the $4
million study, called PAGE for short, will be published in the
2000-01
edition of the World Resources Report titled People and Ecosystems:
The
Fraying Web of Life. PAGE will also set the stage for a larger
$20 million
Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, scheduled to begin next year.
The goal is
to answer the most important question of the century: What is
happening to
Earth's capacity to support nature and civilization?
Time was given an exclusive advance look at the U.N. report, which
makes
for sobering reading. Its conclusions are divided into assessments
of five
major types of ecosystems—forests, freshwater systems, coastal/marine
habitats, grasslands and agricultural lands—and all five are showing
signs
of deterioration (see the graphics on these PAGEs). The report's
maps and
charts capture the stunning scale and character of human impact
on the
planet. One set reveals the degree to which agricultural lands
have been
degraded around the world by the buildup of salts and the loss
of
nutrients; another locates oceanic dead zones caused by pollutants
flowing
to the sea from rivers; another shows the degree to which productive
parts
of the sea floor have been destroyed by trawling; another highlights
how
much humanity has altered coastlines. Many of the statistics are
staggering: half the world's wetlands have been lost in the past
century;
58% of coral reefs are imperiled by human activity; 80% of grasslands
are
suffering from soil degradation; 20% of drylands are in danger
of becoming
deserts; and groundwater is being depleted almost everywhere.
|
|
