Posted on 15-8-2002
Environmental
Socialist Revolution?
From www.globeandmail.com,
by MARK MACKINNON, Tuesday, August 13, 2002
Page A12
Intro by Alan Marston
As in many post-Soviet states, the authorities around Baikal
do nothing to
hide their belief that pumping up the region's sagging economy
is more
important than mitigating any damage their projects could do
to the natural
surroundings. Such a view is far from confined to Russia, on
the contary,
it was the view of the old state socialists, it is the view
that underpins
the so-called global economy - it is a world view that has never
gone away,
but simply re-dressed to please the eye of each succeeeding
generation of
compliant consumers. The raw power of modern mass production
has lent old
views a new productive force unseen in the world before. And
now we are
witness to production's partner, destruction.
Socialist revolutions were masses of people acting to balance
the excesses
of human exploitation that is endemic to industrialism and which
some
governments were incapable of mitigating against. The next socialist
revolution is already underway, as masses of people act to balance
the
excesses of exploitation that transcends people and governments
and touches
every aspect of life. Will Russia be the scene yet again for
the greatest
of human dramas?
.
IRKUTSK, RUSSIA -- Five time zones west from Moscow, just above
Mongolia,
Lake Baikal is so clear that swimmers who brave its cold, tempestuous
waters would risk vertigo if they looked down. The lake fills
a crevice
that runs 1,600 metres in depth and more than 600 kilometres
in length. It
is also the world's largest source of fresh water, with more
volume than
Canada's Great Lakes put together and enough to account for
four-fifths of
Russia's supply. And as locals like to remind visitors, it is
the world's
oldest lake, perhaps 25 million years old, which would make
it 24 million
years older than just about any other.
Baikal, remote and rugged, has long been appreciated for its
unique place
on the planet and unparalleled ecosystem. With more than 2,500
species of
plants and animals in its waters and along its shores -- three-quarters
of
them endemic to the region -- it is as diverse a place as one
can find in
Siberia. But if Lake Baikal was once seen as a living museum
for Earth, it
is now being thrust into an uncertain future. As Russia hurtles
into a new
century of free-market enthusiasm, its new capitalists want
to build a
pipeline, several thousand kilometres long, from the world's
largest
reservoir to the parched lands of China. The idea is about more
than
improving Russia's exports. It has pitted entrepreneurs against
environmentalists in a struggle over the country's vast base
of natural
resources, and how best to develop them.
At Lake Baikal, the two sides have been clashing for decades
over using it
for industrial development, with the environmentalists mostly
losing. For
45 years, a massive cellulose plant has been spilling chemicals
into the
southern end of the lake that Russians reverently call the Pearl
of
Siberia. "It's not that it's in a terrible place," one municipal
official
said. "It's in a beautiful place. It just happens to make terrible
things." As in many post-Soviet states, the authorities around
Baikal do
nothing to hide their belief that pumping up the region's sagging
economy
is more important than mitigating any damage their projects
could do to the
natural surroundings. Even Vladimir Fialkov, the chief scientist
in charge
of studying Lake Baikal, envisions a day when Baikal water will
be pumped
to China, and possibly to the thirsty billions of Africa, the
Middle East
and the United States. "Our analysis shows it is the most pure
water in the
world," said Mr. Fialkov, who heads the Limnological Institute
in the
lakeside town of Listvyanka. Within minutes of meeting a journalist,
he
pulled out a half-litre bottle of "Baikalskaya" fresh water
and put it on
the table. "Please, try some," he said.
Some officials believe the only reason not to build a pipeline
right away
is that as the world grows thirstier, demand will drive up prices
and make
an expensive pipeline project easier to finance. The majestic
lake is deep
enough to satisfy humanity's demands for another 50 years. "If
it's
profitable to export oil and gas by pipelines, it will eventually
be
profitable to export Baikal water by pipelines too," said Anatoli
Malevsky,
chairman of the Irkutsk regional government's natural-resources
committee.
"When the shortage of water is higher, the price of water will
be higher too."
Baikal's value has long been known to Russians, just as it has
long been a
cause for ecologists. At least 336 rivers and streams flow into
the lake,
and its basin has for decades been a base for mining, timber
and
shipbuilding industries. In Soviet times, schoolchildren were
taught to
refer to the crystalline lake as the Sacred Sea, and practised
drawing its
jalapeno pepper-shape in class. Then, in the 1950s, the government
decided
to build the enormous cellulose plant on the southern shores,
in the
village of Baikalsk. Local anger gave birth to the first real
environmental
campaign of the Soviet era -- decades before Mikhail Gorbachev
rose to
power. "Really, perestroika and glasnost were what gave the
environmental
movement a chance to voice itself more loudly. But that first
fight over
Baikal was the start," said Jennifer Sutton, head of the Baikal
Ecological
Wave, an environmental group based in the neighbouring city
of Irkutsk. A
pattern for the next 45 years of wrangling over Lake Baikal
was set: The
environmentalists won a public-relations war and generally made
life harder
for the bureaucrats who wanted to build the cellulose plant.
In 1987, the
Gorbachev government ordered the Baikalsk mill to be "reprofiled"
so that
its activities would be harmless within six years. In 1996,
the United
Nations declared Lake Baikal a World Heritage Site.
Opponents of the mill acknowledge today it is one of the cleanest
operating
plants in Russia. But environmentalists say many of their victories
have
been hollow, which they fear will be the case again in their
fight to stop
any plans for a water pipeline to China. New laws, including
a tax on
polluters to pay for the damage they cause, are frequently dodged.
Moreover, a court recently ruled that the polluter-pay tax is
unconstitutional, leaving open the question of what regime,
if any, the
government will introduce to
replace it. The decree to clean up the Baikal mill also led
nowhere. The
plant continues to spew dioxins, sulphur oxides and chlorinated
organic
compounds into the lake, polluting an area of more than 30 square
kilometres from its southern tip. "Building the plant there
was one of the
biggest mistakes the Soviet government ever made," said Roman
Pukalov,
chief Baikal campaigner for Greenpeace Russia. "The government
knows that
now, but the plant is still there because of local corruption."
While Baikal remains startlingly pure, the location of several
plants along
the Selenga River, its largest tributary, has meant that sections
of the
lake are deteriorating. Inside the 30-kilometre zone around
the cellulose
mill, there were once 30 species of crustaceans. Today, only
four can be
found. Species of plankton crucial to the ecosystem have also
disappeared,
and scores of Baikal's signature species, the nerpa freshwater
seal, have
turned up inexplicably dead on the shores. Ms. Sutton worries
most about
the plankton because they eat bacteria and thereby play a crucial
role in
keeping the rest of the lake clean. While they can handle almost
any type
of natural bacteria, the tiny organisms have proved no match
for the tonnes
of industrial waste that have been discharged into the lake
in recent
decades. "These endemic species are very sensitive to pollution,"
she said.
"You destroy the natural filter, you'll destroy the lake eventually."
In many ways, the continuing battle for Baikal, whether over
the quality of
its water or its purpose, epitomizes the state of Russia's environmental
movement. The greens are waging public-relations battles, and
winning some,
but have yet to declare victory. "We raised public awareness
40 years ago
[during the struggle against the Baikal cellulose plant]," one
veteran
Russian environmentalist said. "But that's about it. Now, the
situation is
worse, not better, than it was then." Part of the problem is
that Russia's
system is not yet a truly democratic forum, and remains a place
where the
most powerful vested interests eventually get their way. Last
year, in its
biggest show of strength to date, the green movement collected
2.5 million
signatures calling for a referendum on two of the biggest ecological
questions facing the country: the government's plan to start
accepting
foreign nuclear waste for storage, and President Vladimir Putin's
plan to
abolish Russia's two main environmental-protection agencies.
The country's
Central Election Committee, however, rejected the request, disqualifying
nearly 700,000 of the signatures for "technical reasons" such
as
incorrectly filled-out passport details. That left the movement
below the
two million signatures the Russian constitution requires to
trigger a
referendum. The greens have not made another attempt.
While that failure could easily be laid at the feet of an obstructionist
political system, some veteran observers say it's also a sign
that the
environmental movement in Russia has yet to catch up to its
counterparts in
Western Europe and North America. "Without a civil society,
there's no
pressure on politicians, and therefore there's no political
will to get
things done," said Alexei Yablokov, a former top adviser to
former
president Boris Yeltsin. "We have no civil society." Though
the groups
spearheading the Baikal campaign -- Baikal Ecological Wave and
Greenpeace
-- are among the most developed non-governmental organizations
in the
country, they have not been able to penetrate the political
process far
enough to influence decisions.
At the Irkutsk natural-resources committee, Mr. Malevsky has
lost his
optimism about the lake's future, even as he promotes it as
a source for
water exports. He said that in the two years since Mr. Putin
came to
office, the closing of environmental-protection agencies and
the transfer
of their tasks to the Natural Resources Department have meant
fewer people
doing environmental monitoring and policing. "Nowadays, enterprises
can
cause air pollution and water pollution and not pay at all,"
Mr. Malevsky
said. Budgets have also shrunk unexpectedly, leaving programs
such as water
purification around the Baikal cellulose plant in the lurch.
"Unfortunately, over the last few years, we have seen a worsening
of the
ecological situation across the country," he said. "A lot of
ecological
programs are going to have financial problems because of this
terrible
federal law."
In Canada and other Western countries, environmental groups
and their
political allies would mount a public-relations offensive, leaking
reports
to the media and lobbying sympathetic politicians to press the
government
to reverse course. But in a remote corner of Russia, drumming
up support
for the world's oldest lake has been as difficult under a democracy
as it
was under the Soviet regime -- in part because the people fighting
for
Baikal feel they are not yet living in a true democracy. "A
developed
democracy has a developed civil society," Mr. Yablokov, the
former Yeltsin
adviser, said in an interview. "In Russia, we're just not there
yet. We're
allowed to take part in the debate, but we're not allowed to
win."
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