With all the research going on has there never been a
serious study on greed? Greed is the sickness that is
killing our planet. It's a contagious, debilitating,
crippling disease that effects us all. Seems that
only humans suffer from this ailment and they appear
to be unable to accurately diagnose it and incapable
of curing themselves. Maybe NIH would fund us if we
wrote a very enticing proposal. Yeah right!
--- Mark Jones <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> by Paul Brown
> Guardian 8/10/98
>
>
> HUMANS have destroyed more than 30 per cent of the
> natural world
> since 1970
> with serious depletion of the forest, freshwater
> and marine systems
> on which life
> depends.
>
> Consumption pressure from increasing affluence has
> doubled in the
> past 25 years
> and continues to accelerate, according to a
> ground-breaking report
> from the World
> Wide Fund for Nature, the New Economics Foundation,
> and the World
> Conservation Monitoring Centre at Cambridge.
>
> The Living Planet Report says that the acceleration
> in environmental
> destruction
> shows that politicians who have been paying lip
> service to
> sustainable development
> have done little to promote it. "Time is running
> out for us to change
> the way we
> live if we are to leave future generations a living
> planet," Nick
> Mabey, WWF's
> economic policy officer, said at the launch of the
> report in London
> last week. "We
> knew it was bad, but until we did this report we
> did not realise how
> bad."
>
> One of the most serious problems revealed for the
> first time is the
> depletion of
> freshwater resources with half of the accessible
> supplies being used
> by humans -
> double the amount of 1960. The rate of decline of
> freshwater
> eco-systems is
> running at 6 per cent a year, threatening to dry up
> many wetlands,
> and push the
> species of those habitats to extinction.
>
> The report says that governments should increase
> the efficiency of
> their water use,
> and stop wasteful irrigation schemes where water
> losses are highest.
>
> Carbon dioxide emissions have doubled in the same
> period, and, being
> far in excess
> of the natural world's ability to absorb them, are
> accelerating
> global warming.
>
> Global consumption of wood and paper has increased
> by two-thirds, and
> most
> forests are managed unsustainably. In the same
> period, marine fish
> consumption
> has also more than doubled, and most of the world's
> fish resources
> are either fully
> exploited or in decline.
>
> Although Western countries have high consumption
> rates, some of the
> developing
> countries are depleting their natural resources at
> an alarming rate.
> The people of
> Taiwan, the United States and Singapore are singled
> out as the
> world's most
> voracious consumers, responsible for depleting the
> Earth's resources
> faster than
> other countries. Britain comes 41st in the list of
> more than 130
> countries.
>
> The report says that though governments are failing
> to take action to
> protect
> croplands and resources, every individual bears a
> responsibility for
> being careless
> with the world's resources.
>
> Dr Norman Myers, of Green College, Oxford, said:
> "As the world
> becomes
> economically richer, it becomes environmentally
> poorer. Many people
> have known
> this for a long time, but they have sometimes
> lacked evidence of a
> comprehensive
> and compelling sort. More power then to WWF for
> documenting our
> declining
> prospect in such fine grain detail."
>
> Although the report says that a growing population
> is part of the
> problem, increased
> consumption has been the main problem. The average
> North American or
> Japanese
> consumes 10 times as much of the world's resources
> as the average
> Bangladeshi.
> Japan and Bangladesh have the same populations but
> have a vastly
> different effect
> on the world's eco-systems, particularly in timber
> and fish
> consumption.
>
> The average North American resident consumes fives
> times as much as
> an African
> and three times as much as an Asian. However, in
> total Asia takes
> more of the
> Earth's resources because there are 3.2 billion
> Asians compared with
> only 0.3
> billion North Americans.
>
> The Swiss billionaire industrialist Dr Stephan
> Schidheiny, who is
> president of the
> Avina Foundation, said: "This index indicates a
> serious decline in
> the health of the
> Earth's ecological balance sheet, which reflects
> our imprudent and
> inefficient use of
> natural resources. To restore its ecological
> health, we must ensure
> that our
> consumption and production of food, water,
> materials and energy are
> within the
> Earth's carrying capacity now, and in the future."
>
> He said people could help save the planet and save
> themselves money
> through
> energy efficiency, reducing waste, using water
> sparingly and not
> contaminating it,
> and by avoiding unnecessary trips in vehicles.
>
> Gro Harlem Brundtland, head of the World Health
> Organisation, said:
> "This
> quantifies for the first time a scary decline in
> the health of the
> world's forest,
> freshwater and marine ecosystems. It shows we have
> lost nearly a
> third of the
> Earth's natural wealth since 1970."
>
> Sir Ghillian Prance, director of the Royal
> Botanical Gardens at Kew,
> said: "The
> index presents a warning which we should all take
> most seriously
> because it charts
> an alarming decline in the health of natural
> forest, freshwater and
> marine
> ecosystems over the past 30 years.
>
> "The conservation of natural ecosystems is not a
> luxury which only
> the rich can
> afford, but is essential to ensure the maintenance
> of the vital
> ecological functions of
> our planet upon which we all depend for our
> survival."
>
>
>
=== message truncated ===
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