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Ecology

Chit Chong writes:

"Modern Society Condemned for Exploiting Future Generations"

Rights for Future Generations Workshop

European Social Forum, London, Oct. 16, 2004

The Rights for Future Generations workshop at the European Social Forum will demand the recognition of the fundamental rights of people in future generations.

Front Against the Golf Course (Malta) writes "Urgent Appeal to save agricultural land in Malta from Golf Course development!
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On 9th September 2004 Malta's Environment and Planning Authority shall be
deciding on the proposed development of a golf course on prime agricultural land in Verdala, Rabat, Malta. The proposed development violates Malta's Structure Plan and the 1991 agreement between the Maltese Government and the Holy See. It shall uproot almost 100 farmers from agricultural land which
has been worked upon for hundreds of years and shall consume unsustainable amounts of water in a country where water is a scarce resource. Irreversable environmental damage shall take place.

Environment, Capitalism & Socialism

Democratic Socialist Perspective (DSP)


The Australian Democratic Socialist Perspective's major work on the environment, originally published by Resistance Books in 1999, is now available online here.The Table of Contents is available below.

"$4 Million Paid to Earth First! Activists

Josh Richman, Oakland Tribune

Friday, May 14, 2004 — Settlement with FBI, Oakland police comes nearly 14 years after car bombing injured environmentalists.


Oakland and the federal government
have paid $4 million to end the long legal battle brought by
two environmental activists against city police and FBI
agents who investigated a 1990 bomb explosion.

Judge Dismisses Case against Greenpeace

MoonieTunes

Miami, FL, May. 20 (UPI) — A Miami federal judge has acquitted the Greenpeace environmental group of boarding a ship carrying Amazon forest mahogany, it was reported Thursday. The South Florida Sun-Sentinel said U.S. District Judge Adalberto Jordan ruled that prosecutors had presented insufficient evidence to send the case to the jury.


The case was the first in which a protest organization had been indicted for the conduct of its members. Greenpeace said the charges were intended to silence the group and put it out of business. A conviction could have jeopardized its non-profit status.


The charges were filed under a 1872 law enacted to discourage brothels from luring sailors from ships that were approaching port. Jordan ruled that the ship, the 965-foot cargo ship Jade, was 6 miles out to sea and therefore not approaching port. Greenpeace said the operation was intended to draw attention to the Amazon rain forest which it says is being destroyed by loggers.

MIKE DAVIS

PLANET OF SLUMS

Sometime in the next year, a woman will give birth in the Lagos slum of Ajegunle, a young man will flee his village in west Java for the bright lights of Jakarta, or a farmer will move his impoverished family into one of Lima’s innumerable pueblos jovenes. The exact event is unimportant and it will pass entirely unnoticed. Nonetheless it will constitute a watershed in human history. For the first time the urban population of the earth will outnumber the rural. Indeed, given the imprecisions of Third World censuses, this epochal transition may already have occurred.


Read the rest at
New Left Review

British Study Covering Last 40 Years Points to Worldwide Mass Extinction of Wildlife and Plants
Tim Radford, The Guardian, Friday March 19, 2004


  Scientists have produced the first comprehensive evidence that the diversity of butterflies, birds and plants is in decline in the UK. They say their research supports the argument that mass extinction threatens life on Earth.

In the past 20 years, according to a study in the US journal Science today, about 70% of all butterfly species in Britain have shown signs of decline. About 28% of plant species and 54% of bird species also declined in areas studied over long periods. The finding comes from government-funded scientists using data painstakingly amassed over the past 40 years by 20,000 skilled naturalists.

From Socialism and Democracy

Joel Kovel, THE ENEMY OF NATURE: THE END OF CAPITALISM OR THE END OF THE WORLD? (London: Zed Books, 2002).

Reviewed by Laurie A. Gates

“Truth is stranger than fiction,” it is said, and lest one be put off by the apocalyptic title, it accurately represents the main point ofJoel Kovel’s latest book. Rather than offeringfire-and-brimstone catastrophism, Kovel detailswith great sobriety the matter-of-fact implications of capitalism for nature and humanity. Also outside the realm of fantasy, he speaks of ecosocialist alternatives as real and fundamental transformations that must occur, and suggests actions to be taken today, by all people, to realize ecosocialism in the future. One thing this requires is the healing of divisions. This book contributes to that end by linking the fight against capitalism with the struggle to preserve the environment.

rob eshelman writes:


"Pentagon Tells Bush: Climate Change Will Destroy Us"

Mark Townsend and Paul Harris, London Observer

-- Secret report warns of rioting and nuclear war

-- Britain will be 'Siberian' in less than 20 years

-- Threat to the world is greater than terrorism

Climate change over the next 20 years could result in a global catastrophe costing millions of lives in wars and natural disasters.

A secret report, suppressed by US defence chiefs and obtained by The Observer, warns that major European cities will be sunk beneath rising seas as Britain is plunged into a 'Siberian' climate by 2020. Nuclear conflict, mega-droughts, famine and widespread rioting will erupt across the world.

nolympics writes:

This from AFP; readers will remember the German greens' u-turn on nuclear power a couple of years ago, accepting that it too is here to stay.

"German Greens Roll Over on GM Food"

BERLIN: Germany is drawing up a law to regulate cultivation of bio-engineered crops, Consumer Minister Renate Kuenast said, admitting that the controversial technology was here to stay.

Kuenast, a member of the pro-enviromentalist Greens party, said the government saw no consumer health risks in genetically modified (GM) foods.

"With or without a law, bio-technology is on the market," she told a press conference.

The law would effectively put into action existing EU directives on exactly what can be grown, where and under what conditions, and on labelling.

Germany, where the pro-environmentalist Greens are a part of the governing coalition, has long been seen as among the countries most sceptical about the technology.

Kuenast said the law would set clear rules and responsibilities on growing bio-crops and offer protection to those farmers whose non-GM produce might be affected by accidental contamination.

Clear labelling would also increase consumer choice by informing them about exactly what they were buying.

She said the bill, to be approved by the cabinet in February, was "a great success for consumers and farmers" after months of negotiations.

Kuenast said ground rules were needed for the cultivation of GM crops in Germany because of the growing use of bio-technology worldwide. She warned of a danger of "creeping infiltration" of such foodstuffs into the country without any labelling if no action is taken.

The law stipulates that farmers growing GM crops must protect neighbouring farmers growing non-GM produce, such as by erecting hedge barriers to prevent cross-pollination.

Compensation would be paid in case of accidental contamination.

Local registers would list all bio-crop producers, who would not be allowed to plant the seeds in or near ecologically sensitive areas.

"The law is a breakthrough. Personally I'm very pleased with this success. For the first time, it will give consumers freedom of choice and farmers will have safe guidelines," she told Monday's issue of the Berliner Zeitung daily.

The European Commission is expected later this year to lift a four-year ban on the import of GM sweet corn, seen as a test case that could pave the way for the authorisation of new GM produce.

Opponents of GM technology say it is being pushed by big corporations with little knowledge about the long-term impact on health and the environment.

Advocates argue that the novel crops could greatly increase yields and help alleviate global hunger, particularly if GM strains could be developed to cope with climate change.

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