The Ecologist Vol 25 Nol January/February 1995 ^ J £3.50 (US $7)

New- Diseases - Old Plagues

Who's Behind the Ecolabel?

Mexico - Wall Street on the Warpath

Oestrogen Overdose

Ozone Backlash

ISSN DEbl-3131

0 1 > The Unsettling of Tibet

770261"313010 Housing Plans and Policies ONA ODERN ANET RICHARD D NORTH 'Richard D North has long been one of the best informed and most thought provoking writers on the whole nexus of environmental and develop­ ment issues. This sharp and intelligent book shows North at the top of his form, arguing convincingly that concern about the future of our globe does not require you to be a modish ecopessimist. It comes like a sunburst of rational optimism and commonsense.' CHRISTOPHER PATTEN Governor of Hong Kong and former Secretary of State for the Environment (1989-1990)

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We welcome payment by UK£ cheque necessarily express the views of the drawn on UK bank, US$ check drawn on US bank, editors. eurocheque written in UK£, banker's draft payable The Ecologist \nternational Serial Number through a British bank, UK or international postal is: ISSN 0261-3131. order, Access, Visa or MasterCard. Printed by Penwell Ltd, Station Road, Kelly North American subscriptions payable by check Bray, Callington, Cornwall, PL17 8ER, UK. drawn on US banks in US funds to: MIT Press Tel: (01579) 383777 Journals, 55 Hayward Street, Cambridge, MA 02142,. Tel: (617)253-2889; Fax: (617) 258-6779 Copyright: The Ecologist 1995 The Ecologist is available on microfilm from University Microfilms International, 300 North Zeeb St., Ann Arbor, Ml, USA The Publisher Contents EDWARD GOLDSMITH Founding Editors Ecologist Vol. 25, No. 1, January/February 1995 EDWARD GOLDSMITH PETER BUNYARD Editorial Editorial NICHOLAS HILDYARD Who Broke Mexico? 2 SARAH SEXTON Ken Silverstein and Alexander Cockburn Editorial Assistant The Ozone Backlash 5 SALLY SNOW John Passacantando and Andre Carothers Associate Editors PATRICIA ADAMS Probe International Feature Articles (Canada) TRACEY CLUNIES-ROSS Housing as Social Control in Tibet 8 (UK) MARCUS COLCHESTER Scott heckle World Rainforest Movement During Chinese rule in Tibet, large areas of Lhasa and major towns have been cleared (UK) for redevelopment, and thousands of Tibetans evicted from their homes. The housing RAYMOND DASMANN programmes have not brought improvements for the majority of Tibetans — but they University of California, Santa Cruz (USA) have brought new forms of social control. SAMUEL S. EPSTEIN University of Illinois Feature Boxes (USA) Agricultural Modernization and International Aid 11 SIMON FAIRLIE Patrick Peatfield/Hannah Pearce (UK) Tibet's subsistence rural economy is to be replaced with a market-oriented one under a new ROSS HUME HALL agricultural master plan, some components of which may be funded with international aid. (USA) SANDY IRVINE "Getting Rich is Glorious" 14 (UK) Richard Smith MICK KELLY China's market economy has increased insecurity and environmental degradation. University of East Anglia (UK) Ecolabels: The Industrialization of Environmental Standards 16 MARTIN KHOR KOK PENG Consumers Association of Karen West Penang (Malaysia) Ecolabelling schemes are being promoted by governments and industry as substitutes SMITHU KOTHARI for environmental regulation. Without the backing of legally-binding standards, Lokayan Social Action Group (India) however, ecolabelling is little more than a marketing gimmick, providing minimal SIGMUND KVAL0Y protection for the environment or for the consumer. Under GATT, even this weak Ecopolitical Ring of Cooperation instrument could be ruled a barrier to trade. (Norway) PATRICK MCCULLY New and Resurgent Diseases: The Failure of Attempted Eradication 21 International Rivers Network (USA) The Harvard Working Group on New and Resurgent Diseases JOHN MILTON Barely 25 years ago, scientists predicted that modern medicine would eradicate (USA) infectious disease. Now old diseases are returning — and new ones emerging at JIMOH OMO-FADAKA African Environmental unprecedented rates. A narrow focus on virus evolution offers an insufficient expla­ Network (Kenya ) nation, not least because it hides the role that human activities play in creating JOHN PAPWORTH opportunities for disease. Fourth World Review (UK) ROBERT PRESCOTT-ALLEN Swimming in a Sea of Oestrogens: Chemical Hormone Disrupters 27 PADATA Sue Dibb (Canada) JOHN SEED Human exposure to chemicals which mimic oestrogens — the hormones that regulate Rainforest Information Centre many of the processes involved in sexual development and reproduction — has been (Australia) linked to reduced fertility and cancers in women and men. Recent research suggests VANDANA SHIVA that soya products may also cause hormonal disruption. Action should be taken Research Centre for Science and Ecology (India) urgently to minimize human exposure to oestrogen mimics in the environment. ROBERT WALLER Commonwealth Human Ecology Centre Books 32 (UK) Risk Society — Three Gorges — Life on the US-Mexican Border — The Gene Hunters RICHARD WILSON (UK) Letters 37 DONALD WORSTER University of Kansas Centre Pages (USA) Campaigns EDITORIAL OFFICE, Opencast Mining • Navajo and Peabody Coal »UK Land Reform • Patents on Life • EU AGRICULTURE HOUSE, BATH ROAD, Genetic Screening • Indian Fish Victory • Anti-NAFTA Move • Macuxi Dam, Brazil • STURMINSTER NEWTON, DORSET, Nigerian Trial • World Bank and Nepal's Arun Dam • Basel Waste Ban • Climate Action DT10 1DU, ENGLAND, UK. TEL +44-1258-473476 FAX +44-1258- Cover: Housing under construction in Lhasa, Tibet (© Norma Joseph FRGS LRPS/TIB). 473748 E-MAIL [email protected] The Ecologist is printed on recycled paper, whitened with hydrogen peroxide.

The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No. 1, January/February 1995 1 Who Broke Mexico? The Killers and The Killing

In February, the Mexican government launched a military bidding up the value of existing assets. In every case, condi­ attack in Chiapas, a province on Mexico's southern border tions demanded by overseas investors inevitably prompt with Guatemala, in an attempt to crush the 13-month old larger scarcity, upsurge and repression. And, as has hap­ peasant uprising by the Ejercito Zapatista de Liberation pened already in countries such as Turkey and Venezuela, National (EZLN) (See "Basta! Mexican Indians Say the bubble inevitably bursts. 'Enough!'", The Ecologist, May/June 1994). The eagerness of Mexico's transformation into the poster child of foreign the Mexican elites and military high command to end the investors was presided over in its most furious phase by Zapatista insurgency is quite obvious, but it was pressure Zedillo's predecessor, Carlos Salinas de Gortari. During put on the Mexican president by large US investors in the Salinas's six-year reign, Mexico became Latin America's country that was probably decisive in giving the go-ahead largest importer of Northern capital. Hundreds of state- for the attack. owned firms were privatized, and some $70 billion in foreign This is no speculative inference. The onslaught on the money poured into the country, mostly into stocks and Zapatistas (now suspended) was announced by President bonds. Ernesto Zedillo on 9 February, less than a month after the US Under such external pressures, Mexican stocks behaved Chase Bank, which has billions of dollars invested in Mexico, erratically even before the peso's crash. During the past year issued a peremptory call for the extinction of Zapatista the Bolsa de Valores — the Mexican stock exchange — rose to Subcomandante Marcos and his comrades. On January 13, an index of about 2,700 (after NAFTA was passed), fell to Chase Bank had issued a "Political Update" announcing about 1,800 in May, then climbed sharply again before drop­ bluntly: ping to the current level of about 1,970. After its privatization "While Chiapas, in our opinion, does not pose a funda­ in 1991, Telmex, the Mexican telephone monopoly, traded at mental threat to Mexican political stability, it is per­ $27.25 per share, climbed to $75 in early 1994, but then in ceived to be so by many in the investment community. early February of this year, was trading at $34 a share. The government will need to eliminate the Zapatistas to The Northern investors in Mexico have been led by play­ demonstrate their effective control of the national terri­ ers such as Goldman Sachs; Salomon Brothers, which since tory and of security policy." the late 1980s has handled $15 billion worth of transactions in The memorandum, which was circulated by the bank's Emerg­ Mexico; and Citibank, a leader in the US corporate campaign ing Markets Group to major investors, also stated that it is in to pass the NAFTA agreement. With the help of the Mexican the best interests of Mexico's ruling party to rig crucial state government, matters were arranged to insure maximum elections over the next few months. Throughout January, the security for their money and hence their peace of mind. Chase banker who wrote the memo was making the rounds First, Mexican government bonds, or tesobonos, carried in Washington, pressing the same message: Zedillo and the yields of up to 16 per cent, a rate reflective of the high risk Mexican army had to move. involved. Mexican stocks also offered handsome rewards, as Zedillo had no options. The peso had collapsed and the seen in the spectacular early rise in the value of Telmex Mexican state was substantively bankrupt; without bailout shares. The whole arrangement was sweetened by the Mexi­ money from the North, it would have to default formally on can government's pegging the peso to a most favourable rate its debt obligations. The bankers' demands and the attack on of about 3.5 to the dollar — a rate that bore no relation to the the Zapatistas went arm-in-arm. In fact, the downfall of the real state of the Mexican currency but which allowed inves­ peso had nothing to do with land occupations in Chiapas, tors to protect their profits when transferring their winnings however much President Zedillo and Wall Street's bankers back home. might try to link them. Why then did the peso plummet, and A mere fraction of Northern capital — somewhere be­ who made a killing? tween 5 and 15 per cent — went to direct investment in Mexican plants and equipment. Sackfulls found their way into the pockets of the Mexican elite (including Harvard- The Bubbles Burst trained Salinas, who, in the tradition of his presidential predecessors, has retired to a life of luxury). Last year Forbes The collapse of the Mexican peso in late 1994 and subsequent magazine listed 24 Mexican billionaires, more than the com­ events provide a record, as detailed as tremors on a seismo­ bined total in Britain, France and Italy. At last count, the graph, of the stress points in US relations with "boom" financial collapse had reduced their number to 10. economies in the Third World and the fantastic plunder such relations involve. The implosion of the Mexican economy is intimately linked Doing the Banks' Bidding to that country's rise in recent years as one of the world's hottest "emerging markets," the name big institutional in­ It should be clearly understood that the performance re­ vestors cite as an example to Third World and Eastern Euro­ quired of the Mexican economy during the Salinas years had pean countries that have deregulated their economies and absolutely nothing to do with economic growth in any ra­ allowed foreigners to buy domestic equities or debt, either tional understanding of the word. What Salinas and his directly or through mutual funds. Bankers and brokerage cronies did not steal, and what remained after the profit houses have made vast profits in these countries by injecting remittances of foreign investors, was used to finance a trade huge sums of money into small markets, thereby temporarily deficit that reached $25 billion last year. The need to attract

2 The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No. 1, January/February 1995 foreign money gave US investors great leverage with Mexi­ value to limit additional injury to balance sheets," and that a can authorities — all the more so because major banks, bailout was essential "to restoring confidence to Mexican frightened by the temporary losses brought on by the 1980s financial markets, and to avoiding contagion effects to other debt crisis, have slashed direct lending to Mexico. emerging markets." The central demand of US fund managers has been that The man the financiers called most urgently was one of Mexico keep the peso artificially inflated. The peso should their own: ex-Goldman Sachs co-chair Robert Rubin, now US have been devalued long ago, but Mexico did not want to Treasury Secretary. Rubin was holidaying in the British advertize its underlying economic ills before NAFTA was Virgin Islands when the crash came, and "his initial instinct," passed. Nor was the Clinton Administration anxious to see said The New York Times, "was to let the Mexicans and the the peso devalued, as it would have cast doubt on its claim market sort it out, and to return to the important business of that a NAFTA-generated export boom, which was contin­ casting for bonefish in the azure waters of the Caribbean." gent on Mexico's maintaining the value of the peso, would But, unsurprisingly, Rubin soon "became convinced that in create hundreds of thousands of new US jobs. Mexico, the [US] Administration was faced with the most The seismograph began to quiver urgently in February modern of foreign policy crises. No nukes, no troops, just the 1994, when the US Federal Reserve began reversing its policy potential for global financial apocalypse." of maintaining low US interest rates, which had pushed The Treasury Secretary's familiarity with the Mexican investors abroad. By the time Zedillo replaced Salinas as scene is rather more detailed than a word so vaguely grandi­ president in December 1994, Mexican reserves had fallen to ose as "apocalypse" would suggest. Rubin's 1993 financial less than $7 billion, forcing Zedillo to devalue the peso in the disclosure statement lists 42 firms with which he had "sig­ hope that such a move — by effectively slashing Mexico's nificant contact" while at Goldman Sachs, of which six were import capacity — would stem the haemorrhage of hard Mexican firms or state agencies, including Mexico's finance currency at the national treasury. The Mexican currency ministry and one of its leading banks. Many of the others promptly collapsed, by 40 per cent. were US companies with substantial business in Mexico. Searching for culprits, the US press placed the blame for Goldman Sachs itself has, of course, made enormous profits the crash on the Zapatistas and their calls for social reform. of its Mexican operations. Also coming in for recrimination was the Mexican peasantry, The bonefish were soon left in peace, as Rubin rallied to charged with having embarked on a "consumption boom" the cause of bailout, which should be seen not so much as a instead of engaging in austere toil. Most ridiculous of all, the "rescue" in any sense of restoring the Mexican economy to US press relayed the charge from the financial sector that the health, but as a way of keeping Mexico "in play". A $47.5 entire catastrophe could have been avoided if the Mexican billion package was organized by the US government, the government had not resisted the wise counsel offered by its immediate consequence of which was to allow resumption of First World tutors. The New York Times journalist Keith the speculative merry-go-round, with investment banks Bradsher wrote on 2 January that Mexico had "failed to swiftly resuming their lucrative practice of underwriting respond quickly when the economic world around it began and trading Mexican securities. to change," and had adopted an economic "strategy that flew in the face of advice from officials of the International Mon­ etary Fund". In fact, during the past five years, no nation has been more rigorously servile than Mexico in implementing recommen­ dations from the IMF and the World Bank, both of whom hailed the country as a model when its economy was riding high. Back in March 1992, the Financial Times said that Mexico was: MSc/Postgraduate Diploma in "the darling of the [World Bank's] economists (and its major shareholder, the US). The bank does not need to Environmental and Development force Mexico to do anything; the two sides agree on Education almost everything... World Bank economists and Mexi­ Two-year part-time distance learning course can officials often spend weekends together brainstorm­ • The first masters level course in Britain to combine environment, devel­ ing on policy issues." opment and education in one programme. • Designed for educators, teachers, NGO personnel and people working in similar fields. Handouts, Please • Flexible delivery to suit the needs of practitioners. The course covers: • The role of education for sustainable development in bringing about As soon as financial disaster struck, the US bankers, who had change. • Environmental and development education: theory and practice. been pushing reverence for free markets in Mexico and the • Contemporary global issues of environment and development. Third World, were on the telephone to Washington demand­ • Strategies for change. ing a US government bailout. When Congress refused to Special emphasis on: Course planning Curriculum change rubber-stamp Clinton's original rescue package, their hyste­ Policy making The role of NGOs ria boiled over. Action research Participatory learning "The prestige of the president, the chairman [of the US For application and further information contact: Course Administrator, Federal Reserve Bank] and the leadership of both houses in MSc in Environmental and Development Education, Legal, Political and Congress has been committed," cried Robert Hormats, vice Social Sciences, South Bank Business School, South Bank University, 103 Borough Road, London, SE1 OAA. . . /^7^ chair of Goldman Sachs International. If Congress killed aid to Mexico, "the feeling in the rest of the world would be that we are a nation in disarray, a country incapable of addressing South Bank University a crisis. The psychological blow would be enormous." A • London• report in Merrill Lynch's Emerging Markets Biweekly said that the "key near-term policy challenge is to stabilize the peso's

The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No. 1, January/February 1995 3 Saving Wall Street With Mexico reduced to the posture of mendicant, foreign investors are hastening to extort further concessions from Some $70 billion in Mexican government notes will mature Zedillo, suggesting steps such as major new privatizations, this year. Even though Mexico has raised short-term interest allowing for 100 per cent foreign ownership of the banking rates on one-year bonds to 24 per cent, in a desperate bid to system, and the prising open of Mexico's oil industry to US prevent a mass withdrawal of foreign capital, most investors corporate predators. will cash out instead of rolling over their notes. On the political front, investors want to insure that domes­ It will be almost impossible for the government to sustain tic discontent does not threaten Mexican stability, which payments to bondholders demanding their money. By Janu­ brings us back to why Wall Street wants Subcomandante ary 31, Mexico's reserves had fallen to $3.5 billion, of which Marcos and his comrades in the EZLN dead. $2.1 billion came from a credit line extended by the US Federal Reserve and other foreign central banks a few days Bullets, not Ballot Boxes after the peso collapsed. In short, Mexico has no capital. The country is effectively bankrupt. Heading up the Wall Street war party is Chase, whose Janu­ "I can guarantee that the emerging markets departments ary 13 memorandum warned that Zedillo might not be able on Wall Street are now calculating how far Mexico can last to gain the confidence of the Zapatistas and their supporters [with the $47.5 billion bailout]," one banking veteran tells us. because "the monetary crisis limits the resources available to 'They'll be advising their firms to buy notes which mature in the government for social and economic reforms". This is May or June, and then they'll get out. Beyond that point no bank-speak for saying foreign investors should have first one's going to want to hold on to Mexican notes for more than rights to the dwindling reserves at the Mexican treasury, a few weeks." leaving nothing for the anti-poverty programmes Zedillo While Wall Street plots its strategy, most Mexicans con­ promised to Chiapas. front a new round of austerity. Inflation for 1995 is expected The author of the memo is Riordan Rett, director of Latin to at least double, to a rate of more than 20 per cent. The American Studies at Johns Hopkins School of Advanced weaker peso also means, ipso facto, a huge increase in the International Studies, who was fired as a Chase adviser after country's foreign debt, which is denominated in dollars, now the memo was leaked. Regarded in the past by his academic worth some 40 per cent more against the Mexican currency peers as conservative but rational, Roett hardened after than in December. At $166 billion, this external debt is going to work full-time for Wall Street, following in the already far higher than in 1982, when Mexico's bankruptcy grand homicidal tradition of such academics-turned- set off the Latin debt crisis. Zedillo, in a move seen as policymakers as Walt Rostow, Henry Kissinger and Herman "encouraging" by foreign investors, intends to hold wage Cohen. increases for the year to 7 per cent. In addition to calling for the Zapatistas' elimination, the Chase Bank's memo also explained: "The Zedillo administration will need to consider care­ Frank Cass fully whether or not to allow opposition victories if fairly won at the ballot box. To deny legitimate electoral victo­ ries by the opposition will be a serious setback in the ENVIRONMENTAL President's electoral strategy. But a failure to retain PRI controls runs the risk of splitting the government party". POLITICS Both the US financial elites and security establishment view anything less than a PRI dictatorship in Mexico with pro­ Editors Stephen C Young, University of Manchester, found alarm. A Latin American Strategy Development Work­ UK and Michael Waller, Keele University, UK shop at the Pentagon in 1990 considered that "a 'democracy opening' in Mexico could test the special relationship [be­ Environmental Politics is concerned with three tween the US and Mexico] by bringing into office a govern­ particular aspects of the study of environmental ment more interested in challenging the US on economic and politics, with a focus on industrialised countries. First, nationalist grounds." Delal Baer, a senior fellow at the Center it examines the evolution of environmental movements for Strategic and International Studies, lamented the di­ and parties. Second, it provides an analysis of the lemma faced by Mexico, which is being pressured to pen up making and implementation of public policy in the area its political system even though "financial markets might not respond positively to increased democracy because it leads of the environment at international, national and local to increased uncertainty." levels. Third, it carries comment on ideas from both a While the bankers were banging the war drums, military 'deep' and a 'shallow' perspective, generated by the advisers from Chile and Argentina — two of the most brutal various environmental movements and organisations, of Latin America's armies, responsible for tens of thousands and by individual theorists. of deaths during the "dirty wars" of the 1970s — were already in Chiapas training Mexican troops. In another omi­ ISSN 0964-0416 Volume 4 1995 nous move, the Chilean army has discreetly named Colonel Quarterly: Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter Oscar Carter Cuadra as military attache in Mexico. Carter is Individuals £42/$55 Institutions £98/$140 the son-in-law of General Manuel Contreras Sepulveda, the former director of Pinochet's secret police, and currently UK/OVERSEAS ORDERS to: Frank Cass, 890-900 Eastern Avenue, appealing his prison sentence for the 1976 murder in Wash­ . Ilford, Essex IG2 7HH, UK. Tel: 0181 599 8866 ington of Orlando Letelier. Fax: 0181 599 0984 E-mail: [email protected] It has also been reported in Mexico that the CIA helped US ORDERS to: Frank Cass, c/o ISBS, 5804 N E Hassalo Street, Portland, OR 97213-3644, USA. with the identification of Subcomandante Marcos, and it is Tel: (503) 287-3093, (800) 944-6190 Fax: (503) 280-8832 beyond question that the US Southern Command was cogni­ sant of the military moves planned for Chiapas.

4 The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No. 1, January/February 1995 The Corporate State Bank to offer his advice. Days later, with the peso falling, Fidelity and other US investment firms cut back their pur­ The crash in Mexico has rocked other emerging markets. chases of short-term Mexican treasury certificates, ravaging Stocks, plunged not only across Latin America but in Hong stock prices and pushing up interest rates. Mexican authori­ Kong, Indonesia, Poland and Thailand. ties soon took steps to bolster the peso. Despite efforts here to portray Mexico's crisis as suigeneris, When it comes to the play of major financial institutions in these emerging market bubbles share many common fea­ world politics, the state, in a way unintended by Marx, may tures. They all have inflated currencies, corrupt elites who be withering after all, at least in the observation of the have a tendency to loot foreign capital, and widely overval­ proprieties of a former time, whereby a US Treasury official ued stocks as a consequence of the enormous inflow of might pretend to speak in the "national interest/' even though speculative money from abroad. The net result is economies he was reading from a policy statement dictated by an oil poised for collapse. company or an arms firm. But Robert Rubin is a bond trader In the period of the high Cold War, a worried banker from Wall Street wherever he sits, a fact that he does not would ventilate his fears to the Treasury Department or the disguise. Corporate power is so brazenly overwhelming that national Security Council. Corporate concerns would nor­ the mediation of the state is scarcely required to invoke the mally be answered with the dispatch of troops or the activa­ national interest, and the important decisions are openly tion of the CIA. taken by the chieftains of capital, whether in the "private In the Mexico crisis, the state still serves as the guarantor sector" or at the supra national level, at the IMF. of last resort, but the ordering personnel are drawn from the corporate world. When Mexican presidential candidate Luis Ken Silverstein and Alexander Cockburn Donaldo Solosio was assassinated last March, Fidelity's fund manager, Robert Citrone, felt it was imperative that Mexico reassure foreign investors by propping up the peso. Ken Silverstein and Alexander Cockburn write and edit Citrone did not waste time contacting the State Depart­ CounterPunch, a Washington, DC-based newsletter. This editorial is ment. Instead, he rang up authorities at Mexico's Central an edited version of an article which first appeared in The Nation.

Crisis? What Crisis? The Ozone Backlash

First it was over the Antarctic. Then over the Arctic. Now international controls on ozone-depleting substances. scientists have announced massive ozone depletion in the In the spring of 1993, the EPA declined to act on appeals by upper atmosphere over Siberia and Europe, with ozone NASA scientists to issue a public health warning about levels 20-30 per cent lower than normal. Studies released in spending too much time in the sun after they discovered 1994 and 1995 by the US National Aeronautics and Space significantly decreased ozone levels over North America. A Administration (NASA) also showed that depletion over the year later, the EPA began a tepid "Living Sun-Smarter" daily poles had outstripped predicted rates of ozone loss for the health alert that makes little mention of ozone depletion. In past three years — with record levels of ozone destruction late 1993, DuPont, the US chemical giant, was persuaded by over Antarctica. Models by scientists at the US National the Clinton Administration to continue producing Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration suggest chloroflurocarbons (CFCs) — the chemicals most responsi­ that ozone depletion is triggering a series of self-reinforcing ble for ozone depletion — in the developed world for a full depletion cycles, with ozone loss causing still further ozone year beyond the date when the company had publicly com­ loss, resulting in geometric rates of destruction. mitted itself to ceasing domestic CFC production. This was in Biologists, too, are worried. As the earth's ozone layer response to pressure from vehicle manufacturers which still thins, animals and plants are bathed in increased levels of had not done sufficient work to find alternatives for automo­ ultraviolet-B (UV-B) radiation from the sun. Recent studies bile air-conditioners which use CFCs. now link increased UV-B to damage to hardwood forests in The greatest threat to action on ozone depletion, however, Ohio; to the deaths of juvenile trout; and to damage to midge may well come from Congress, following the Republicans larvae, one of the key links in the freshwater food chain. In landslide victory in November 1994, which has made clear December 1993, research leaked from the US Environmental that it intends to dismantle health, labour and safety regula­ Protection Agency (EPA) presented substantial evidence tions. The Montreal Protocol, the 1987 international treaty that UV-B suppresses the immune system of animals and that binds signatory states to phasing out ozone-depleting humans — regardless of their level of pigmentation and substances by the end of the century, looks certain to be an despite the use of sunscreens. early target. Yet even as the scientific community builds an increas­ ingly alarming picture of the state of the earth's ozone layer Rush to Destruction and the biological impacts of ozone depletion, prominent opinion leaders, particularly in the US, have pronounced the A key figure behind the ozone backlash has been Rush ozone crisis "over". An "ozone backlash", which began in the Limbaugh, the ultra-conservative host of a public "talk ra­ early 1990s, is rapidly gaining ground and now has powerful dio" show, with an audience of some 20 million people. allies, both in the Clinton Administration and in Congress. Lambasting the ozone crisis as a "scam" and a "hoax", Official concern over ozone depletion has given way to Limbaugh bases most of his arguments on two books pub­ complacency, research cuts and even attempts to strip back lished in the early 1990s: Trashing the Planet and Environmen-

The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No. 1, January/February 1995 5 tal Overkill, by the late Dixie Lee Ray, a former Governor of Washington State and former head of the US Atomic Energy Commission. Ray's information on ozone depletion comes from The Holes in the Ozone Scare by Rogelio A. Maduro. Maduro is an associate editor of 21st century, a magazine published by Lyndon Larouche, described by Science as "an extremist politician,/, who recently served a lengthy prison sentence for conspiracy to avoid taxes. Publicity material for Holes in the Ozone Scare urges the "overthrow of the murder­ ous environmentalist regime now ruling our schools, gov­ erning institutions and the media", while Limbaugh accuses "environmentalist wackos" of being out to ruin the Ameri­ can way of life by banning CFCs. The arguments put forward by Limbaugh, Ray and Maduro Join the Green Party carry little scientific credence. Ray, for example, insists that because CFCs are heavier than air, they cannot rise into the The Green Party is the political stratosphere: in fact, as Sherwood Rowland, one of the first scientists to warn of the dangers of ozone depletion points arm of the Green movement and out, the weight of CFCs is a red herring, since CFCs are largely carried into the stratosphere (where they have been is a must for everyone concerned measured in significant amounts in hundreds of tests for with radical change. years) by the action of winds. Nor is there any basis to Limbaugh's oft-repeated claim that ozone depletion has been limited to "occasional reduced Meet with people with green levels of ozone over Antarctica". The reality is that substan­ lifestyles, politics, economics, tially-reduced levels of ozone have regularly been measured over most of the globe, with the exception of the tropics. In philosophy, food and healing. February 1995, the World Meteorological Organization re­ ported that ozone levels over Europe were 10-12 per cent The Green Party below normal, while over North America, the deficiency was la Waterlow road 5-10 per cent, with periods where levels were 20 per cent lower than normal. Archway, London N19 5NJ Equally misleading is the assertion that ozone depletion is Tel: 0171 272 4474 Fax: 0171 272 6653 largely the result of natural phenomenon, such as volcanic eruptions, rather than industrial emissions of chlorine-based compounds. According to Limbaugh, Holistic Holidays "Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines spewed forth more than a thousand times the amount of ozone-depleting and Courses chemical in one eruption than all the fluorocarbons manu­ on the beautiful Greek factured by the wicked, diabolical and insensitive corpo­ rations in history." island of Skyros Yet, as the Environmental Defense Fund, a Washington- based lobby group, points out, "Pinatubo's destructive effect The environment and us. Two week on the ozone layer has been about fifty times less than that of residential courses in green theory with: CFCs, rather than a thousand times greater, as Limbaugh claims. Thus his estimate is off by a factor of fifty thousand." Moreover, all the chemicals emitted by Pinatubo were quickly Rudolf Bahro — ex-chairman of the German washed out of the stratosphere by rain, unlike CFCs, which Green Party, Professor of Social Ecology at will remain in the stratosphere for at least a century. Indeed, the Humboldt University in Berlin. the record levels of ozone depletion announced by the World Meteorological Organization in September 1994 occurred in Henryk Skolimowski — Polish philosopher the absence of volcanic dust from Pinatubo. What is not and author, consultant to UNESCO and Vice pointed out by Limbaugh and others is that natural phenom­ ena, like the eruption of Mount Pinatubo, can seriously President of the Teilhard Society. enhance the ozone-depleting ability of industrial chemicals Plus art, windsurfing, yoga, t'ai chi, personal already in the stratosphere. development, massage, dance and much more. Also writing workshops with D.M.Thomas, Sue Worse to Come Townsend, Andrew Davies, Elaine Feinstein and Despite such glaring holes in their arguments, Limbaugh, others. Ray and Maduro's revisionist views have been seized upon Idyllic surroundings, delicious food and like- by journalists in the mainstream press and are now gaining increasing currency as the mood of many Americans swings minded company. to the Right. In 1993, for example, the Washington Post de­ clared: Brochure: Skyros (TE), 92 Prince of Wales Road, "After nearly a decade of headlines and hand-wringing London NW5 3NE. Tel: 0171 284 3063. about the erosion of the earth's protective ozone layer,

6 The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No. 1, January/February 1995 the problem [of ozone depletion] appears to be heading their ozone-depleting potential was just five per cent that of toward solution before [researchers] can find any solid CFCs. If allowance is taken for their shorter life-span, how­ evidence that serious harm was or is being done." ever, that potential is four to five times greater than origi­ nally thought. In effect, use of the substitutes adds to the Thanks to the Montreal Protocol, according to Boyce burden of ozone-depleting chemicals in the atmosphere — at Rensberger, the Post journalist responsible for the story, the a time when emissions of those chemicals need to be reduced world has averted the "dark scenarios of environmental as quickly as possible. doom that were pronounced during the discovery of the Antarctic ozone hole." Fingers in the Pie In reality, the peak of ozone destruction is yet to come — and the Montreal Protocol is losing steam at precisely the moment when steps are urgently needed to reduce ozone Some regulators and many atmospheric scientists are now depleting chemicals in the atmosphere as quickly as possible. talking about phasing out the substitutes to CFCs as quickly Ozone is destroyed through various complex reactions in the as possible: the Washington-based Institute for Energy and stratosphere involving a number of chemicals, the most Environmental Research, for example, recently called for the damaging of which are chlorine and bromine compounds. worldwide elimination of HCFCs by 1996. Such demands are These chemicals have "lifetimes" varying from a few years to not well received by DuPont, one of the largest US producers a few hundred years. There is now a heated debate among of HCFCs and (until the end of 1995) CFCs or by many parties bureaucrats and industrialists as to which chemical should to the Montreal Protocol. be phased out when. Unfortunately, with the lack of public Having backed the substitutes, the Protocol is now push­ awareness on this issue, serious compromises are being ing them through a fund, administered by the World Bank, made — just when we are learning that the potential for that was intended to help Third World countries "leapfrog" chlorine and bromine to destroy ozone will not remain con­ damaging ozone-depleting technologies. As Greenpeace re­ stant. ports, 75 per cent of the grants made in 1994 for reducing ozone-depleting chemicals in the manufacture of foam, went One of the important conditions for ozone depletion is to support technologies which used CFCs and HCFCs, while extreme cold in the stratosphere. The latest research suggests most of the projects in the domestic refrigeration sector that as ozone is destroyed in the stratosphere, so the strato­ supported CFC or HCFC technology — this despite the sphere becomes colder, thus increasing the rate of depletion. Bank's own advisers recommending cyclopentane, a chemi­ In this way, the amount of ozone destruction caused by a cal with no ozone-depleting potential and almost no global single chlorine molecule is accelerated, the ozone depletion warming impact, as the most cost-effective alternative. itself creating the conditions for yet more ozone depletion. In addition, according to Jerry Mahlman, Director of the Na­ The pattern of grants approved by the Bank, and its advice tional Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Geophysi­ to Third World countries, are unsurprising: its primary advi­ cal Fluid Dynamics Lab at Princeton University, global warm­ sory panel on grantmaking, the Ozone Operations Resource ing may enhance the ozone-depleting potential of chlorine- Group, consists of seven representatives, all of whom are based compounds, threatening to boost ozone depletion to "closely associated with the chemical industry" and two of previously unthinkable levels. whom are in the employ of ICI, Britain's major manufacturer of CFCs and HCFCs. The dominance of industry is also evident within the conference of the parties to Montreal The Holes in the Protocol Protocol, where discussions about the timing of a phase out is now largely discussed in economic rather than environ­ mental terms. According to Joe Mendelson, Director of the The key to reducing ozone depletion lies in reducing emis­ Ozone Protection Project for Friends of the Earth-US, "The sions of ozone-destroying chemicals to the atmosphere. De­ Protocol is being driven solely by industry-defined techno­ spite the agreement by 139 signatory nations to the Montreal logical possibilities rather than the dire consequences of Protocol to phase out CFCs by the end of 1995 and several continued ozone depletion." One top US Representative to other ozone destroying chemicals by the turn of the century, the meeting said, "[ozone depletion] is not an environmental concentrations of chlorine within the stratosphere will con­ issue. It's an economic issue." tinue to rise for several decades — and will not return to "normal" levels until well into the 21st century. This is because, ten years after the first ozone hole was officially Capitalizing on the Backlash recognized, emissions of CFCs are only just beginning to fall in the developed world. Meanwhile, in the Third World, For industry, resisting controls on HCFCs and other CFC where production of CFCs is permitted under the Protocol, substitutes has become a number one priority. In this, they CFC use continues to rise. Use of CFCs, moreover, is likely to have undoubtedly been well served by the mood of doubt continue long after they are officially phased out — a huge and complacency engendered by the ozone backlash. Yet black market for CFCs has developed in the US, where, without action to reduce the chlorine load in the strato­ according to a US Customs7 agent, they are the second sphere, the earth and all its inhabitants will, on present biggest item of contraband into Port Miami after cocaine. In evidence, be subjected to increasing levels of UV-B radiation, addition, the CFCs now in use in air-conditioning units and with potentially devastating results. The debate is not merely other industrial uses constitute a "bank" of ozone destruc­ about science: as ever, it is about politics. It is time the tion that, despite efforts to control their releases, will delay environmental movement retook the initiative, countering the eventual elimination of these compounds from the at­ the propaganda peddled by Limbaugh, Ray and Maduro, mosphere. and exposing the agenda of those corporations who are now Moreover, the Protocol does not effectively cover CFC sheltering in the lee of the backlash. substitutes, many of which, though less damaging than CFCs, John Passacantando and Andre Car others still deplete ozone; the so-called HCFCs are also powerful John Passacantando is Executive Director of Ozone Action, based in greenhouse gases. When HCFCs were approved by the Mon­ Washington, DC; Andre Carothers is Vice Chair of the Board of treal Protocol as substitutes for CFCs, it was estimated that Greenpeace-USA.

The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No. 1, January/February 1995 7 Housing as Social Control in Tibet

by Scott Leckie

Since the occupation of Tibet by the Chinese authorities in 1950, much of the country's architectural and cultural heritage, particularly in the capital, Lhasa, has been destroyed. In the past few years, many thousands of Tibetans have been evicted from their homes which have been demolished, while modern buildings have been constructed primarily for Chinese settlers. Such practices, combined with agricultural and economic reforms, are a continuing threat to Tibetan ways of life.

In 1950, the army of the People's Republic of China invaded discrimination against Tibetans in housing, education and health Tibet. Nine years later, after an abortive uprising put down with care.5 One result is increasing numbers of homeless Tibetans. a loss of 87,000 lives, the Dalai Lama, Tibet's spiritual and Most of the new migrants have settled in towns and cities, but political leader, fled into exile. Many Tibetans regard the years in rural areas of eastern Tibet, too, "population transfers" and of subsequent Chinese rule as years of repression and ecological discriminatory housing policies have resulted in severe hard­ destruction. Besides removing Tibet's art treasures, mining its ship for local Tibetans. Although China's colonial presence in mineral wealth and clearcutting much of its forests, the Chinese the countryside was, for many years, restricted to military government appears to have attempted to "re-engineer" Tibetan settlements and administrative offices, rural areas of eastern society and ways of living. Integral to that process has been the Tibet are increasingly being opened up to settlers; large residen­ encouragement of Chinese settlements in Tibet and the use of tial housing projects are now under construction in some remote housing policies as devices of social surveillance and control. areas and planned for central areas as well. In areas where large In a process which the authorities describe as improving numbers of transmigrants have settled, so much arable land has housing conditions, the government has evicted several thou­ been taken over to construct housing that many local Tibetan sand Tibetans from their homes and torn down their houses, villagers are unable to support themselves on the remaining demolished monasteries and other public buildings; introduced land. In the village of Gyatso, just outside Lhasa, the Tibetan housing reallocation policies that have segregated Tibetans into community has been left with less than 10 per cent of their crowded and decrepit ghettos, reconstructed whole towns and original cultivable land.6 cities along easily-policed grid lines, and imposed new forms of housing many Tibetans consider inappropriate to local ways of living. Evictions and Segregation

Monotone cement compounds, built to house Chinese settlers "Population Transfer" and Tibetan officials working with the Chinese authorities, now dominate Tibet's towns and cities, which, increasingly, are Until the early 1980s, the government of China had a pro­ segregated into Chinese and Tibetan quarters, the latter notice­ gramme to move Chinese settlers into Tibet under a policy ably poorer in terms of housing and public services. As the UK called "Giving Help to Tibet".1 Many Chinese soldiers, police, Minority Rights Group reported in 1990: professionals, workers and economic migrants — some dis­ placed by development schemes in China itself — have moved "Most Tibetan towns are surrounded and even dwarfed by expansive Chinese sectors having walled compounds with to the country. Now, Chinese people are encouraged to settle by running water and electricity. Tibetan quarters often lack generous incentives, ranging from double rates of pay, to running water or reasonable sanitation. In larger towns both guaranteed housing (which is difficult to obtain in China itself), sectors have electricity, but for Tibetans it is often rationed. to the promise of three months' paid holiday for every 18 In smaller towns and villages there is generally no electric­ months worked. Some of the 1.2 million people who will be ity at all, unless they lie along a major highway and contain evicted by the massive Three Gorges dam being built on the a Chinese compound."7 Yangtze river may go to Tibet.2 Tibetans themselves are esti­ mated to number between five and six million people.3 Such segregation has been accomplished through a combination The resettlement programme has led to unemployment for of zoning policies, relocation and housing reallocation policies. Tibetans and a devaluing of their skills; to the takeover of much Following the 1959 uprising, Lhasa was divided into three of the country's best agricultural land so that, in some places, sections — south, east and north — and, for those deemed Tibetans have moved to less productive areas;4 and to de facto "undesirable", passage between the three area was strictly controlled: for years some family members living little more

Scott Leckie is co-director of the Centre on Housing Rights and Evictions than a mile apart had no knowledge of each other. Soldiers from and legal adviser to Habitat International Coalition. the People's Liberation Army "visited" almost every Tibetan

8 The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No.l, January/February 1995 house in Lhasa, evicting "rebels" and seizing furniture, rugs, kitchen utensils and food. Those who were unable to move in with relatives were permitted to stay in their old homes, but only if they lived with the livestock. Under the pretext of land reform, large areas of land around Lhasa (and other towns and cities) were expropriated to build army camps, detention centres and housing for settlers. Houses belong­ ing to Tibetan nobles were also seized, either to be demolished or transformed into offices and, in some cases, prisons. During the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976), thousands of monas­ teries and temples were destroyed, along with numerous Tibetan homes, in what many Tibetans regard as an attempt to obliterate outward signs of Tibetan culture and to break apart Tibetan communities.8 Traditional Old and new: the centuries-old Potala Palace overlooks an office of the Chinese Tibetan two-storey houses, with the national airline (CAAC). living quarters built above the sta­ bles on the ground floor, were decreed to be "bourgeois ex­ complexes range in size from 50 to 2,000 inhabitants, with cesses" — in many cases, their inhabitants had to destroy their employees of government institutions constituting the largest second storey living quarters and live in the damp, windowless housing unit populations. Such housing generally consists of stables below. two small rooms, with an average occupancy of four persons. Demolitions and zoning policies have been accompanied by Private water taps and toilets are rare within work unit housing.9 a feverish building programme which continues today. Since In Lhasa, over two-thirds of work unit housing — which tends 1950, the Chinese central government has poured some 18 to be built with Chinese architectural methods —is inhabited by billion yuan (US$3 billion) into construction programmes that Chinese migrants.10 have rebuilt large areas of Lhasa (and many other urban centres) Selective enforcement of residence rules have enabled the along lines approved by the regime: boulevards wide enough for authorities both to segregate Tibetans from Chinese settlers and tanks to roll along have replaced the capital's narrow streets and to discriminate against Tibetans. As a Tibetan refugee stated in passages, while the city itself now consists almost exclusively 1990: of commercial buildings and dormitory blocks. From a small "Tibetans wishing to move to towns such as Lhasa, Chamdo town covering an area no larger than 3 km2, Lhasa has expanded and Shigatse are often prevented from doing so, while 2 to 40 km , almost all of the new city consisting of settlements for Chinese settlers are actively encouraged to take up resi­ Chinese administrators, military personnel, workers and set­ dence in these urban centres. All Tibetans without urban tlers. The Tibetan quarter, known as the "old city", has been resident permits are thus effectively forced to remain where reduced to an area of less than 1 km2. they are, notwithstanding the prevailing local economic or other circumstances. In May 1992, it was reported that resident permits were exchanging hands in the black market Residence Permits and Identity Cards in Lhasa for over 5,000 yuan [$800], a price far beyond the means of ordinary Tibetans."11 Although a substantial majority of Tibetans now living in the No housing is available to those without a residence permit or Tibetan quarter of Lhasa wish to remain in their existing homes an identity card. Moreover, households seeking public housing and neighbourhood, they have little say in where they live. and other rationed services are generally required to belong to Excluded from influencing rent levels, the design of their a work unit. Without a work unit, a person must obtain housing dwellings, the physical layout of the buildings and the surround­ from the private market, an often difficult task.12 Since Tibetans ing environment, the type of architecture and building materials who have been evicted from their homes generally do not belong utilized and the overall shape of long-term development plan­ to a work unit, they are effectively denied access to new ning, Tibetans by and large have to live where the authorities housing, even if they wanted to live in it. "Renovated" Tibetan decide. housing is also denied to most Tibetans, since living in such Tibetans are required to carry identification cards with them houses requires special resident permits which they rarely at all times, and movement within the country, or changes in possess. In addition, regulations introduced by the Chinese employment or accommodation, can generally be achieved only regime effectively prevent Tibetans from building their own with government permission and the agreement of one's "work homes — not least by requiring them to produce evidence of a unit", which also provides housing. In Lhasa, work unit housing bank balance of more than 10,000 yuan [$1,600] as security.13

The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No.l, January/February 1995 9 Unfit for Habitation mayor declared that by the end of the year, he hoped to be able to announce that there were "no old, dangerous houses in Lhasa's centuries-old Tibetan communities — once quite ap­ Lhasa."20 propriate to dwellers' needs — have become increasingly unfit Observers are sceptical of claims that the old houses were "in for human habitation. As those evicted move in with their danger of collapse, unsafe or unhygienic". Independent surveys relatives, it is not uncommon in the Tibetan quarter of Lhasa for of houses destroyed in the 1990 clearance revealed that, while 8 to 10 people to inhabit a small two-room dwelling. In many perhaps in need of renovation or repair, the overwhelming instances, they have no option but to live on the ground floor of majority did not require demolition or rebuilding as vulgarized courtyards that, prior to 1950, were used exclusively for animals "Tibetan-style" dwellings. and storage. Most Tibetan houses do not have indoor toilets; the Such rebuilding has been justified in terms of "modernizing" public toilets are now so filthy that people relieve themselves on the capital and building a "beautiful and charming sacred city".21 the unpaved cobblestone streets. Water, which used to be free to But many analysts believe that the true motivation behind the all residents, must now be paid for. destruction lay in the regime's wish to create roads wide enough The unsanitary conditions have led to major outbreaks of for easy police and troop movements, it having proved difficult to diseases, many of them new to Tibet. As one Westerner who control crowds during protests in old Lhasa's maze of narrow lived in Tibet during most of 1987 and 1988 reports: passages. The demolitions and evictions have also enabled the Chinese regime to keep the Tibetan community under better "Because human waste and filth is so concentrated in the surveillance. Chinese-paid informants, for example, have been Tibetan part of town, and due to the lack of drainage, rehoused within traditional Tibetan courtyards, creating distrust adequate sanitary facilities and garbage and waste removal, conditions of environmental hygiene are extremely alarm­ and uncertainty among neighbours: as one evicted resident com­ ing. Tibetan doctors told me that diseases such as tubercu­ plained, "Now we cannot know who is beside us, below us or 22 losis and dysentery were virtually unheard of in Lhasa prior above us." Housing compounds, complete with guarded gates to 1959. There are at present a large number of cases of that are locked in the evenings, have also been built, allowing easy dysentery, as well as other intestinal problems which were surveillance of those who come and go. non-existent or extremely rare prior to the Chinese takeo­ ver. During 1988 there was a typhoid epidemic, something which doctors said had never occurred previously. So in my The Master Planners opinion, it is clear that the housing and living conditions of most Tibetans has contributed substantially to the worsen­ 14 Many of these evictions and demolitions have taken place under ing health situation." the Lhasa Development Plan, approved by the Chinese State Those evicted from their homes who do not have relatives, extra Council in 1984, under which the "reconstruction" of Lhasa will money or good guanxi (backdoor connections) now face major be completed by the year 2000. The principal planning objective housing problems. In mid-1992, according to the Tibetan Un­ is "the transformation of the old city" through "readjustment" derground Group Policy on Foreign Investment, the number of itiao zheng) into "a modern socialist city with local national homeless Tibetans in Lhasa exceeded 2,000 families, despite characteristics,"23 a city that is "relatively perfect, beneficial for hundreds of new buildings under construction to house Chinese production, convenient for daily life, rich, civilized and clean".24 15 migrants. The real figure of the homeless is likely to be even The Plan divides Lhasa into three sectors: the city centre, the higher, since many of those living with relatives, though they northern district and the western district. Population figures are have a roof over their heads, are effectively homeless, lacking given for the northern and western districts — 40,000 and the resources, access or connections necessary to acquire a 50,000 people respectively — but none are provided for the city home of their own. Others who lack official resident permits do centre, which includes the Tibetan quarter, a range of adminis­ not show up in the official (or unofficial) figures — but judging trative offices and the Tibet Autonomous Region's party head­ from the numbers of beggars, unemployed migrants or pilgrims quarters. Given that the Plan envisages a total population of periodically expelled from Lhasa, they add considerably to the 200,000, some postulate that the city centre may be used to numbers of homeless. In the largest such expulsion, carried out house up to 110,000 people, greatly increasing overcrowding in mid-1989, 40,000 Tibetans were ordered onto trucks and and inadequate housing.25 16 driven from Lhasa to their native villages. If the Development Plan is implemented, the Tibetan quarter of Lhasa will effectively cease to exist. In the Plan's drawing for the year 2000, the old city has been consumed by an amorphous Further Clearances mass of modern Chinese buildings with "Tibetan characteris­ tics".26 Only the Jokhang and Ramoche Temples, Tibet's oldest Having brought about much of the overcrowding, homelessness places of worship and the religious centre of the country, and a and deprivation in Lhasa and other cities, the Chinese govern­ handful of historic homes have been earmarked for preservation ment has used the appalling conditions in which many Tibetans as "cultural relics" — in keeping with the mayor's intention "to live as a pretext for yet more urban clearances. In the name of leave a few examples of traditional Tibetan architecture, here improving water and sewage amenities,17 "hazardous housing" and there, as a souvenir."27 has been "renovated" — in practice, demolished — and large More than half of the older houses in the area around the areas of the old city of Lhasa have been razed of houses deemed Jokhang Temple known as the Barkhor have already been "on the verge of collapse".18 In 1990, the mayor of Lhasa demolished. Some 5,000 people have had to move from Barkhor launched a major clearance programme in the old city; more and Shol, the neighbourhood at the food of the Potala Palace, the than 10 per cent of the remaining two-storey stone housing, former home of the Dalai Lamas; a further 10,000 are scheduled much of it over 200 years old, was flattened by bulldozers.19 The for eviction. A tourist and shopping plaza to replace Shol village

10 The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No.l, January /February 1995 Agricultural Modernization and International Aid

In line with the goal of surveys of contemporary "economic reform", the Tibetan agriculture avail­ Chinese authorities have able (conducted in Nyemo drawn up an agricultural county in 1987), author master plan for central and Zhang Rongzu notes that: eastern Tibet, known as the "the system of household One River Two Streams responsibility seems to have provided some (ORTS) programme, which farmers . . . with an aims to replace the subsist­ opportunity to return to old ence rural economy with a methods of tilling their market-oriented one. land. Recently, a reduction The ostensible objectives in the use of tractor plough are to increase grain output, was noticed, and a primarily wheat, and rural reappearance of 'two yak cash income by introducing pulling a wooden plough' irrigation and modern has been reported in the Farmers threshing barley at Samye agricultural techniques and county. The author also by linking agricultural met local people who were production more closely to the fertilizer used. Grain is bartered or asking Buddhist priests to pray for a market by persuading farmers, for exchanged for pastoral products and good harvest. . . The farmers do not instance, to grow and sell cash salt produced by the nomadic herders like to change their traditional crops. Many critics, however, believe within trading relationships sustained cropping system too much. It has the plan is being used to eliminate over many generations among different already attained a higher yield level, traditional farming and the rural groups. and they prefer the local variety of economy, which will, in turn, change In the 1960s, chemical fertilizers and qingke [the Chinese name for much in Tibetan ways of life and pesticides, large-scale irrigation and Tibetan highland barley] . . . The culture. Indeed, the tenacity with intense cultivation of non-indigenous agricultural system in Nyemo, even which many Tibetans have main­ crop varieties, wheat in particular, were with the environmental limitations, is tained their agricultural methods, introduced. Some 80 per cent of arable that of a rural economy which is self- despite previous attempts by the land was ploughed for wheat with sufficient in food". Chinese authorities to modernize disastrous consequences, not least Most of the taxes on rural Tibetans farming, reflects not only their because wheat is not suited to the were also lifted in the 1980s, leading conviction that, under Tibetan Tibetan climate. Failed harvests, to an increase in cash income (from conditions, traditional methods are together with food exports to China, led an average of 127 yuan in 1979 to 220 yuan in 1982 at a time when 4 superior, but also a determination to to the first famines in Tibetan history. yuan were roughly equivalent to $1). maintain their Tibetan identity. Traditional grazing and nomadic Although a free market for rural migrations were also forbidden, causing produce quickly emerged, it soon extensive overstocking, overgrazing and Cultural Revolution stabilized at a limited level: average desertification. Agriculture rural income remained at 300-400 yuan during the late 1980s, lower than Traditional agriculture and animal Tibetan Agriculture Revives any province in China. husbandry account for 90 per cent of economic activity in Tibet and is the In 1980, however, agriculture and occupation of most of its people. In pastoralism in Tibet were "de-collectiv­ "Transforming" Agriculture the north and west, nomadic pasto- ized": the land remained state property ralism is the main system of land but was distributed to individual house­ When the "responsibility" system was use, while to the south and east, a holds under the "responsibility system" introduced in 1980, it was described wetter and milder climate supports which left farmers and herders with as a "breathing space" to last 10 more crop cultivation. Effective some degree of control over decisions years. It is still largely in place today, irrigation canals and high-yielding concerning crop and livestock produc­ although more restrictions and varieties of highland barley, suited to tion, varieties, output and sale or obligations have been imposed, specific localities and cultivated in exchange of surplus on the open varying from county to county. Quota rotation including fallow periods, market. As a result, most Tibetan taxes were reintroduced in the late have been developed over centuries. farmers stopped using chemical 1980s for all rural producers. Usually These traditional methods are well fertilizers and farm machinery and amounting to between 5 and 20 per adapted to the poor soil fertility, resumed traditional patterns of agricul­ cent of annual production — grain for harsh weather conditions and short ture in much of the countryside. Large- farmers; butter, meat, wool and hides growing seasons — the Tibetan scale irrigation schemes and reservoirs for nomads — for sale at state prices, plateau is more than 3,500 metres built in the 1960s and 1970s were these are becoming an onerous high. abandoned and are now disused. burden for most households, as Animal husbandry supplies meat, Farmers have also reverted to bartering market prices have increased drasti­ milk, butter, wool, hair, skin, fuel and with nomads. cally with inflation while state prices manure; yak-dung is the main In one of the few independent remain unchanged. Most counties

The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No.l, January/February 1995 1 I now oblige farmers to use chemical A feature item on the ORTS programme second largest city in Tibet. The grant fertilizers as part of the quota system in the Peoples' Daily states that: represents about one-third of the while in some areas, grain quotas "agriculture in Tibet's river basin has EU's total aid budget for China and have to be fulfilled in wheat rather undergone unprecedented change, acc-ounts for one-third of the total than the traditional barley. with the traditional production modes cost of the five-year project in the In the early 1990s, the central and of Tibetan agriculture being phased mountain-valley area. In a February regional governments started to out. . . This [ORTS] programme that 1994 draft proposal, EU officials pursue all-out economic growth in straddles the next century will enable concluded that: Tibet. The Chinese official news the middle reach basin of the three "local farmers must now become rivers to take the lead in ending the agency, Xinhua, reported that to more market-sensitive as with thousand-year state of natural develop Tibet's rural economy, the increased production they will be farming and herding". state had financed irrigation to moving from a largely subsisted to "transform" about 50,000 hectares of a market economy". farmland, primarily to grow wheat for International Aid One independent witness has sale, and fenced up to 267,000 described the project as "an interna­ Apparently unaware of its full implica­ hectares of grassland for livestock tionally endorsed attack on the tions, the European Union and the grazing. It had helped local farmers traditional rural economy" of Tibetan World Food Programme (WFP) under to replace wooden ploughs drawn by subsistence farmers, while a repre­ the UN Food and Agriculture Organiza­ cattle with machinery and introduced sentative of the UK-based Tibet tion (FAO) have both given active Support Group has said that: "agro-science to modernize their support to the Chinese government's "This project is being directed into traditional ways of farming". Further­ agricultural programme in Tibet. a region where . . . considerable more: The WFP launched a five-year, $7 effort has been made to . . . "local governments introduced million pilot project — part of a longer- generate crop surpluses required 'economic and trade' contents to term scheme called "3357" — in the to feed a higher number of the numerous ethnic traditional Lhasa river valley in 1989. Criticism Chinese immigrants". festivals ... so that the Tibetan from some of WFP's own consultants, A former consultant on the project peasants and herdsmen could among others, however, led the WFP to maintains that: experience a new way of spending withdraw from the project in 1994. "the soil may look rich, but it will the festivals." Numerous Tibetan refugees have dry out from excessive farming One newspaper article reports that reported that the authorities have been and farmers will then need a lot farmers are expected to change their "fooling the UN and diverting all the more fertilizer to increase harvests dress habits from home-made money" away from intended Tibetan even by a small amount. . . Within clothing to bought leather jackets and employees and beneficiaries of irriga­ a decade the land . . . will become Western-style suits and skirts, all tion construction towards Chinese a desert if this Project goes manufactured in China. immigrant workers. It is widely believed ahead". that Project 3357 is part of ORTS. The Tibet Support Group concludes Tenzin Atisha, a representative in One River Two Streams that: charge of environmental affairs for the "aid of this kind rubber-stamps Central Tibetan Administration in The overall economic development China's long-term population Dharamsla, said in May 1994 that the plan for central and eastern Tibet has transfer and settlement activities WFP project was: been laid out in the 10-year, One — two key facets of its strategic "a key facet of China's colonization River Two Streams (ORTS) pro­ colonization and expansion plans and expansion plans in the region. gramme covering four main river in Tibet. . . We are far from We now believe that [the project] is valleys. The programme envisions certain as to whether the EU has almost certainly being used to the creation of a core region in Tibet given any serious thought to the develop infrastructure required to where new industries and enterprises political context within which they support ever increasing levels of will be encouraged and economic are endorsing this programme." Chinese immigration and settlement growth concentrated. According to Even though it is at present uncertain in the rural areas of Tibet. These Xinhua: whether the EU will go ahead in population transfer policies and goals "The 18 counties in the central Panam, the involvement of interna­ now pose an urgent and significant part of the region have been tional aid agencies in Tibet can only threat to the survival of the Tibetan designated as the 'bread basket' be taken by Tibetans as a sign that people and our culture. However well of the [Tibet] autonomous region. business with China is now more intended this project might originally A comprehensive agricultural important to Western countries than have been, corruption and the development programme is now concern over human rights. Interna­ misappropriation of UN funds are being initiated with two billion yuan tional aid and approval has bestowed now . . . deeply embedded into its from the central government... A on the ORTS programme kudos and delivery". group of manufacturing and dignity, the propaganda value of processing enterprises has shot In October 1994, the European Com­ which has been fully exploited by the up in the area as energy and mission approved a 7.6 million ECU official media. communications facilities have grant (US$10m) for financial and This box is based on articles, available on technical assistance for a new phase of been greatly improved, making it a request, by Patrick Peatfeld & Hannah major production centre of ORTS, primarily for construction of a Pearce. Patrick Peatfeld is an commodity grain, vegetables and pumped irrigation scheme to increase independent researcher on Himalyan foodstuffs, textiles and light grain output, in the fertile Panam county affairs; Hannah Pearce is a freelance industry". in the prefecture of Shigatse, the environmental journalist and film-maker.

12 The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No.l, January/February 1995 is now under construction, due for completion by the beginning integrate it more closely with China because of its physical of September 1995, in time for the celebrations planned to mark remoteness and the questionable loyalty of its people. the thirtieth anniversary of the re-naming of Tibet by the Controls on internal movement of Chinese have been relaxed Chinese authorities as the Tibet Autonomous Region. and residence permits waived in favour of migrants from the Other building activities in the Tibetan quarter in Lhasa have Chinese provinces adjacent to Tibet. The majority of the new escalated markedly. The total number of housing units under migrants work in the commercial and retail sectors, whereas construction in the area in late 1993 exceeded 500. The units previous settlers have mainly been soldiers, officials, technicians house approximately 2,000 persons, mostly in municipal flats. and engineers. The Chinese official news agency reported in Government housing projects on the demolished sites are large- August 1993 that 1,700 new businesses had opened in Lhasa since scale and tend to occupy more than one site. Surveys in 1990 and the beginning of the year under "a series of preferential policies . 1993 found that water and sewage facilities in the new public .. which encourage the rapid growth of the private sector". In 1993, housing units were minimal with 30-40 units sharing one court­ only 10-15 per cent of shops and business in Lhasa were Tibetan- yard tap. In addition, the concrete breeze block and cement owned, 8-9 per cent government-owned and the remainder run by housing cannot withstand earth tremors or the extremes of Chinese settlers.30 The economy of rural Tibet, where much of the Tibet's climate. Some Tibetans have com­ mented that because the new housing is difficult to heat and has poor insulation, there has been an increase in respiratory illness, especially during the winter. Some Tibetans now living in the new smaller housing units object to changes in eating and sleeping habits which have re­ sulted from reduced space and facilities as well as to changes in household religious practices because of the lack of space for an altar room. Some also complain of the lack of space for outdoor work or activities in the smaller, overcrowded courtyards. Re­ location from small compounds to larger apartment blocks has tended to break up extended family networks and other long­ standing forms of social association.28

Socialist Modernization The right to housing occupies a central place within human rights law. To some degree, every government has international and national legal obligations to Far from improving living conditions in the respect, protect and fulfil housing rights. Whilst the existence of such obligations Tibetan quarter, the "reconstruction" of has undoubtedly increased the bargaining power of many communities struggling Lhasa has brought new problems for Tibet­ to improve their housing conditions, the "right to housing" has also provided state ans. In May 1993, eyewitnesses claimed: bureaucracies — often acting in alliance with private capital — with a powerful 'Those evicted are routinely relocated means of attempting to increase their control over ordinary citizens. to concrete block apartments often half the size and up to ten times the monthly rent of their original trade has traditionally been carried out by nomads, has also been homes. The apparent goal is to raise increased revenue for affected by these new migrants; in particular, Hui traders from the State from what is considered Lhasa's prime real estate, neighbouring provinces in China have been buying up the no­ and to provide housing for the dramatically increasing mads' surplus products such as wool and sheepskins. Several numbers of settlers from mainland China. The effect has incidents of protest and unrest seem to have been started by local been to drive Tibetan residents who cannot afford the exorbitant new rents to the outskirts of Lhasa, where there attempts to evict Hui traders. is little opportunity for businesses, and to populate what The traditional Tibetan economy is being increasingly were once historical landmarks with Chinese entrepreneurs marginalized, as artisans cannot compete with the flood of who monopolize the tourist trade."29 cheaper, mass-produced imported goods. One observer has estimated that "in the face of overwhelming pressure from the Many of these entrepreneurs have migrated to Tibet since 1992 modern sector, Lhasa's local economy may soon be extinct".31 when the regime launched its programme of "Socialist Mod­ In June 1994, several hundred Tibetan traders from the Barkhor ernization". In line with market reforms taking place in China area protested in front of the municipal government building (see Box pp. 14-15), the programme is aimed at developing the against 50 per cent increases in the local business tax. "Nowa­ private sector economy, generating more energy and promoting days China is opening up the whole of Tibet on the pretext of industry, as well as making Tibet more accessible to China's economic development, but in reality it is in order to deny economy through infrastructure development as a means of Tibetans rights and work through the endless transfer of Chi­ solving Tibet's "problems". These are perceived as two-fold: nese people to live here," comments a Tibetan underground the poverty and "backwardness" of the region, despite large group. "Anyone who has eyes can see houses for Chinese being subsidies from the Chinese government; and the need to constructed everywhere in great haste."32

The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No.l, January/February 1995 13 "Getting Rich is Glorious"

It is not just in Tibet that the Chinese throughout China, protesting at worsen­ 1980s, they have plunged into authorities have promoted economic ing conditions. One official in the corruption, embezzlement, smug­ development at the expense of industrial city of Tianjin said, "The gling, expropriation and theft of state people's livelihood and the environ­ poverty of the workers is just like dry funds and the privatization of state ment. Since 1978, the government wood. Once you set fire to it, it will be a enterprises and properties to amass under Deng Xiaoping as been conflagration." personal fortunes. The associated opening up China itself to economic In the joint-venture sector, foreign violence has already caused many market reforms, encouraging the investors and their Chinese partners are deaths and rendered travel unsafe in Chinese to strive for a US-type recreating working and living conditions many areas. consumer lifestyle under the slogan not seen since the Industrial Revolution "getting rich is glorious". in Europe. Lured by the availability of China's economy has grown by an millions of workers fresh from the Environmental Degradation annual 13 per cent since 1992 after a countryside, factory operators "feel free Scientists have observed that "no decade in which annual growth in to do things that would land them in jail country in history has undertaken an GNP exceeded nine per cent. Since in the advanced industrial world". In economic and industrial revolution on 1978, average rural cash incomes special economic zones, child labour, an ecological foundation in such a have grown more than sixfold while compulsory overtime and beatings of degraded state" as China has. In a urban incomes have more than workers are routine. Health and safety country where only 10 per cent of the tripled. The Economist recently procedures are nonexistent or disre­ land can be cultivated, about one- estimated that substantial disposable garded. Officially, 13,385 workers died third of the cropland has been incomes should: in factory fires and industrial accidents degraded over the past 40 years "create some of the biggest in 1993, up from 7,633 in 1991, most of because of overfarming (soil erosion, business and financial opportuni­ them in the coastal special economic desertification), energy projects ties in history, and far-sighted zones; by August 1994, another 19,000 (hydropower stations, coal mining) Western firms and their workers deaths had been officially recorded. and industrial and housing construc­ stand to profit immensely from Labour activists say the real toll is far tion. Water supplies are drying up this." higher. under the heavy demands of indus­ tries, agriculture and domestic use. Unemployment Polarization Of China's 500 cities, 300 are short of water and 100 "seriously short." By China's transition to a market For the employed, incomes are up, but the turn of the century, the "water economy is, however, creating as so is the cost of living. With deepening deficit" for the country is projected to many problems as it solves. Some 41 market reforms, state subsidies are be equal to Mexico's consumption in million people in China are officially being slashed so that state sector 1990. unemployed, but independent employees are being forced to pay for China's factories discharge some estimates claim more than three housing, medical care and other goods 36 billion tonnes of untreated times that number are without jobs. and services that used to be rationed or industrial waste water and raw At least one-fifth of the 120 million subsidized. China Daily reports that sewage into the country's rivers, people working in state industries are privatization of the social welfare lakes and coastal seas each year. threatened with layoffs. Close to half system is at the top of the government's Four-fifths of China's rivers and lakes the rural workforce of 430 million is agenda, including dismantling the are "seriously polluted", their waters said to be redundant. According to system of free medical care. In addition, unfit for drinking and their fish unfit to China Daily, some 80-100 million of ever-mounting government debt to fund eat. China's agriculture ministry has these comprise a "floating popula­ bankrupt state firms is propelling reported that more than 100,000 tion" of migrant labourers who sweep double-digit inflation. people were poisoned by pesticides back and forth across the country in In consequence, the market system and fertilizers during 1992 and 1993; search of work, sleeping under is fast replacing Mao's "poor but equal" more than 14,000 of them died. bridges, in train stations and in the egalitarianism with stark social polariza­ China also now faces a solid shantytowns growing up around tion. In China's cities, wealthy entrepre­ waste crisis. Whereas almost many Chinese cities. By the year neurs, traders, smugglers, "red capital­ everything used to be recycled, the 2000, the pool of rural unemployed ists" and corrupt cadres lord over the mass promotion of consumer culture will reach almost 300 million. poverty of millions of migrant workers, in the 1980s, accompanied by much Half the state-owned firms are many of whom are being driven from packaging and disposable containers bankrupt. An estimated 10 per cent destitution to begging, crime and has led to a glut of garbage in most of state sector workers are either not prostitution. China's cities. By 1990, more than getting paid on time, or not at all. A vicious society-wide struggle over 10,000 dumps had been built. More Unemployed workers are getting less property has also been unleashed, led than seven billion tonnes of rubbish, than $10 per month in benefits, and by Party cadres and the children of little of which is recycled or treated to many pensioners have lost their state Deng Xiaoping and other leaders: remove toxins, fill up some 600 support. In the past two years, before 1978, such individuals were square kilometres of land. hundreds of thousands of workers powerful, privileged but propertyless; China's industrial emissions of have staged strikes, slowdowns and now they are striving to convert their greenhouse gases, particulates and sit-ins at state-owned factories power into private property. Since the heavy metals are increasing

14 The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No.l, January/February 1995 exponentially. If present trends view of orbiting satellites. China's yet developed. It could also take continue, China will be the world's National Environmental Agency re­ advantage of its organic-based largest producer of acid rain and the ported in June that air pollution is agriculture and so avoid the destruc­ world's largest emitter of greenhouse causing a sharp increase in deaths from tion of top-soil and the pollution, gases shortly after the year 2000, lung cancer, which climbed 18.5 per cancers and other health costs belching an additional US's worth of cent in the major cities from 1988-1993. resulting from chemical-intensive particulate emissions into the air and According to the Agency, the leading agribusiness. China could also take a Western Germany's-worth of cause of death in China is polluted air. advantage of its legendary tradition sulphur dioxide emissions. Scientists Mercury and lead poisoning is on the of conservation and recycling and estimate that even if China's industry rise among children. thereby avoid the inevitable solid grows at only 8.5 per cent per year To counter such trends, China could waste disposal crises that afflict (less than half its current rate of take advantage of its "underdevelop­ capitalist countries. growth), by the year 2025 China will ment". For example, it could build on Richard Smith produce three times as much carbon the strength of its comprehensive train- Richard Smith is a historian whose PhD thesis focused on class structure and dioxide as the United States. Already, bicycle system of public transport, the economic development in China. A full the smog is so dense that whole most energy efficient as well as the version of this article is available from The cities routinely disappear from the least polluting method of mass transit Ecologist.

Housing Rights

Taken individually or as a whole, the planning policies of the Violations, Including Denial of the Right to Self-Determination", UN doc. E/ Chinese government in Tibet constitute grave breaches of the CN4/1992/37, p.37. 6. Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference of Lhasa City Committee housing rights of the Tibetan people, as enshrined in interna­ Conference Secretariat, 15 July 1993, Bulletin No 2, Official Document; "TIN tional law. Other states have already been officially criticized Document 8 (YR)", Tibet Information Network, 1993. by the United Nations for planning and housing abuses that, 7. Statement by the Minority Rights Group, UN doc E/CN 4/1990/NGO/9, 24 January 1990. though no less excusable, are less repressive and discriminatory 8. Most figures claim that 6,000 temples and monasteries were totally or than those being inflicted on Tibet. Yet no UN resolution or partially destroyed throughout Tibet. action has been directed at the government of China for its 9. Tibet Information Network, Document No TMP4/NE/NE.DOC, 1992, p.2. human rights or housing rights record in Tibet. Although there 10. Rong Ma, "Han and Tibetan Residential Patterns in Lhasa", China Quarterly, No 128, 1991,pp.822-823. should be no false illusions that mere reference to housing rights 11. "TIN News Update", Tibet Information Network, 3 December 1992, London. violations in Tibet will necessarily result in meaningful changes 12. US State Department Human Rights Country Reports, China Chapter, 1990, in the conditions confronting many Tibetans, the longer the p.8. 13. Statement from a source in Lhasa, June 1993. international community hesitates to apply international law, 14. Interview with the author, 15 August 1989. the greater the remoteness of changing the injustices carried out 15. "Statements on Economic Investment from Tibet", Tibet Information in Tibet in the name of "planning, progress and development". Network, London, 1992. 16. Tibet: Proving Truth from Facts, Dept. of Information and International Relations, Central Tibetan Administration, Dharamsala, 1993, p.46. This article is an edited extract from Destruction by Design: Housing Rights 17. "TIN News Update", Tibet Information Network, 30 April 1990, London, Violations in Tibet by Scott Leckie, published by the Centre on Housing Rights pp.5-7. and Evictions, Postbus 15100, 3501 BC Utrecht, THE NETHERLANDS, price 18. Liu Tung Fen and Wangdu, "How are you improving the living standard of $7 for those in the Third World, $15 in the First World, the Tibetan people?: Interview with Loga, Major of Lhasa Municipality", China's Tibet, Spring issue, 1991, pp.7-16. 19. "TIN News Update", op. cit. 17. 20. Renmin Ribao (in Chinese), Beijing, 25 March 1990, p.3. Notes and References 21. "General Strategy of the City of Lhasa", Lhasa Evening News, 9 March 1991. 22. "Knocking Out", South China Morning Post, 8 December 1990. 23. Document No 31, Party Central Committee, Lhasa, 1980. 1. "TIN Summary (BB)", Tibet Information Network, London, 25 May 1990, 24. CCP Central Committee Document No 31-1980, 1985, cited in Grey, J., p.ll. The Chinese government claims that Tibet became an integral part of "Modernise, Or Else! Building the New Lhasa", Himal, January/February China 700 years ago and accordingly rejects any allegation that it has 1995, p.ll. occupied the country. See The Legal Status of Tibet: Three Studies by Leading 25. "To Build a Beautiful and Charming 'Sacred City' — Reflection on the Jurists, Office of Information & International Relations, Dharamsala, India, Achievements of the Past 40 Years of the Municipal Construction of Lhasa 1989, p.vi; van Walt van Praag, M., The Status of Tibet: History, Rights and City", Lhasa Evening News, 9 March 1991. Prospects in International Law, Westview Press, Boulder, CO, 1987. The 26. South China Morning Post, op. cit. 29. Cosmetic and superficial Tibetan Central Tibetan Administration of the Dalai Lama believes that "the basic additions have been attached to the exterior of many new buildings in the old intent of Tibet's 'development' by China is to support the Chinese population quarter, making them indistinguishable from old Tibetan-style buildings to in Tibet, provide raw materials and products for China's industries, and casual tourists. However, the structural design and building materials are those income for China's profits". See Tibet: Environment and Development Issues, of current Chinese building practice, involving pre-cast concrete slabs, single Department of Information and International Relations, Central Tibetan layer walls and large windows which, because of the climatic conditions in Administration, Dharamsala, India, 1992, p.3. Tibet, are likely to deteriorate rapidly and encourage damp and cold. See 2. See Xu Chengshi and Zhong Bu, "Yangtze Exodus Begins", Panoscope, No "Demolition and Reconstruction in the Old Quarter of Lhasa 1993: TIN 37, London, October 1993. Background Briefing Paper No 23", Tibet Information Network, 8 November 3. See, for instance, Asia Watch, Merciless Repression: Human Rights in Tibet, 1994. Washington, DC, May 1990, pp.73-79. 27. Stoddard, H., A Report on the Protection of Tibetan Cultural Heritage, Paris, 4. Lowe, J., "The Scorched Earth: China's Assault on Tibet's Environment", 1992, p.6. Multinational Monitor, October 1992, pp. 15-19. 28. See "TIN Background Briefing Paper No 23", op. cit. 26. 5. Statement by Disabled People's International, Human Rights Advocates, 29. "TIN Document", Tibet Information Network, London, 21 September 1993. International Federation of Human Rights, International Federation of Rights 30. Grey, J., op. cit. 31. Violations, Pax Christi, International Education Development Inc. and 31. Ibid., p. 16. Liberation, "The Situation in Tibet: A Survey of Current Human Rights 32. Cholsum Thuntsok, cited in ibid., p. 13.

The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No.l, January/February 1995 15 Ecolabels The Industrialization of Environmental Standards by Karen West

Ecolabels are seals of approval given to manufactured products deemed to have fewer impacts on the environment than functionally and competitively similar products. But far from encouraging industry to strive for higher environmental standards, voluntary ecolabelling schemes are rapidly degenerating into a means whereby industry can set the standards it likes. Whilst some products and processes have undoubtedly been improved, overall ecolabelling is proving to be an extremely blunt instrument for environmental protection.

As environmental issues became the ob­ consumer thus enabled to make an in­ particularly in the EU, in expanding the ject of public concern in Western Europe formed choice between products, market role of ecolabelling and other voluntary and North America in the 1970s and forces could be harnessed for environ­ market instruments to substitute for le­ 1980s, citizens were urged to use their mental ends, promoting better industrial gally-binding regulations.6 purchasing power to pressure industry to practices and reducing product-related reduce its negative impact on the envi­ environmental impacts. ronment. The rise of "green consumer­ The earliest scheme was Germany's Industry Domination ism" quickly led to an explosion of green Blue Angel scheme — so called because claims by companies eager to tap this it adopted the Blue Angel logo of the In most schemes, the body which decides purchasing power. "Eco-friendly", "en­ United Nations Environment Programme on the types of product for which ecolabels vironmentally safe", "recyclable", "bio­ as its emblem — which was established will be made available and on the criteria degradable", "ozone friendly", "safe in a by the German Federal Environment for assessing whether such a product landfill" and "safe for incineration" were Agency in 1978. Since then, most OECD should be granted an ecolabel comprises just some of the claims which manufac­ governments — with the exception of the representatives from industry, consumer turers bombarded consumers with. US, where a private initiative known as groups and environmental groups. In prac­ Many of these claims were misleading "Green Seal" operates3 — have set up tice, the needs of industry often takes or false, exaggerating the "eco-friendli- ecolabelling schemes, the European Un­ precedence over those of other interest ness" of products. Some companies gave ion (EU) launching its version in June groups in the decision-making process. the impression that an entire product was 1993. In the South, a number of countries As a result, ecolabelling schemes are rap­ "eco-friendly" when actually only a small have developed ecolabels or are in the idly degenerating into a means whereby component had an environmentally-be­ process of doing so. Worldwide, there are industry can set the environmental stand­ nign attribute. Some stated that a product now some 30 schemes in operation. ards it likes. was free of particular toxins or contami­ Apart from the Blue Angel scheme, no In the European Union, ecolabelling nants, when it had never contained any of ecolabelling scheme is more than seven boards are required to ensure that their them. Others simply failed to substanti­ years old. Indeed, the recent flood of composition "is such as to guarantee their ate a claim.1 One result was a decline in schemes has led the International Stand­ independence and neutrality."7 EU regu­ consumer confidence in "eco-friendly" ards Organization (ISO) to consider de­ lations, however, give little or no guid­ products. veloping a global ecolabelling standard ance as to how "independence" and "neu­ In response to pressure from both con­ to facilitate trade in ecolabelled prod­ trality" are to be ensured. Nor is there any sumer organizations and industry to in­ ucts.4 The environment directorate of the attempt to specify the mix of interests tervene in the confusion, many govern­ Organization for Economic Cooperation between industry, consumer organizations ments eschewed mandatory controls in and Development (OECD) has also and environment groups permitted in the favour of voluntary "ecolabelling" looked into this issue.5 decision-making process. In the German schemes.2 Under these schemes, a prod­ The German scheme, the model for Blue Angel scheme, profit-making or­ uct would be "objectively" assessed as to most other schemes, was never intended ganizations are not permitted to partici­ its "eco-friendliness" by an "independ­ to play more than a modest role in envi­ pate directly in decisions on criteria.8 In ent" body which would award an official ronmental protection. Its architects rec­ many countries, however, no such rules seal of approval — an ecolabel — if it ognized that it could only work within a apply. met an agreed set of criteria. With the robust regulatory framework, in which Industry has a greater direct stake in environmental quality standards for prod­ ecolabelling decisions than other interest

Karen West is a freelance researcher and writer ucts and processes were enforced. There groups, as well as the time and resources on environmental issues. is now, however, growing interest, to ensure its interests are defended.

16 The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No.l, January/February 1995 Life Cycle Assessment

Ecolabelling criteria should, in theory, Industry's Tool frequently disputed. The pharmaceuti­ address the full impacts of a product cal giant Proctor & Gamble, for from manufacture to final disposal. At This is not entirely surprising. Life instance, has been criticized for its present few do so. Yet even the "life cycle assessment has been devel­ claim that disposable nappies are no cycle assessments" which have been oped almost exclusively by industry more harmful to the environment than made have generated considerable for industry and its primary concern re-usable cloth nappies. According to controversy. is with identifying those impacts that the company, life cycle assessment One reason is that there is no industry can take action to prevent or revealed that: accepted methodology for assessing reduce without reducing its profitabil­ "Neither of the two types of nappy and comparing different ecological ity. Those aspects of the life cycle shows significant advantages after impacts. Many impacts such as soil that can be quantified — the amount consideration of all the environ­ of materials used in manufacturing a erosion and the loss of biodiversity mental aspects like raw material product, the energy consumed, the are skimmed over while the ecologi­ needs, solid waste, waste water, wastes generated during production cal impact of "renewable" resources, air emissions and energy demand." such as cotton, are often ignored — are thus assessed in minute entirely — even though their produc­ detail: the broader issues are The Women's Environmental Network tion is energy intensive and heavily- brushed aside as too amorphous to (WEN) commissioned an independ­ dependent on toxic chemical inputs be amenable to analysis. ent review of the studies cited by and monocultures. Similarly, life Biodiversity issues, for example, Proctor & Gamble. The review cycle assessments often fail to were deemed irrelevant to the EU's criticized the studies for failing to assess products to "the point where assessment of the life cycle of tissue consider fully the environmental the product and the emissions are paper products. As one study put it: impacts associated with the packag­ ing and transportation of nappies. back in their original state as part of "Including environmental aspects, It also argued that different nature." Many of the most severe other than energy aspects ... is impacts are explicitly excluded. The too variable from location to assumptions about the number of guidelines issued by the US Society location to be included in the times re-usable nappies are used, and for Environmental Toxicology and evaluation of products for the way in which they are laundered, Chemistry, for example, exclude ecolabelling purposes." would significantly affect assessments social impacts, such as human rights as to the amount of energy and water abuses, whilst animal testing has not consumed. The review concluded: been considered in some product Conflicts over Claims "It is in fact more likely that the use categories in the EU scheme on the of disposable nappies entails grounds that it is an ethical, not an As a result, claims made on the basis heavier environmental burdens ecological, issue. of life cycle assessments are than do cloth nappies."

Environmental and consumer organi­ making process. Industrial concerns such washing machine and the manufacturing zations, by contrast, have few resources as Kingfisher, Hoover, Pilkington Shell process itself are entirely ignored.9 As the or personnel to give detailed considera­ and Rhone Poulenc which have person­ British lobby group Women's Environ­ tion to product criteria or to attend lengthy nel on the UK Board — although these mental Network comments: working group sessions. For many non­ personnel act in a "personal capacity" — governmental organizations, participat­ have an indirect, if not direct, stake in "While the use of the machine clearly ing fully in ecolabelling schemes (either most of the product categories for which has the most impact in terms of en­ ergy, water and detergent loss, the as permanent members of ecolabelling they determine qualifying criteria. mining of the metals used and its committees or as consultants on drafting The influence of industry over subsequent effect on the environment criteria) is a diversion from the more ecolabelling schemes is clearly reflected have not been monitored."10 important task of ensuring that the public in the labels issued. In theory, ecolabelling and the environment are protected through is meant to assess the environmental im­ The EU scheme, moreover, addresses the legally-binding regulations. pacts of a product through its entire life environmental impact of disposal of old One result is that many ecolabelling cycle from "cradle to grave" (see Box machines only by requiring manufactur­ boards have been captured by the very above). In practice, the impacts consid­ ers to give "encouragement" to the recy­ groups whose products are to be assessed. ered — and the criteria used to assess cling of old machines.11 In Britain, for example, members of the such impacts — are limited to those which In the case of the EU ecolabelling UK Ecolabelling Board, which adminis­ industry finds least onerous to address. criteria for kitchen and toilet paper, the ters the EU scheme in Britain, are se­ Compromises between environmental proposed limit on the amount of adsorb- lected by the Department of the Environ­ protection and the demands of industry able, organically-bound halogens (AOX) ment and the Department of Trade and are readily apparent. For example, the EU in bleach-plant effluent was raised, fol­ Industry. Although any individual with ecolabelling scheme's criteria for wash­ lowing industry lobbying. Likewise, the sufficient expertise can register their in­ ing machines focus mainly on how much proposed criterion for sustainable forest terest in being a member, in practice, energy the washing machine consumes management for tissue paper made from industrial interests have played a dispro­ when it is being used: the impacts of fresh, unused fibre was relaxed because portionately large role in the decision- extracting the raw materials to make the of industry pressure. Industry lobbying

The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No.l, January/February 1995 17 Tissue Paper Ecolabels

The manufacture and disposal of one-time use disposable have set for a tissue paper ecolabel address these issues to products like kitchen paper, paper towels and paper varying degrees. serviettes poses many environmental problems which ecolabelling should address: Sustainable Forestry and Recycling

• The production of tissue paper from fresh, unused The Blue Angel scheme disallows the use of fresh, unused fibre raises issues concerning sustainable forest fibre and stipulates which grades of used fibres may and management and the replacement of biodiverse may not be used. ecosystems with monoculture tree plantations. Green Seal specifies that recycled fibre only is to be used in the manufacture of paper towels and serviettes (that • Currently, much high-quality recycled paper is used is, no fresh, unused fibre) — but states that only 40 per cent for low-grade paper products such as one-time use has to be post-consumer waste. Since manufacturers are disposables. Instead, stronger unused and recycled unlikely to recycle more than they have to, the remaining 60 fibres should only be used for high-quality paper per cent of the fibre is unlikely to be "recycled". grades — for example, for high-quality printing and The Nordic Council's criteria stipulate that 90 per cent of writing paper. Products which are to be used just once the fibre needs be recycled, but does not require manufac­ and thrown away, and which are hard to recover for turers to ensure that the remaining 10 per cent unused fibre further recycling, should be made only from fibres comes from sustainably managed forests. which have become weak through repeated use. The EU scheme allows for the use of unused fibre; the • The use of chlorine-based chemicals (elemental forestry management principles which it specifies for the chlorine, chlorine dioxide and hypochlorite) to bleach forests or plantations providing the unused fibre are, pulp has a highly detrimental effect on people and the however, very weak. It is difficult, if not impossible, how­ environment. Hundreds of organochlorine by-products, ever, to determine precisely what standards and criteria the including highly toxic, persistent and bioaccumulative complex EU scheme does actually set. dioxins and furans, are formed in bleach plant effluents, many ending up in coastal and inland waters. Dioxins Chlorine Bleaching are known to suppress the immune systems of The use of all halogenated bleaching chemicals, which organisms exposed to them; cause potentially a range includes all chlorine compounds, are disallowed by the Blue of reproductive disorders; and be carcinogenic. Only Angel scheme. The Nordic Council's criterion forbids a fraction of organochlorine by-products have been chlorinaceous bleaching chemicals. But the EU and Green assessed for their environmental toxicity. Phasing- Seal schemes rejects such a precautionary approach to the out chlorine in industrial processes is the most effective organochlorine problem, by setting limits on discharges of way to deal with organochlorines, and the paper adsorbable organically-bound halogens (AOX) in effluent. industry, among others, should be a focus of concerted regulatory attention. Overconsumption of Disposable Products

• The consumption itself of disposable paper products All schemes compare products within a narrowly-defined has detrimental environmental impacts. Discarded product category. A broader category which included re­ paper products account for 35-40 per cent of household usable cloth alternatives would be more likely to encourage waste volume. consumers to switch to re-usable varieties, and thus The criteria that four schemes — Blue Angel (Germany), promote reduced consumption of disposable paper Green Seal (US), Nordic Council and the EU scheme — products.

has also resulted in less stringent compli­ environmental standards and reducing should be "functionally equivalent".15 In ance testing measures.12 negative impacts associated with manu­ the case of light bulbs, for example, Euro­ One result of such weak standards is facturing is minimal. Such concerns have pean light bulb manufacturers have fought that by the time they are published, most already led one member of the UK label­ hard to keep compact fluorescent light manufacturers can comply with them. In ling Board — Tessa Robertson of bulbs from being lumped into the same the case of the EU washing machine Greenpeace — to resign, accusing the ecolabelling category as standard incan­ ecolabel standard, all German manufac­ Board of being more concerned with get­ descent light bulbs — on the grounds that turers were able to meet the labelling ting criteria approved and ecolabelled they do not perform the same functions. criteria from the beginning. Tentative es­ products on the market than with ensur­ Compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs) timates suggest that the same is true of ing tough environmental standards.14 are estimated to be six times as energy Danish tissue paper manufacturers for efficient as standard incandescent bulbs,16 the EU tissue paper ecolabel standards, yet standard incandescent bulbs account whilst in The Netherlands 60 per cent of Narrow Categories for over 90 per cent of the European the tissue paper produced could meet the market. Creating two separate product standards without changes to manufac­ Just as industry has limited the criteria for categories, one for CFLs and one for turing practices.13 assessing products, so it has actively incandescent bulbs, resulting in two When so many products qualify for sought to narrow and manipulate the cat­ ecolabels, prevents consumers from com­ labels so soon after criteria are devel­ egories of products which are assessed, paring products and from making a oped, ecolabelling's role in improving insisting that products in a given category broader environmental choice.

18 The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No.l, January/February 1995 What is true for light bulbs is true for many other products. As a result, product groups selected for ecolabelling tend to be narrowly-defined, ho­ mogenous groups — cars with catalytic con­ verters, washing ma­ chines, CFC-free fridges, kitchen paper with a high percent­ age of recycled fibre and relatively energy efficient light bulbs — which, though expedi­ ent for industry and ad­ ministratively conven­ ient for ecolabelling White goods discarded on an amenity tip. The EU ecolabel for washing machines does not set boards, make little firm criteria for disposal of old machines, but merely requires the manufacturer to encourage recycling. In addition, an ecolabel invites consumers to choose between one machine and sense from an environ­ another, but does not encourage a switch to community-based laundry services. mental point of view. Instead of encouraging consumers to US Green Seal scheme), for some 75 paper label, even though lobbying by reassess their lifestyles and patterns of product categories, with over 3,500 sin­ tissue manufacturers has already ensured consumption, ecolabels simply invite gle products labelled by 873 companies. that the criteria are less stringent than them to chose between existing products. However, in 1991, some 13 years after those of the Nordic Council. The choice presented is between one the establishment of the scheme, over The European Lighting Companies washing machine and another, between half of the total labels awarded were in Federation, which represents Europe's one car and another: the option of making just four product categories.17 In many main light bulb manufacturers, have simi­ more radical choices — of switching to product categories, market forces have larly stated that they will not participate community-based laundry services or us­ simply failed to have any effect on con­ in any ecolabelling schemes whose crite­ ing public transport, for example — is not sumers or producers.18 In over half the ria address anything wider than energy offered. Ecolabels may encourage con­ product categories, fewer than 10 labels efficiency, such as packaging or the use sumers to buy recycled, non-chlorine had been awarded.19 This is in a country of hazardous substances like mercury.21 bleached kitchen paper in preference to where there is a high awareness of envi­ non-recycled, chlorine bleached kitchen ronmental issues on the part of consum­ paper, but they give no indication that all ers and industry — and where conditions Ecolabelling and Free Trade kitchen papers, however they are manu­ should thus be conducive to a successful factured, are less environmentally friendly ecolabelling scheme. Because of its voluntary rather than man­ than reusable cloths. Similarly, for those If manufacturers are unhappy with the datory nature, ecolabelling has fitted well able to do so, taking the bus or train is a labelling criteria, all they have to do is with the deregulatory climate of the 1990s better environmental choice than driving refuse to participate and the scheme loses and with the "sustainable development" a car, with or without a catalytic con­ its purpose — especially where produc­ discourse of protecting the environment verter. Indeed, even if all car owners ers act in concert to defend their common through market-led instruments — one switched to cars with catalytic converters interests. In some cases, manufacturers reason why it has proved so attractive to as a result of an ecolabel, there would be have deliberately undermined industry.22 The types of ecolabels avail­ no net gain for the environment if private ecolabelling initiatives through boycotts. able in practice offer manufacturers in­ car ownership itself increased. In 1992, for instance, the Nordic Council centives to maintain their market share or (which administers a scheme covering sell more products while enabling them Iceland, Sweden, Norway and Finland) to appear to be improving the environ­ An Effective Veto published criteria for a kitchen and toilet mental profile of products and processes. paper ecolabel which set a limit on the But some governments and official Even where ecolabelling schemes have amount of fresh, non-recycled fibre to be bodies are now preoccupied with the pos­ set a point beyond which they will not used and did not allow the use of chlo­ sibility that even voluntary ecolabelling lower environmental standards, the vol­ rine-based chemicals for bleaching tissue violates free trade rules.23 The European untary nature of ecolabelling gives indus­ pulp. In response, the main European Commission has been asked by member try an effective veto over the schemes. In tissue paper manufacturers, under the states to look into the compatibility of Germany, for example, the Blue Angel aegis of the European Tissue Sympo­ ecolabelling with the section of the new scheme has issued labelling criteria, gen­ sium, withdrew from the Nordic General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade erally of a relatively high standard (com­ ecolabelling scheme.20 It is likely that (GATT) on Technical Barriers to Trade pared with the EU scheme or the private they will also boycott the EU's tissue (TBT) which covers product standards.24

The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No.l, January/February 1995 19 The GATT alarm over ecolabelling Notes and References accordingly; give "encouragement" to recycling; was originally raised by Brazil in 1993 and permanently mark components heavier than 50 mg which are made with polymeric materials. when it expressed concern over the EU's 1. For example, the UK Advertising Standards 12. These observations were made to the author proposed criteria for tissue paper prod­ Authority (ASA) upheld a complaint against the during discussions with Brussels participants in, ucts. Brazilian pulp manufacturers com­ Vauxhall car manufacturer about its claim that and observers of, the deliberations on the kitchen one of its models was "the greenest car in its and toilet paper ecolabels. plained that the criteria governing the class". Although the car had the lowest fuel 13. Jaakko Poyry, Western European Tissue Paper consumption of renewable and non-re­ emissions in its class, it was only fifth in terms of Markets and the Eco-Labelling Potential of newable resources, waste generation and fuel consumption. The ASA also ruled against Toilet Tissue and Kitchen Rolls, Danish the hamburger chain McDonalds for claiming Environmental Protection Agency, 1994. sulphur emissions would disadvantage that the polystyrene in its packaging was "fully 14. Robertson, T., personal communication. foreign producers who could not meet recyclable" when the company itself did not 15. Summarizing attitudes to the assessment of these criteria.25 recycle it. See: "Firms fail to heed ASA advice lightbulb categories, a study commissioned for on absolute 'green' claims", ENDS Report, the UK Ecolabelling Board notes: "a meaningful The United Nations Conference on September 1993; and "ASA's Second Ruling on comparison of the environmental performance of Trade and Development (UNCTAD) has Polystyrene vs. Paper", ENDS Report, December two products can only be drawn if the products since raised a number of other general 1992. perform the same function or satisfy similar 2. Commission of the European Communities, needs." See Environmental Resources Ltd., concerns, pointing to the general lack of Towards Sustainability, Fifth Action Programme Ecolabelling Criteria for Lightbulbs, Report for transparency in the decision-making proc­ on the Environment, Brussels, 1992. The UK Ecolabelling Board, London, February 1993. ess of Northern ecolabelling schemes, the Commission comments: "Up to now, [European] In addition to being functionally equivalent, a Community action programmes on the further requirement is that goods be "competi­ predominance of local and multinational environment have largely been based on tive in the eyes of the consumer". See commercial interests and the exclusion of legislation and controls involving government Organization for Economic Cooperation and developing country interests.26 The fact and manufacturing industry. The concept of Development, Environmental Labelling in shared responsibility requires a much more OECD Countries, op. cit. 5. that manufacturers will have to adapt broadly-based and active involvement of all 16. Environmental Resources Ltd., op. cit. 5. exported products to a variety of stand­ economic players including public authorities, 17. Organization for Economic Cooperation and ards set by different ecolabelling schemes public and private enterprise in all its forms, and, Development, Environmental Labelling in is also cited as a possible barrier to devel­ above all, the general public, both as citizens and OECD Countries, op. cit. 5. consumers" (p.57). 18. Ibid. 27 oping country exports. 3. Government initiatives have instead regulated 19. Salzman, J., The Trade Implications of A number of proposals for dealing manufacturers' claims through legislation that Ecolabelling, Paper delivered to OECD with these problems are being consid­ strictly defines terms like "recyclable", Workshop on Life Cycle Management and "biodegradable" and "ozone safe". As of May Trade, OECD, Paris, 20-21 July 1993. ered, such as widening representation on 1994, 15 cases of products in breach of the 20. Swedish Standards Institution, "Environmental ecolabelling committees to include de­ definitions had been heard by the Federal Trade Labelling", fax, 6 June 1994. veloping country interests, creating a sys­ Commission. In Europe, no such legally- 21. European Lighting Companies Federation, enforceable definitions exist in consumer law. Environmental Labelling of Lamps — Logo tem of mutual recognition of national 4. International Standards Organization/Interna­ Pollution, Brussels. ecolabelling schemes, standardizing prin­ tional Electrotechnical Committee, Report of the 22. The International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) ciples and procedures for ecolabelling, Fourth Meeting of the ISO/IEC Strategic states: "Making market forces work in this way Advisory Group on Environment (SAGE), to protect and improve the quality of the and drawing up a global ecolabel. If pre­ Toronto, June 1993. environment with the help of performance-based vious moves to harmonize standards to 5. Organization for Economic Cooperation and standards and judicious use of economic suit free trade rules are anything to go by, Development, Environmental Labelling in OECD instruments in a harmonious regulatory Countries, OECD, Paris, 1991. See also framework is one of the greatest challenges that however, ecolabelling schemes are likely Organization for Economic Cooperation and the world faces in the next decade." See to be harmonized towards the lowest Development, Workshop on Life-Cycle International Chamber of Commerce, Business standard rather than the highest.28 Management, OECD, Paris, 20-21 July 1993. Charter for Sustainable Development — 6. Implicit in the European Commission's 1992 Principles for Environmental Management, Fifth Action Programme on the Environment, for London, undated. example, is the concept that voluntary instru­ 23. It is surprising that voluntary ecolabelling Conclusions ments should take over some of the function of schemes should have come under free trade legislation. See Commission of the European scrutiny at all. Ecolabelling schemes are not If citizens as consumers are to play any Communities, op. cit. 2. official standard-setting bodies and would not part in halting environmental decline, it 7. Commission of the European Communities, normally be expected to comply with free trade "Council Regulation (EEC) No. 880/92 of 23 rules. Mandatory ecolabelling schemes such as will be through radical changes in life­ March 1992 on a Community Eco-Label Award the Dutch government's proposal to label styles and patterns of consumption, ori­ Scheme", Official Journal of the European imported timber have effectively been outlawed entated towards local produce, Communities, 1992, p.4. by GATT. Current concern about the trade 8. In fact, the Blue Angel scheme has been implications of voluntary ecolabelling schemes maximization of product life, re-use and criticized for not giving enough ground to seems to be about the degree of government recycling and energy conservation, not industry. involvement in their execution and funding. through buying ecolabelled products. At 9. Khoroushi, S. and Vallely, B., Ecolabelling and 24. "Question Mark over Future of EC Ecolabelling Washing Machines — Problems with Environ­ Scheme", ENDS Report, October 1994. best, ecolabelling is a means of bringing mental Criteria, Women's Environment 25. Jha, V. and Zarrilli, S., Ecolabelling Initiatives about small incremental changes in prod­ Network, 1993. as Potential Barriers to Trade — A Viewpoint uct and production environmental stand­ 10. Ibid. from Developing Countries, Paper delivered to OECD Workshop on Life Cycle Management ards which address a narrow definition of 11. EU criteria for washing machines fall into three categories: key criteria, which are firm standards and Trade, OECD, Paris, 20-21 July 1993. environmental impacts, based mainly on on energy and water consumption which 26. UNCTAD Secretariat, International Coopera­ physical and material inputs and outputs. manufacturers must meet; performance criteria tion on Ecolabelling and Ecocertification At worst, it is nothing more than a mar­ to ensure that there is no diminution of product Programmes, Paper to the Ad Hoc Working quality; and best practice criteria which stipulate Group on Trade, Environment and Development, keting gimmick. Unless environmental that manufacturers must give information, for UNCTAD, Geneva, November 1994. criteria for products are truly objective example, on recyclability or appropriate wash 27.Ibid. and participation in ecolabelling schemes temperatures. For recycling, there are only best 28. See, for example, Avery, N., Drake, M. and practice criteria. Manufacturers are required to Lang, T., "Codex Alimentarius: Who Is Allowed mandatory, it is difficult to see how this provide information that the machine is made of In? Who Is Left Out?", The Ecologist, Vol 23, will ever change. recyclable materials which should be disposed of No 3, May/June 1993.

20 The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No.l, January/February 1995 Townspeople in 1630 fled to the countryside, hoping to escape the plague, one of the diseases that scientists in the 1970s predicted would soon be a thing of the past.

New and Resurgent Diseases The Failure of Attempted Eradication by The Harvard Working Group on New and Resurgent Diseases

Official predictions that modern medicine would eradicate infectious diseases have proved to be spectacularly misplaced. Diseases, such as malaria, tuberculosis, measles and hepatitis, are still a major cause of death in many parts of the world. New diseases continue to emerge at unprecedented rates while known ones return to regions where they were on the decline. In many cases, changes in the environment are creating new pathways for diseases to spread and take hold.

It is barely 25 years since W. H. Stewart, death due to infectious disease."2 daunted by evidence that many of the then Surgeon General of the United States, At the time, such a claim did not seem agents of infectious diseases were rapidly told the US Congress that "the time has wholly unjustified. Within a decade of developing resistance to the drugs and come to close the book on infectious Stewart's testimony to Congress, the chemicals — the mainstay of the eradica­ disease."1 With tuberculosis, polio and World Health Organization (WHO) offi­ tion campaigns — that had previously other killer infections on the decline cially announced the worldwide "eradi­ killed them. It was also unimpressed by throughout the industrialized world, cation" of smallpox after a 20-year long research that revealed the remarkable Stewart and many other public health vaccination campaign.3 WHO forecast ability of bacteria, insects and other agents officials were confident that, thanks to that this triumph of medical science and of disease to survive apparent elimina­ improved hygiene and the development bureaucratic management would soon be tion. It was therefore dismissive of those of new drugs and vaccines, the "war" repeated for six target diseases — diph­ who questioned its unbridled optimism against infectious disease was all but won theria, measles, whooping cough, teta­ or its goal of eradicating the pathogenic — at least in the West. As one prominent nus, tuberculosis (TB) and polio — causes of disease. What had been done biologist, John Cairns, would write in through its Expanded Programme on Im­ for one disease could, it was assumed, be 1975, "During the last 150 years, the munization.4 done for others.5 Western world has virtually eliminated The medical establishment was un-

Members of the Harvard Working Group on is a sociologist of science; Christina Success Turns Sour New and Resurgent Diseases have been working Albuquerque de Possas is a social scientist; together since 1991; they are Richard Levins is Charles Puccia is a systems ecologist; Andrew an ecologist; Tamara Awerbuch is a Spielman is a public health entomologist and Yet today infectious diseases remain the biomathematician; Uwe Brinkmann was an Mary E. Wilson is a clinical infectious-disease leading causes of death in the world, killing international health epidemiologist; Irina specialist. In 1994, the New York Academy of more people than heart disease or cancer,6 Eckardt is a philosopher of science; Paul Sciences published their book, Diseases in Epstein is a medical practioner; Tim Ford is an Evolution: Global Changes and Emergence of while the incidence and spread of these environmental microbiologist; Najwa Makhoul Infectious Diseases, edited by M E Wilson, R infections, which had been deemed to be Levins and A Spielman.

The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No. 1, January/February 1995 21 "under control", is increasing. Africa alone soaring from a few hundred A growing number of researchers, doc­ In the US, the incidence of tuberculo­ a year in the late 1940s to an estimated tors and public health officials, however, sis (TB), which had been declining stead­ 200,000 today.16 are beginning to question this view. Many ily since 1882,7 rose by 18 per cent be­ In addition, the last two decades have viruses do indeed show high mutation tween 1985 and 1992, with 26,687 cases seen humans succumb to a range of previ­ rates; and viral variation per se undoubt­ reported in 1992.8 In New York City, "the ously unrecorded (but probably long edly plays a role in causing some diseases climb has been even steeper, with an present) diseases. First came Lyme dis­ to persist — influenza, for example.18 But increase of nearly 150 per cent since ease (1975), hantavirus pulmonary syn­ focusing solely on the evolution of patho­ 1980."9 In Europe, TB has returned with drome (1977), then Legionnaire's dis­ gens is to overlook that the genetic make­ a vengeance: Italy reported a 28 per cent ease (1978), toxic shock syndrome (1978) up of pathogens — whether microorgan­ increase in cases between 1988-1990, and, more recently, AIDS (1981) and isms, such as bacteria or viruses, or larger whilst Switzerland experienced a 33 per Ehrlichiosis (1989). organisms, such as protozoa, fungi and cent rise from 1986-1990.10 Suddenly, the euphoric proclamations worms — is only one of many factors that In 1991, eight million new TB cases of freedom from infection seem, at best, contribute to the emergence of disease. were reported worldwide, and one-third premature; at worst, dangerously The way in which these pathogens of the world's population is now esti­ hubristic. spread from host to host is one of these mated to be carrying the infection. While factors. To facilitate such a spread, many the infection is dormant in most of these pathogens require an accomplice, called people, the spread of the human Disease Turnover a vector, which is often an insect. The immunodeficiency virus (HIV), which insect bites an animal infected with the destroys the immune cells that keep the Few scientists now predict the total elimi­ pathogen and ingests some of its blood. TB bacterium under control in the body, nation of infectious disease, maintaining When the insect feeds again, it deposits in is expected to cause many of them to instead that the pattern of infection will that subsequent host's tissues pathogens succumb to the disease. With several be one of "disease turnover". Within derived from the first host. strains of the bacterium now resistant to mainstream science, medical practition­ Certain "reservoir hosts" may also be all anti-TB drugs,11 WHO admits that the ers generally hold that mutations in vi­ required for perpetuating the pathogen. disease "is out of control in many parts of ruses and other microbes are responsible Rodents, for instance, may harbour a mi­ the world."12 for such turnover — new diseases emerg­ crobe without apparent symptoms, while Diphtheria has reemerged as a major ing as evolutionary pressures cause patho­ also supporting the fleas, ticks or other killer of adults in the former Soviet Un­ gens to move from animals to humans, or ectoparasites that serve as the vehicle for ion, the number of cases more than dou­ to convert from innocuous forms into transmission. The degree of contact be­ bling between 1985 and 1992 in Russia lethal ones.17 tween reservoir, vector and pathogen alone.13 Plague has resurfaced largely determines the preva­ in India, while malaria has re­ lence of infection. Whether or turned to regions from which it not a potential host succumbs to Ecology Law Quarterly had supposedly been eliminated provides a synthesis of the disease, however, depends and is spreading to previously ECOLOGY JAW legal and technical on its general state of health and unaffected areas. Cholera, for matters, and addresses nutrition, as well as its genetic the entire range of envi­ the first time in almost a cen­ disposition. Quarterly ronmental questions, tury, has reemerged as a major including such areas as: killer in Latin America.

Epidemics of dengue fever, • Toxic and Hazardous Pathways for Disease a viral infection transmitted Substances primarily by the Aedes aegypti • Air Quality In fact, virtually all pathogens • Water Resources mosquito, have swept Ven­ • Land Use Planning that are regarded as "new" pre­ ezuela, Brazil, India and Aus­ • Energy Development viously existed in nature. Their tralia for the first time ever. • Public Lands emergence as "new" agents of Management disease has generally resulted WHO warns that dengue "is • Oceans Policy spreading . . . throughout the • Wildlife not from the pathogens chang­ globe, affecting tens of mil­ • International ing but from social conditions lions [of people] annually."14 Environmental Law and environmental changes that Cases of the more severe forms have enabled the pathogens to of the disease, dengue gain access to new host Edited since 1970 by students of the Boalt Hall School of Law haemorrhagic fever and den­ University of California, Berkeley populations, or to become more gue shock syndrome, are sky­ Published by the University of California Press virulent in immunocom- rocketing: between 1986-1990, promized hosts. Marburg and an annual average of 267,692 Subscriptions: Individuals, $29; Institutions, $48; yellow fever viruses, for exam­ cases were reported, as com­ Students, $21 (Outside USA, add $6) ple, originally were infections pared with an average of29,803 Single issues: Individuals, $8; Institutions, $13.50; Students, $5.50 of monkeys; Rift Valley fever Send orders to: University of California Press, Journals Division, 15 cases in previous years. Yel­ 2120 Berkeley Way #5812, Berkeley, CA 94720-5812 was an inherited infection of low fever, too, is on the in­ FAX MC/VISA orders to: 510/642-9917 mosquitoes; andhanta virus was crease, the number of cases in maintained in rodent

22 The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No. 1, January/February 1995 The Dialectic of Disease

Neither pathogens nor their vectors are static entities, fixed original host invade the gastrointestinal mucosa so they by nature; nor is their relationship to their environment a are not whisked away during the diarrhoeic episode. passive one. Organisms undergo natural selection both Pathogens face other strategic decisions as well. Should within the host and in the course of transmission between they reproduce rapidly and exit quickly or should they hosts. A pathogen's success in adapting to conditions prolong the infection in the face of uncertain success in within and between hosts will determine, in part, its infecting someone else? The strategy adopted will depend success in spreading throughout a population. on the relative rates of pathogenic reproduction, contagion A pathogen is confronted with three, sometimes possibilities and the danger of strong and effective treat­ conflicting, demands. It must obtain nourishment to ment of the infection. develop and reproduce, avoid being killed by the body's The role of drugs — antibiotics and antivirals in particu­ defences, and find a satisfactory exit to another host. lar — in directing natural selection in the pathogen makes Meeting these demands may require that a pathogen the intervener a part of the system being intervened in. The localize to a particular site in the body. For example, the host's behaviour in effect becomes part of the selection blood is an optimal site for feeding, but it is a site of high pressure and affects the characteristics of the pathogen in immune activity. A pathogen in the central nervous system the next outbreak. For example, if the host uses antibiotics, is relatively secure from destruction by the immune system some of the pathogens may develop resistance to the but has no easy exit. The skin is also relatively safe from drugs. During future outbreaks, these drug-resistant the immune system and can be exited fairly easily, but it is pathogens may predominate, and other antibiotics will have not a good site for reproduction. to be used to eliminate them. Worldwide misuse of antibiot­ Some pathogens adopt strategies for dealing with the ics has resulted in multiple drug-resistant pathogens that immune system, so they are freer to choose sites in the are, with current technology, essentially untreatable. body where immune activity is high. The human Vectors, like pathogens, also undergo evolutionary immunodeficiency virus, which causes AIDS, can remain in change. Currently, a new biotype (or possibly sibling the blood because it destroys part of the immune system. species) of the whitefly Bemisia tabaci, carrier of bean Trypanosomes, which cause sleeping sickness, can also golden mosaic virus, is spreading at the expense of the remain in the blood because they are adept at changing previous biotype. The new biotype has a wider range of their protein coat to dodge detection by the immune host plants to feed on and is therefore spreading viruses to system. new plant species. In this case, a change in host range of From the point of view of the pathogen, the symptoms the vector makes new species of plants serve as reservoirs suffered by the host are merely by-products of the patho­ for infections of crop plants. Reservoirs can maintain gen's life style. For example, in diarrhoeal diseases, the pathogens at low levels in wild populations without being most obvious symptom arises when the pathogen exits its noticed, until a change in the environment or vector opens host in search of another. The pathogens remaining in the up new opportunities.

populations.19 These pathogens trans­ researchers isolated the Oropouche virus and planting cacao for chocolate. ferred to humans because human activity in the blood of highway workers and After the farmers harvested their ca­ created the opportunity for them to do so. discovered that it was the same as that cao beans, they discarded the hulls in In the case of yellow fever, humans found in the blood of a sloth on the side of piles that were an ideal breeding serve as hosts for the pathogen mainly the Belem-Brasilia highway. Writer Ann ground for the midge which spread when forests are being cleared, bringing Gibbons records that the connection be­ the virus to humans along the Ama­ zon roads."21 people into contact with the mosquitoes tween the virus, the sloth and the epi­ that normally live in the canopy along demic took 19 years of epidemiological Viewed from this perspective, the aetiol­ with the monkey reservoir. Humans rep­ detective work: ogy of Brazil's Oropouche epidemics resent a literal "dead end host" for this "At the time, the virus was not known cannot be reduced to a single cause. Rather pathogen, since each epidemic rapidly to be responsible for epidemics in they resulted from a complex dialectic exhausts the reservoir of potential sus­ humans or animals, but by 1961 it between a pathogen and its environment, ceptible hosts. had spread to Belem, causing a 'flu­ where human activity — the colonization The complex interaction of events that like epidemic in 11,000 people. While of the Amazon region, the cultivation of can result in the emergence of a new it was clear that Oropouche was to cacao, and subsequent environmental disease is well illustrated by Oropouche blame for the epidemic, it was not changes that encouraged the prolifera­ fever, a non-fatal disease which causes clear how a virus never seen in hu­ tion of Culicoides and their interaction severe headaches, muscle pains and oc­ man beings before had leaped from with humans22 — created the opportunity casionally meningitis.20 Frequent epidem­ the jungle fauna to the residents of for Oropouche to become a disease in Belem ... By 1980 researchers had ics of the disease have occurred in Brazil humans. Attempts to "explain" the answer: in that year, they isolated in which hundreds of thousands of people Oropouche through a narrow focus on the virus from biting midges have been affected. The first outbreaks (Culicoidesparaensis), which proved viral evolution are thus highly mislead­ followed the building of a highway in the to be the missing link. The forest- ing, not least because they render invis­ early 1950s from Belem on the coast to dwelling midges, it seems, had gone ible the role that specific economic and the capital, Brasilia, in Amazonia. Soon through a population explosion when social forces played in creating the dis­ after construction of the highway, the settlers started clearing the forest ease.

The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No. 1, January/February 1995 23 What is true for Oropouche is true for by current development policies, could numerous other diseases. Most bacteria Complexity is the bring the virus to the vector, risking an are not pathogens, most arthropods are urban epidemic. Similarly, in Latin not disease vectors, and most mammals hallmark of disease America, public health officials fear that are not a source of human disease. If they the stage is set for a major outbreak of emerge as agents of disease, it is more yellow fever: as in Africa, the risk is that often than not because of environmental is thought to have resulted from a freighter urban mosquitoes will pick up the virus change, which today results primarily discharging ballast water from China into from rural migrants seeking work in the from human activity. In continent after Peruvian coastal waters. The water car­ cities. Air travel could then spread the continent, country after country, both old ried the cholera vibrio which flourished disease still further afield to countries and modern technologies and ways of in algal blooms enriched with nitrogen such as the US, where the mosquito vec­ living have created new niches for patho­ and phosphorous from sewage and ferti­ tor is now firmly established in the south­ gens. As economies become increasingly lizers. Algae are filtered and eaten by east of the country. According to the US international, environments degraded and molluscs, crustaceans and fish that are, in Institute of Medicine, a future yellow growing sections of society impoverished, turn, eaten by people. Once it entered fever outbreak in New Orleans alone could the pace of this change increases. Latin America, the infection spread rap­ cause 10,000 to die within 90 days, and idly, encouraged by rapid urbanization 100,000 to become ill.25 Jim LeDuc, a competent virologist and epidemiologist Pathogens on the Move and IMF- and World Bank-imposed cut backs in sanitation and public health pro­ working for WHO, warns of the spread of Increased travel and trade have greatly grammes. As of December 1994, mil­ yellow fever that "we could be in for a 26 increased the opportunities for pathogens lions of Latin Americans had become ill major worldwide catastrophe." and vectors to spread to new areas. The while thousands had died. Numbers can problem is not a new one — yellow fever only be estimated, as reported cases are Changing Ecosystems and its principal vector, the Aedes aegypti thought to be only a fraction of those mosquito, probably spread from Africa to infected. The emergence of new diseases has been the Americas via the slave trade — but the Likewise, though as yet with less dras­ greatly assisted by environmental degra­ rapidity with which goods and people now tic consequences, the Asian tiger mos­ dation. Importation into a new location move around the globe has augmented the quito, a potential vector for dengue fever, does not ensure that a pathogen will take likelihood of "microbial traffic". was recently introduced into the US in a hold there. In fact, most introductions do One reason is that modern transporta­ shipment of rubber vehicle tyres imported not result in colonization because the tion has cut travel time to almost any­ from Asia. The mosquito is now estab­ species does not find a hospitable niche where in the world to a few days at most, lished in at least 18 states in the US. It has and dies. To colonize new terrain, the less than the average incubation period of similarly been introduced to Brazil and intruding pathogen must find a suitable many pathogens. Travel time, therefore, parts of Africa through the trade in tyres.24 environment and a receptive host popula­ presents a less significant barrier to the Current development policies have also tion. spread of disease than it once did. In contributed considerably to the spread of In general, colonization is easiest in Christopher Columbus's time, for exam­ disease by undermining local livelihoods regions of low biological diversity, where ple, crossing the Atlantic Ocean was slow and forcing people to migrate in search of the intruder faces less competition from compared to the progression of, say, small­ work. The resurgence of malaria, for ex­ native species. Oceanic islands are notori­ pox. Since all carriers of the smallpox ample, has been greatly exacerbated not ously vulnerable to colonization; they have virus manifest symptoms of the disease, only by the building of irrigation schemes, been devastated by colonizations of rats, most infected travellers would have ei­ creating drainage problems that increase goats or weeds because the few native ther become sick and died or recovered the opportunities for vector mosquitoes species could not compete. Also vulner­ before they reached the New World. As a to breed, but also by migrant workers able are habitats that have been disturbed result, smallpox did not reach the Ameri­ bringing the pathogen into areas where it by natural events or human activity, be­ cas until several decades after Columbus' s previously did not exist. Non-immune cause these events eliminate predators and voyage. Today, travellers routinely ar­ migrants entering endemic areas may fuel competitors and create opportunities for rive home with diseases they have "picked another kind of outbreak. Political and new species to take up residence. up" abroad: in the US, virtually all of the economic oppression has exacerbated the For example, the spread in much of the 1,173 cases of malaria reported in 1991 problem, as more and more people are northeastern United States of Lyme dis­ were contracted overseas.23 forced to move both within countries and ease, which causes symptoms ranging The concern, however, is not simply between them. The net effect is that dis­ from a distinctive rash to meningitis and with sporadic cases of travellers being eases once limited to small regions of the severe rheumatoid arthritis, is related to struck down with tropical illnesses. The globe are no longer confined. several human activities that have dra­ large-scale movement of goods and peo­ The increase in yellow fever has gen­ matically altered the region's ecology. ple around the globe increases the prob­ erated the fear that in Africa the disease Forest clearance during previous centu­ ability of vectors (often insects) and non- will be carried from savannah areas and ries to make way for agriculture elimi­ human carriers of disease being intro­ forest fringes, where it is currently con­ nated deer and their predators from the duced into areas where neither previ­ fined, to the continent's major cities, area. The forests eventually returned dur­ ously existed — frequently with fatal where the mosquito vector is plentiful but ing the 1900s, as did the deer — but not results. The reintroduction of cholera to the virus as yet absent. Migration of the deer's predators. The deer tick, car­ South America in the 1990s, for example, people from rural to urban areas, spurred rier of the Lyme disease infection, was

24 The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No. 1, January/February 1995 able to spread unimpeded temperatures would carry with throughout the deer population. them changes in wind and pre­ At the same time, many more cipitation patterns, ocean cur­ homes were built in forested rents, humidity, soil composi­ sites, leading to greater num­ tion and vegetation. All of these bers of people being bitten by affect human activity and infected ticks which had ac­ movements of people, as well quired their infection from lo­ as redistributing vectors and cal rodents27 — and Lyme dis­ creating new breeding sites for ease emerged as a major epi­ disease. In Zimbabwe and west­ demic. The disease is now the ern Mozambique, periods of most common vector-borne dis­ drought, associated with the El ease in the US with all 50 states Nino effect, have regularly led now affected and over 40,000 to major infestations of rats, cases reported to the US Cen­ which serve as carriers for a tres for Disease Control since number of pathogens.30 In In­ 1982.28 dia and Colombia, a warmer Infrastructure development, climate is believed to be re­ poverty and pollution have also sponsible for Aedes aegypti combined to create new niches mosquitoes, associated with for diseases. Sewage and ferti­ both dengue and yellow fever, lizer pouring into marine eco­ being found above 2,000 me­ systems, the overharvesting of tres: previously they were lim­ fish and shellfish and the loss of ited by temperature to altitudes wetlands, combined with cli­ below 1,000 metres. matic changes, have conspired Climatic disruption in the to cause massive algal blooms ^ form of floods and drought may in coastal areas worldwide, pro­ £ also trigger new diseases. In viding a rich environment for M: late 1993, for example, a mys- diverse communities of micro­ m terious illness emerged in the organisms. The sea-surface tem­ * "Four Corners" region of the peratures in these environments «5 southwestern United States. A are frequently high, encourag­ DC ing a shift towards more toxic A pensioner living in condemned private housing in 37-year old farmer who worked forms of pathogens, possibly Coventry. The rising incidence of TB in Britain, especially in the area sought medical help in some deprived inner city areas, has been attributed in by increasing their rates of mu­ when an illness he had had for part to an increase in the disease's traditional allies: poor tation and reproduction. Among six days took a turn for the housing, overcrowding and malnutrition. the new species that have been worse. At first, the farmer ex­ perienced 'flu-like symptoms, identified in these algal blooms is a new whole new niches have been created be­ including fever, nausea and vomiting, variant of the cholera vibrio called V. yond the original geographic and eco­ which progressed to coughing and short­ Cholerae 0139. Antibodies that recog­ logical range of the vectors. ness of breath. An X-ray showed fluid in nize other known variants of cholera do Moreover, as the environment of af­ both of the farmer's lungs. After 12 hours, not recognize this new variant, which is fluent areas becomes increasingly "engi­ he developed acute respiratory distress now present in 10 Asian nations. Many neered" — through, for example, the im­ and died. Several weeks and several cases fear that this environmentally-hardy, new poundment, treatment and distribution of later, scientists at the Centres for Disease form of the disease could easily become water, and the design of closed buildings Control in Atlanta linked the mysterious the agent of a worldwide cholera pan­ in which air recirculates — organisms 29 disease to a new strain of hantavirus, one demic. which can survive in disinfected and "hy­ of a group of viruses that have been asso­ On land, piles of used rubber tyres gienic" environments prosper. Legion­ ciated with hemorrhagic fevers and kid­ around the edges of rapidly growing cit­ naire's disease, cryptosporidiosis ney disease in Europe and Asia, but that ies collect water in which the mosquito (400,000 infected in Milwaukee, US, in had not previously been known to cause Aedes aegypti, a vector for dengue fever March 1993), "sick building syndrome" disease in North America. Studies at the and yellow fever, reproduces. Irrigation and other microbacterial infections are University of New Mexico have linked ditches, borrow pits, construction sites, the result. Likewise, prisons and hospi­ the emergence of the disease to a sudden poorly-drained water pumps and puddled tals have been sites for the transmission increase in deer-mice, which are carriers river bottoms may all serve as breeding of tuberculosis. of the hantavirus, following the end of a sites for the mosquitoes that carry ma­ six year drought in the spring of 1992. laria. The pathogens carried by the mos­ Climate Change Heavy rains deluged the area, producing quitoes can feed in these new habitats an abundance of pinon nuts and grass­ without being diverted to other animals, In addition, there is now widespread con­ hoppers — food for mice. Deer-mice who are less successful in shuttling the cern about the potential effects of climate flourished, but the drought had virtually pathogen to human hosts. In this manner, change on disease. Changes in global eliminated all of their predators. Between

The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No. 1, January/February 1995 25 May 1992 and May 1993, the numbers of more vulnerable to disease. Eradication of Smallpox, Final Report of the In addition, ageing populations, the Global Commission for the Certification of deer-mice increased ten-fold and did not Smallpox Eradication, WHO, Geneva, 1980. decline until October 1993, at which point increased numbers of people with dam­ 4. "Keep on Taking the Initiatives", The Economist, the epidemic came to an end. As of Feb­ aged immune systems, and the spread of 13 November 1993. ruary 1995, 102 cases of hantavirus pul­ AIDS have provided susceptible hosts 5. Ibid. 6. Bloom, B.R. and Murray, C.J.L., op. cit. 1. monary syndrome had been reported in for a wide range of infectious diseases 7. Reider, H.L., Cauthen, G.M., Cormstock, G.W., 21 states, mostly clustered in the South­ that would otherwise be easily repelled and Snider, D.E., Epidemiological Review, Vol. west: 52 per cent were fatal, the mean age by the host's immune system. In a sus­ 11, 79, 1989, cited in Bloom, B.R. and Murray, C.J.L., op. cit. 1. of victims being 35. ceptible population, however, the dis­ 8. Brown, P. "The Return of the Big Killer", New eases are more likely to reach epidemic Scientist, 10 October 1992, p.30. proportions. 9. Ibid. Vulnerability 10. "WHO attacks Global Neglect of Tuberculosis Crisis", Press Release, WHO, Geneva, 15 Finally, the spread of a human pathogen Confronting Complexity November 1993. 11. Ibid. A third of TB cases tested in New York in requires a vulnerable human population. Disease cannot be understood (let alone 1992 were resistant to the principal anti-TB drug The vulnerability of a group of people to and almost a fifth were resistant to the two main countered) in isolation from the social, a pathogen depends not only on how anti-TB drugs. ecological, epidemiological and evolu­ 12. Nakajima, H., "Tuberculosis: A Global contagious the pathogen is and how tionary context in which it emerges and Emergency", World Health, No.4, July-August quickly it is transmitted from person to 1993, p.3. spreads. Indeed, if one lesson has emerged person, but also on the population's im­ 13. "Diphtheria in the former Soviet Union: The from the spectacular failure of Western munity. In this equation, all social and Epidemic Continues", Press Release, WHO, medicine to "eradicate" certain diseases, Geneva, 10 September 1993. environmental changes are potentially it is that diseases cannot be reduced to a 14. WHO, quoted in Maurice, J., "Fever in the Urban reflected epidemiologically, since condi­ Jungle", New Scientist, 16 October 1993, p.25. single cause nor explained within the tions can affect the opposing processes of 15. Lederberg, J., Shope, R.E. and Oaks, S.C. (eds.), prevailing linear scientific method: com­ Emerging Infections: Microbial Threats to Health in contagion and recovery, acquisition and plexity is their hallmark. Indeed, such is the United States, Institute of Medicine, National loss of immunity. Academy Press, Washington DC, 1992, p.50. the network of factors that lead to disease The degree of contagion, for example, 16. Maurice, J., op. cit. 14, p.26. that the conventional classification of dis­ 17. Gibbons, A., "Where are 'new' diseases born?", depends on the number of pathogens that eases into "infectious", "environmental", Science, Vol.261, 6 August 1993. leave an infected individual and enter the 18. Morse, S.S. (ed.), Emerging Virsuses, Oxford "psychosomatic", "autoimmune", "ge­ environment. It also depends on the University Press, Oxford, 1993, p. 12. netic" and "degenerative" is probably ap­ 19. Gibbons, A., op. cit. 17. number that survive in that environment plicable only to a few diseases where one 20. Monath, T.P., "Arthropod-borne Viruses" in and gain contact to and ultimately infect Morse, S.S., op. cit. 18, p. 142. factor overwhelms all others. other people. Each of these steps is com­ 21. Gibbons, A., op. cit 17. That lesson has still to be learned within 22. Monath, T.P., op. cit. 20, p. 145. plex and combines biological and social many of the most powerful institutions 23. R. Epstein, "Global Village Virus", The factors that are not constant. For exam­ Geographical, August 1993, p.32. governing health policy. The failure of ple, no two people are equally susceptible 24. Morse, S.S., "Examining the Origins of the World Health Organization to imple­ Emerging Virsuses", in Morse, S.S. (ed.), op. cit. to infection. A person's general state of ment successfully its Extended Pro­ 14, p.19. health is as much determined by social, 25. Lederberg, J., Shope, R.E. and Oaks, S.C. (eds.), gramme of Immunization (EPI) against nutritional, age and gender factors as by op. cit. 15, quoted in Maurice, J., op. cit. 16, its six target diseases has been blamed not genetics. Personal habits, such as smok­ p.27. on a failure of approach, but on a failure 26. Ibid, p.25. ing, sexual practices, alcohol consump­ 27. Awerbuch, T.A. and Speilman, A., "Host Density of administration. Now that EPI has been tion, and food availability and prefer­ and Tick Dynamics: The Case of the Vector of replaced by the Children's Vaccine Ini­ ences can also contribute to a person's Lyme Disease", in Perry, B.D. and Hansen, J.W. tiative (CVI), funded by the Rockefeller (eds.), Modelling Vector-borne and Other susceptibility to a particular disease, as Foundation and the World Bank, the WHO Parasitic Diseases, The International Laboratory do social and economic factors. for Research on Animal Diseases, Nairobi, is concentrating its efforts on developing Kenya, 1994, pp. 51-64. These factors range from housing con­ new "super-vaccines". It is a perspective 28. Lederberg, J., Shope, R.E. and Oaks, S.C. (eds.), ditions to the availability of food and the on disease that benefits many vested in­ op. cit. 15, p.73. extent of exposure to pollutants, and are 29. Epstein, P.R., "Biodiversity Questions", Science, terests, but does little to address the mul­ in turn skewed by the differential impacts Vol. 265, 9 September 1994. The "El Nino" tiple causes of disease. Although aware effect is a naturally-occurring climatic of class, gender, race and ethnicity. In the of such disease complexity, health insti­ phenomenon, affecting in particular the Pacific US, African American and Native Ameri­ coast of South America, in which a massive body tutions remain locked into policies and can communities tend to be more ex­ of warm water in the Pacific moves from west to products that contribute to a focus on east, rising as it moves. The phenomenon is posed to environmental pollutants than eradication of specific pathogens, prima­ associated with tropospheric warming and a shift more affluent communities. The rise of in precipitation patterns, leading to drought in rily for institutional and economic TB primarily affects poor, inner city com­ specific areas of the world and heavy rainfall in reasons.31 others. Southern Africa has repeatedly munities. Likewise, as current develop­ experienced drought in an El Nino period. ment policies redistribute power, land Notes and References 30. Epstein, P.R., "Emerging Diseases and and other assets in favour of a small Ecosystem Instability: New Threats to Public Health", American Journal of Public Health, 85, minority of the world's population, the 1. Surgeon General W.H. Stewart, cited in Bloom, B.R. and Murray, C. J. L., "Tuberculosis: 1995,pp.l68-172. increasing poverty of those marginalized Commentary on a Reemergent Killer", Science, 31. Makhoul, N., "Assessment and Implementation by the development process leaves them Vol. 257, 21 August 1992, p.1055. of Health Care Priorities in Developing without adequate nutrition, shelter or ac­ 2. Cairns, J., Cancer: Science and Society, W.H. Countries: Incompatible Paradigms and Freeman, San Francisco, 1975. Competing Social Systems", Social Sciences and cess to basic health provisions and thus 3. World Health Organization, The Global Medicine, Volume 19, 4, 1984, pp.373-384.

26 The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No. 1, January/February 1995 Swimming in a Sea of Oestrogens Chemical Hormone Disrupters by Sue Dibb

There is growing concern that a range of natural and synthetic chemicals, such as PCBs and dioxins and those contained in certain foods, detergents and plastics, can disrupt the body's delicate hormonal balance. Evidence is increasingly suggesting a link between increased human exposure to these chemicals which mimic oestrogen hormones and reproductive and sexual development disorders, reduced fertility and cancers in women and men.

Oestrogen hormones were first identified oestrogen and oestrogen mimics as a pos­ In 1991, a multidisciplinary group of sci­ in the late 1920s, but it is only recently sible common denominator. entific experts met at Wingspread, Wis­ that many of their functions in the human More recently, researchers investigat­ consin, to discuss endocrine (hormone) body are beginning to be more fully un­ ing the rising incidence of reproductive disrupters in the environment and their derstood. In women, most oestrogen is development problems in humans believe effects on human and wildlife sexual de­ produced by the ovaries before the meno­ there is now evidence to support the theory velopment. They issued a consensus state­ pause. It regulates the menstrual cycle that human exposure to oestrogen-like ment: and pregnancy, lowers the risk of heart chemicals, particularly as a fetus and dur­ "A large number of [synthetic] chemi­ ing early childhood, is contributing to attack and osteoporosis (brittle bones in cals that have been released into the 1 later years) but can also stimulate the these problems. environment, as well as a few natural growth of breast and uterine cancers. In In 1992, for example, Danish profes­ ones, have the potential to disrupt the men, the testicles produce oestrogen, sor Neils Skakkerbaek published in the endocrine system of animals, includ­ though in much lower quantities than in British Medical Journal a review of 61 ing humans . . . Unless the environ­ women. High levels of oestrogen are scientific papers on semen quality which mental load of synthetic hormone known to inhibit growth of the testes in identified a dramatic 50 per cent decline disrupters is abated and controlled, childhood and to lower sperm production in sperm counts in men worldwide since large-scale dysfunction at the popu­ 6 in adulthood. 1940.2 More recent studies from France, lation level is possible". In the fetus and early infant, oestrogen Belgium and the UK indicate that sperm plays an important role in sexual differ­ quality as well as sperm counts have entiation, and the formation and develop­ declined in recent decades, and that men Environmental Pollutants ment of the reproductive organs in fe­ born after 1950 are more likely to be males and males. The balance between affected.3 Over the past 50 years, the Human exposure to chemicals which can oestrogens, often thought of as female incidence of testicular cancer has dou­ mimic oestrogen (exogenous oestrogens) hormones, and androgens, male sex hor­ bled in most industrialized Western coun­ has increased since the 1940s as manu­ mones, is critical at this stage of human tries where it is now the most common factured chemicals began to be used on a development. Any disruption to this bal­ cancer of young men, while defects of the wider scale. At least 37 chemicals have ance and to the hormone system seems to male reproductive tract seem to have in­ been identified as being able either to be more potent in the fetus and infant than creased during the same period as well.4 mimic oestrogens in the body or to inter­ in an adult. In women, the incidence of breast can­ fere with the various systems that regu­ cer in Western Europe and the US has late the body's production of oestrogen increased since 1940, and is the most and other sex-linked hormones. These Disruption common cancer found in women. Re­ chemicals include the chlorinated hydro­ searchers are investigating the links be­ carbon, DDT, its breakdown product, Concern over the adverse effects of hu­ tween the disease and increased exposure DDE, some polychlorinated biphenyls man exposure to oestrogen which is not throughout life to oestrogens and their (PCBs), dioxins, several pesticides and produced by the body or to chemicals mimics. Scientists are also concerned that fungicides, and some chemicals used in which mimic oestrogen arose in the late environmental oestrogens may play a role detergents and plastics. 1970s when researchers, investigating in causing endometriosis, a painful, often Many of these chemicals are resistant the link between different organochlori ne disabling, disease affecting women in their to biodegradation and are widely distrib­ pesticides and cancer, began to see early reproductive years which can lead uted in the environment; they enter the to fertility problems. Formerly a rare con­ food chain and water supplies and, through dition, it now afflicts five million women Sue Dibb is co-director of the Food Commission, consumption, accumulate in fat tissues in 5 London, UK. in the US. animals and humans. They can cross the

The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No. 1, January/February 1995 27 Oestrogen Chemicals

Like other hormones, oestrogens act as messengers in the to suppress oestrogen and thereby to inhibit both the body, activating biological effects by binding to "receptors" growth of oestrogen-fed tumours and the development of within a cell nucleus. The binding "switches on" the further tumours. receptor to initiate changes in cells, tissues and organs. By There is some evidence, however, that the body may this means, oestrogen and other sex hormones activate a become resistant to tamoxifen which, if continued to be wide range of physiological events in puberty and adult taken, may actually promote tumour growth. In this way, life, but also irreversibly organize sexual differentiation and tamoxifen's action is similar to those of phytoestrogens development in the fetus. Various complex hormonal which can act either as oestrogen agonists or antagonists, regulatory and balancing mechanisms control the body's depending on the dose, potency, duration and pattern of production of oestrogens and break them down into exposure. At high levels or after long-term exposure, harmless substances which the body excretes. oestrogens may become toxic, causing liver disease, Compounds or substances which have a sufficiently haemorrhagic diseases and immune system disorders. similar structure to human oestrogen can also "lock on" to The age of the person seems to be another critical a receptor. Some environmental pollutants, pharmaceutical factor in determining the effects of oestrogen hormones drugs such as the contraceptive pill and the anti-breast and their mimics. The greatest effects seem to take place cancer drug, tamoxifen, and plant oestrogens in the developing fetus and young infant, although these (phytoestrogens) are all capable of occupying oestrogen- effects may not become apparent until later in life. In adult receptors. Of these compounds, oestrogen agonists or women, the biological effects of exposure to endogenous mimics act in a way so as to add to the oestrogenic activity oestrogens differ depending on whether a woman is pre- within the body. or post-menopausal; after menopause (when ovulation Oestrogen antagonists, on the other hand, bind to the and menstruation stops), a woman produces much less oestrogen receptor but do not activate the biological natural oestrogen. effects of oestrogen; they "lock on" but do not "turn the As the metabolism of exogenous oestrogens is not key" to activate oestrogenic activity, including the break­ identical to that of human or animal oestrogens, they are not down process. These antagonists may block the receptor subject to the hormonal regulatory and balancing mecha­ in this way for extended periods, preventing endogenous nisms, including the chemical breakdown process. As a oestrogens from binding to and activating the receptor, and result, their actions are harder to predict. Weak exogenous thus reducing oestrogen processes in the body. The anti- oestrogens, for instance, can be relatively more potent at breast cancer drug, tamoxifen, appears to have the ability low blood concentrations than endogenous ones.

placenta from these tissues to the devel­ licle-stimulating hormone. It is thought water from the plants indicated oestro­ oping fetus. that exogenous oestrogens can suppress genic chemicals, including breakdown While the evidence that exogenous the amount of follicle-stimulating hor­ products of a chemical used in some de­ oestrogens affect human development is mone released from the pituitary gland, tergents, plastics and spermicides.10 not conclusive, there is strong supporting thereby decreasing Sertoli cell develop­ The first generation of people exposed evidence from wildlife and laboratory ment. as fetuses or young infants to chemicals animal studies, indicating that many of In Florida, an alligator study identified which act like or mimic oestrogen on these chemicals are detrimentally affect­ low rates of egg-hatching among alliga­ such a scale began reaching their repro­ ing reproductive development. tors in lakes where levels of DDE could ductive ages in the 1970s. Dr Richard Studies have found alterations in the be detected. Those eggs that were hatch­ Sharpe of the British Medical Research semen quality of adult rats, exposed just ing were predominately female; males Council's Reproductive Biology Unit in after birth to PCBs via their mothers' that hatched had abnormally small pe- Edinburgh points out that because some milk. Amounts of the order of one nises. Similarly, studies of birds in the US consequences of this exposure may not nanogramme — one thousand millionth in areas with high levels of PCBs found become manifest for some 20 to 40 years or 10"9— of the chlorinated hydrocarbon female gulls and terns with additional after birth, the extent to which children TCDD (dioxin), given once to pregnant egg-laying organs and males with a mix born today might be affected may not be rats on day 15 of their pregnancy, seemed of male and female reproductive organs.8 clear until well into the next century. to have no effect on the mother, but, Research in Texas has shown that in Besides reproductive development depending on the dose, the frequency of male turtles hatched from eggs the shells problems, some scientists believe that undescended testes in male offspring in­ of which had been applied with very low oestrogen-mimicking pollutants add to creased, and testicular weight and sperm doses of oestrogen-mimicking chemicals, adult oestrogen exposure as well, increas­ count in adulthood was reduced.7 ovaries were forming in turtles that were ing in particular the risk of oestrogen- In humans and other mammals, sperm otherwise male.9 In the UK, researchers sensitive breast tumours in women. This counts appear to be dependent upon the at Brunei University found that male rain­ cause is thought to account for much of development of Sertoli cells during de­ bow trout caged near the outfalls of sew­ the increase in breast cancer in recent velopment in the womb and in early child­ age treatment plants were producing large years. A 1987 US pilot study at Hartford hood. The Sertoli cells control sperm pro­ amounts of an egg-yolk protein, Hospital, Connecticut found that women duction, regulate the development of the vitellogenin, which is normally produced with breast cancer had significantly higher urethra and the descent of the testicles in in adult female fish in response to oestro­ concentrations of PCBs, DDT and other adolescence, and are affected by the fol­ gen or oestrogen mimics. Analysis of the pesticides in their bodies than women

28 The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No. 1, January/February 1995 without breast cancer.11 Canadian re­ — of phytoestrogens from soya can in­ sheep, rats, cheetahs, birds, dogs, ham­ searchers have postulated a link between duce changes in women's menstrual cy­ sters, mice, cattle, rabbits and even fish. higher levels of DDE in breast tissue and cles, including lengthening of the cycle Their role in human health, however, the risk of developing the type of breast and reducing mid-cycle surges of the is controversial. Phytoestrogens seem to cancer which is promoted by high levels luteinizing and follicle-stimulating exhibit a complex dual role in humans: of oestrogen.12 hormones.17 they can act either as an oestrogen agonist — adding to the oestrogenic Pharmaceutical Drugs activity in the body — or as an oestrogen antagonist — block­ Pharmaceutical drugs are an­ ing the effects of endogenous other source of exogenous oestrogen. The action seems to oestrogens. Long-term use of be in part dependent on the dose the oral contraceptive pill, par­ and age of the person. (See Box, ticularly from a young age, p.28) has also been associated with Some scientists have sug­ an increased risk of breast can­ gested that, because cer. Use of the Pill has also phytoestrogens can block the raised concern that the syn­ availability and actions of en­ thetic oestrogen, ethinyl dogenous oestrogen in the body, oestradiol, used in many for­ a diet rich in phytoestrogens mulations, is contaminating may reduce the risk of develop­ water supplies. However, ing breast cancer.18 Much of the while it has been detected in supporting evidence for this some water sources, it does theory is epidemiological, based not seem to be present in sig­ largely on data from Japan and nificant concentrations in China where women have much drinking water, and environ­ lower rates of breast cancer and mental pollutants seem to be a consume more soya-based prod­ far greater source of ucts than Westerners. exogenous oestrogens.13 But dietary phytoestrogens More is known about an­ may be only one factor in these other synthetic oestrogen, lower rates. Traditional Japa­ diethylstilbestrol (DES), nese and Chinese diets are also which was widely used as a to much lower in fat than Western growth promoter in cattle and | diets — typically less than 20 other livestock from the 1950s | per cent of calories come from until the early 1980s, when it g fat compared to around 40 per was banned.14 From 1948- o cent in the UK and the US. As 1971, DES was also pre­ ^ the relative consumption of fats scribed to over five million (especially animal fats), pro­ Refuse being loaded onto chutes for incinceration. The teins, refined carbohydrates and women diagnosed as having incineration of household and commercial wastes is a major low levels of oestrogen, soucre of dioxins which can act as oestrogen mimics. fibre affects the metabolism and mainly in the US but also in excretion of oestrogen produced the UK.15 Daughters of women who were Soya meal is by far the richest source by the body, a low fibre, high animal fat given DES have a higher risk of develop­ of phytoestrogens in human diets. A by­ diet leads to lesser amounts of endog­ ing rare vaginal cancers while sons have product of the more lucrative soya oil enous oestrogens being broken down and an increased risk of abnormally-small market, consumption of soya meal has excreted. Instead, they are reabsorbed testes, malformed penises, testicular can­ increased considerably in the past two or into the body from the gut. As a result, a cer, low semen volume and low sperm more decades. Many vegetarians and ve­ woman is exposed to increased amounts counts.16 Today, endocrinologists regard gans eat soya as a substitute for meat of her own oestrogens, which could pro­ the effect of DES on human offspring as protein while some babies are given spe­ mote the growth of breast tumours. In a model for the problems that other oes­ cially-formulated soya milks. Soya is also addition, the oestrogen-blocking action trogen-like substances may cause. increasingly used by animal feed manu­ of phytoestrogens may also reduce fertil­ facturers as a cheap protein to replace ity by suppressing ovulation. Plant Oestrogens fishmeal, meatmeal or skim milk pow­ Other scientists maintain that der. Soya meal is also now found in many phytoestrogens, along with other A third source of human exposure to feeds for pets, commercial livestock and exogenous oestrogens, should be mini­ oestrogens is phytoestrogens — oestro­ zoo animals. mized in women who already have gens occurring naturally in many plants Phytoestrogens have been found to be oestrogen-induced breast cancer, as well and fungi which are biologically active in toxic in many animal species, reportedly as in pregnant women and in young in­ humans and animals. Even moderate causing reproductive disorders, infertil­ fants, arguing that phytoestrogens can consumption — 45 milligrammes per day ity and cancers in many species such as add to the oestrogenic activity in the

The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No. 1, January/February 1995 29 Soya Infant Formula

A 1994 report from New Zealand examining the toxicity of Toxicity recommended in 1992 that levels of soya questions the suitability of feeding babies soya-based phytoestrogens in soya baby milks and other soya foods infant formulas, The report was co-authored by New for children should be analysed as part of its review of Zealand aviculturists Richard and Valerie James, among natural toxicants in foods, yet that research has not started. others, who became mystified by the range of health The Food Commission, an independent consumer watch­ problems their breeding parrots — some 600 birds of 40 dog on food, is urging the UK's Department of Health and species — were developing, including infertility, reproduc­ the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (MAFF) to tive disorders, premature maturity and death caused by ensure that the recommended research is given urgent immune system failure. Confering with other experienced priority. The Department of Health recommends that soya aviculturists and animal breeders in New Zealand, Aus­ infant formula should not be a first choice. As soya infant tralia and the US, they discovered widespread breeding, formulas have only been generally available in the last 20 growth and behavioural problems and deaths in finches, years, it could be too early to detect any possible long-term rabbits, poultry, guinea pigs, cats and fish. Analyses of effects on infants. commercial bird feed and other animal feed indicated that Dr Donald Shutt, a former consultant to the World Health soya ingredients were associated with the toxic effects. Organization on phytoestrogens, has stated that more The Jameses then became concerned about the research is urgently needed to assess the potential possible effects on infants fed a soya-milk formula. They oestroenicity of soya formulas for infants. One problem, had observed various physical and behavioural symptoms however, is that it is neither easy nor ethical to study the in their own children who had been fed soya formula effects of phytoestrogens on babies. One recent review of several years previously and were aware that there were the risks and benefits of phytoestrogens warned that "in similiarities betweeen bird food and soya milks for babies. utero and childhood exposures to exogenous oestrogenic Soya-based infant formulas were developed some 20 agents could easily exceed the narrow bounds of optimal years ago for bottle-fed infants who have allergies to cows' or physiological levels and thus be of significant toxicologi- milk protein. Soya formula fs often recommended as an cal concern". alternative for babies with allergies, but less well known US researchers Patricia Whitten and Frederick Naftolin are its other potential effects, including the allergies it have studied the effects of dietary phytoestrogens in actually causes. In the UK, about three per cent of babies laboratory rats in the US and found that the reproductive are fed soya formula; the level is much higher in New cycles of female offspring of mothers who had been fed a Zealand and the US. low-level phytoestrogen diet during lactation were dis­ From analyses of levels of isoflavones (soya rupted — in effect, the offspring did not ovulate. Although phytoestrogens) in soya-based infant formulas available in caution is needed in extrapolating between species, the New Zealand, the researchers calculated that the biologi­ researchers concluded that, as processes involved in cal effects of phytoestrogens typically consumed by a baby human sexual differentiation continue in the early years of drinking soya milk would be 100 times greater than the life, "the common inclusion of soy protein in infant formulas amount of natural oestrogen the child would receive from may be a cause for concern". breast milk. They estimated that, on a weight-for-weight As a result, Professor Clifford Irvine is highly critical of basis, this is equivalent to giving a baby several contracep­ the soya industry and the way that it promotes its products: tive hormone pills a day. Their research prompted the New "In my opinion, the satisfaction with which the soy lobby Zealand government to undertake a review of soya-based highlights the beneficial effect of isoflavones on a products for human consumption and to take the issue up number of Western adult diseases and brushes aside with the World Health Organization. potential effect on neonates and infants is almost In the UK, the government's expert Committee on obscene."

body. (See Box, p.28) New Zealand re­ small doses of a substance with anti- Safe Exposure? productive endocrinologist Professor oestrogenic capabilities can control Clifford Irvine is therefore cautious about cancer in adults, these same proper­ Is there a safe level of exposure to addi­ the wisdom of advocating an increase in ties will affect sexual development in the neonate."19 tional oestrogens and oestrogen-like sub­ foods rich in phytoestrogens, such as soya: stances? Dr Sharpe provides a warning: "The evidence that isoflavones [soya Dr Richard Sharpe also recommends ex­ phytoestrogens] are beneficial is treme caution with regard to increasing "Any oestrogen exposure during based on their short-term effects in amounts of phytoestrogen: childhood ... is excessive, bearing low dosage in which they function in mind the minimal endogenous as an anti-oestrogen. However, the "We just don't know enough about oestrogen production at this time. action of the isoflavones is very the effects of oestrogen-type chemi­ Furthermore, in assessing risk for similar to that of the widely-used cals on the developing foetus and breast cancer in women, lifetime anti-cancer drug, tamoxifen. Al­ new born babies. Therefore, I would exposure to oestrogens is placed though tamoxifen has been a recommend that exposure to oes- top of the list, so in this context if in lifesaving drug in adults, its action trogens from whatever source no other, any exposure to environ­ in the new-born is not so benign. In should be kept to a minimum espe­ mental oestrogenic chemicals might fact, it is almost inevitable that if cially during childhood."20 be viewed as being undesirable."21

30 The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No. 1, January/February 1995 Scientists at the 1991 Wingspread Con­ chemicals they use ... We shouldn't "Those who seek to reform national ference in the US agreed that action is assume that because a product is avail­ cancer policy and environmental needed to reduce exposure to synthetic able that it is safe . . . We have to regulations will confront powerful chemicals already in the environment and change the way of thinking and re­ opposition from the cancer establish­ verse the onus. Manufacturers need ment, industrial polluters and phar­ to prevent the release of new products to prove that chemicals they propose maceutical companies, all of whom that can act as endocrine disrupters. They to release are harmless rather than are well served by the current inat­ also recommended that reproductive ef­ environmentalists' having to prove tention to cancer prevention. Ad­ fects should be given greater priority when certainty of harm."23 equate reforms will require execu­ health risks are evaluated during the ap­ tive and legislative action — a goal proval process for chemicals and that all Achieving these objectives will not be that will be achieved only with strong new products, their by-products and all easy. Cancer prevention, for instance, is support from the independent scien­ persistent, bioaccumulative products re­ just one area of public health where con­ tific and public health communities, leased into the environment in the past flicts between commercial, academic and along with concerned grass-roots citi­ 24 should be screened for hormonal activ­ public interests are spilling over into the zens groups." ity.22 However, most regulatory bodies political arena. Confronting what they are only just beginning to consider such see as medical inertia in the face of a Although the study of oestrogen mimics measures. breast cancer epidemic, some women in is in its infancy, a number of synthetic the US are following the lead of AIDS and naturally-occurring substances are activists and "acting up" to campaign for already known to mimic oestrogen and Phasing Out better funding for research into prevent­ have the potential to disrupt the body's ing breast cancer, rather than research delicate hormonal balance. While fur­ Ann Link of the UK Women's Environ­ into drug treatments used once the cancer ther research is urgently needed to un­ mental Network, which is campaigning for has appeared. Yet preventive funding is derstand better the risks these chemicals a complete phaseout of chlorine com­ much harder to secure than funding for pose, action should be taken now to mini­ pounds, says industry needs to take action: drug therapy studies which could reap mize human exposure to toxic chemi­ financial benefits for the drug industry. cals, particularly during fetal "Large-scale industries such as plas­ US health and environment campaigner development and childhood. tics, detergents and cosmetics need Dr Samuel S Epstein recently remarked: to reduce the number of unnecessary

Notes and References

1. Sharpe, R., "Could environmental, oestrogenic N.C.,Tyler, C.R. and Sumpter, J.P., "Estrogenic Clinical Nutrition 60, 1994, pp.333-40. chemicals be responsible for some disorders of Effects of Effluents from Sewage Treatment Other researchers hypothesize that in adults of human male reproductive development?", Works", Chemistry and Ecology 8, 1994, pp.275- reproductive age, phytoestrogens act to regulate Current Opinion in Urology, 4, 1994, pp.295- 285. oestrogenic activity by reducing total oestrogenic 301. 11. Falk, F., Ricci, A., Wolff, M.S. et al., "Pesticides bioactivity in the upper end of the physiologic 2. Carlsen, E., Giwercman, A., Keiding, N. and and polychlorinated biphenyl residues in human range, but increasing total oestrogenic bioactivity Skakkebaek, N., "Evidence for decreasing quality breast lipids and their relation to breast cancer", in the lower end of the physiologic range, thus of semen during past 50 years", British Medical Archives of Environmental Health 47, 1992, lowering the risk of disease over time. See Journal, Vol 305, 1992, pp.609-613. pp. 143-6. Clarkson, T., Anthony, M. and Hughes, C, 3. See Ginsberg, J., Okolo, S., Prelevie, G. and 12. Dewailly, E., Dodin, S., Verreault, R. et al., "Estrogenic Soybean Isoflavones and Chronic Hardiman, P., "Residence in the London Area "High organochlorine body burden in women Disease", Trends Endocrinol. Metab. Vol. 6, and Sperm Density (letter)", The Lancet, Vol with oestrogen receptor-positive breast cancer", Issue 1, 1995, pp.11-16. 343, 1994, p.230; Van Waelegham, K., DeClerq, Journal of the National Cancer Institute 85, 18. Progress in understanding the significance of N., Vermeulen, L., Schoonjans, F. and Comhaire, 1994, pp.648-52. plant oestrogens has been slow and there are F., "Deterioration of Sperm Quality in Young 13. Purdom, C.E. et al. op. cit. 10. large gaps in knowledge. Sheeham maintains that Belgian Men During Recent Decades (abstract), 14. In 1981, orally-active anabolic oestrogens, there is a need to understand more fully adverse Hum. Reprod. 9 (suppl. 4), 1994, p.73; Irvine, including DES, were banned in Europe. The versus beneficial effects of phytoestrogens. D.S.,"Falling Sperm Quality (letter)", British anabolic oestrogens used now in the livestock While most research has focused on the Medical Journal 309, 1994, p.476; Auger, J., industry are not orally active. endocrine activity of females, there is little Czyglik, F., Kuntsmann, J.M. and Jouannet, P., 15. Sharpe, R. and Skakkebaek, N., op. cit. 4. research into males, or into possible developmen­ "Significant Decrease of Semen Characteristics 16. Hines, M., "Surrounded by estrogens? tal effects of phytoestrogens on females and of Fertile Men from the Paris Area During the Considerations for neurobehavioural develop­ males. See Sheeham, "The Case for Expanded Last 20 Years (abstract)", Hum. Reprod. 9 ment in human beings", in Colborn, T. and Phyoestrogen Research", Proc. Soc. Exp. Biol, (suppl.), 1994, p.72. Clement, C, op. cit. 6. Vol 208. 4. Sharpe, R. and Skakkebaek, N., "Are oestrogens 17. One study at the Dunn Nutrition Unit in 19. Professor Clifford Irvine, personal com­ involved in falling sperm counts and disorders of Cambridge charted hormonal changes in six munication, 1995. the male reproductive tract?", The Lancet, Vol. women who added moderate amounts of soya (60 20. The Food Commission, "New Zealand research 341, 1993,pp.l392-1395. grammes containing 45 milligrammes of questions safety of hormones in soya baby 5. Hileman, B., "Environmental Estrogens Linked to isoflavones) to their diet over one month. The milks", Living Earth & The Food Magazine, 3, Reproductive Abnormalities", Cancer, Chemistry menstrual cycle of all the women lengthened by January 1995, p.28. See also James, R.F., James, and Engineering News, 31 January 1994. up to five days while the usual surges of V.A., Woodhams, D.J. and Fitzpatrick, M.G., 6. Colborn, T. and Clement, C. (eds.), "Chemically- luteinizing hormone and follicle-stimulating The Toxicity of Soybeans and Related Products, induced alterations in sexual and functional hormone (which stimulate ovulation) in mid- Auckland, New Zealand, 1994. development: The wildlife/human connection", cycle were suppressed. The researchers 21. Sharpe, R., op. cit. 1. in Advances in Modern Environmental hypothesize that phytoestrogens may act in a 22. Colborn, T. and Clement, C. (eds.), op. cit. 6. Toxicology, Princeton Scientific Publishing Co. similar way to the anti-breast cancer drug, 23. Ann Link, personal communication, 1995. See Inc, Princeton, New Jersey, 1992. tamoxifen, by blocking the availability and also Chlorine pollution and our environment, 7. See, for example, ibid, and Sharpe, R., op. cit. 1. actions of natural oestrogen in the body. See Women's Environmental Network Information 8. Hileman, B., op. cit. 5. Cassidy, A., Bingham, S. and Setchell, K., Briefing, (1994) 9. See Weiss, R., "Oestrogen in the Environment", "Biological effects of a diet of soy protein rich in 24. Clorfene-Casten, L., "The Environmental Link to The Washington Post, 25 January 1994. isoflavones on the menstrual cycle of Breast Cancer in the Politics of Breast Cancer, 10. Purdom, C.E., Hardiman, P.A., Bye, V.J., Eno, premenopausal women", American Journal of Ms. Magazine, May/June 1993.

The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No. 1, January/February 1995 31 stepped out of the shadow of tradition, voting", is now being questioned world­ modernization now has to take as its ref­ wide by citizens outside the formal politi­ erence point not the past, but the changes cal system. In this way, politics is prised and the effects of change it has itself open by a public increasingly disillu­ produced. Science too is being forced to sioned by the (in)actions of their political become reflexive because "in its progress, representatives. science has just lost the truth as a school­ Readers are invited to make the link boy loses his milk money ." between the emergence of new protest But despite the growing awareness movements organizing around risk and among scientists of the challenges pre­ risk-related issues and the effects of sented to science as traditionally prac­ modernization on individual lives. Beck tised, Beck contends that its practice is suggests that risk comes to play a promi­ not changing radically. Indeed, it remains nent part in people's lives largely as a Books unclear how science can be made to result of an increasing tendency to­ change so that the risks and hazards ac­ wards individualization in society. The companying technological progress are main causes of this individualization placed on at least equal footing with the are taken to be the changing status of Outdated Modernity often exaggerated promises of progress. women, increased mobility, competi­ That they are not motivates Beck's scath­ tion and the move to a society of flex­ ing critique of technical risk assessment, ible and pluralized underemployment RISK SOCIETY: Towards a New which purports to analyse hazards associ­ in place of full employment. Modernity by Ulrich Beck, SAGE Pub­ ated with new technologies in a scientific Individualization and the breakdown lications, London, New Delhi, Newbury manner. Increasingly exacting scientific of tradition in society force individuals to Park, 1992, £13.95/$13.95, (pb), 260pp. standards, especially those relating to become authors of their own biographies. ISBN 0-8039-8346-8 (originally pub­ proof of causality, reduce the number of That is, people have to make a growing lished in German as Risikogesellschaft: risks that are recognized as such, thereby number of decisions about themselves Auf dem Weg in eine andere Moderne, multiplying the risks to which people and whereas previously, automatic ascription Suhrkamp Verlag, Frankfurt am Main, the biosphere are exposed. to class, gender and family roles meant 1986). Since many new products and tech­ that no decision was there to be made. nologies can only be properly tested once Biographies become reflexive as indi­ The main contention of Risk Society is they have been released or widely used, viduals seek to learn how best to cope that industrial society is being transformed "society is becoming a laboratory". Beck with the risks associated with the deci­ into a risk society: notes that this does not stop scientists sions and choices demanded of them in "The system of coordinates in which determining, before release or use, "ac­ their daily lives. life and thinking are fastened in ceptable levels" for exposure to toxins on One psychological effect of this is that industrial modernity — the axes of the basis of bogus claims to truth and when what are essentially social prob­ gender, family and occupation, the objectivity. This farce — "a very compli­ lems come to the fore, individuals inter­ belief in science and progress — cated, verbose and number-intensive way nalize them as personal failure. Another begins to shake, and a new twilight of saying: we [the scientists] do not know way in which individuals respond to of opportunities and hazards comes either" — serves to legitimize a disregard societal changes is in coming together into existence — the contours of for the empirical evidence coming from with like-minded people to form protest the risk society." the suffering of humans and ecosystems movements. The risks and threats associated with new who endure the consequences of a regime Risk Society is incredibly thought-pro­ and ever more powerful technologies such which effectively sanctions their poison­ voking and has quickly established itself as nuclear power and genetic engineering ing. as one of the most significant works of are a principal concern for Ulrich Beck Beck traces the origin of this tragic contemporary social analysis. A book of who argues that such risks call into ques­ state of affairs to the "economic Cyclopia enormous breadth, it raises several issues tion the legitimacy of modernization. of techno-scientific rationality", which of critical importance in contemporary Whereas the perceived benefits from tech­ allows for the perception of possibilities society. However, some of it appears spe­ nology used to be significant compared for productivity increase, but is blind to cific to the German experience, and in with associated risks, today the "side ef­ the risks and problems associated with parts it is heavy going, probably reflect­ fects" of technological advance take cen­ new technology. In Western societies, ing the density of the analysis rather than tre stage. Furthermore, some of the risks this results from the separation of the its translation. Despite this, there are many now confronting humanity are of a global political-economic sphere from the memorable phrases and passages through­ nature and cannot be side-stepped, re­ techno-economic sphere, the former be­ out the book which lend colour to the gardless of one's wealth. In Beck's words, ing the domain of democratic politics, the often disturbing subject matter. "poverty is hierarchic, smog is demo­ latter that of "non-politics". Technologi­ cratic"; in the risk society, social class cal changes which shape society have Dominic Hogg begins to lose its relevance as a defining thereby been removed from political le­ Dominic Hogg is a MacArthur research characteristic. gitimation. student, Global Security Programme, The modernization process, Beck con­ Such a "no-questions-asked" attitude, Faculty of Social and Political Sciences, tends, is becoming reflexive: having long which means that "progress replaces Cambridge University, UK.

32 The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No. 1, January/February 1995 and statements by Chinese scientists, jour­ nalists, politicians and intellectuals op­ Damming the posed to the Three Gorges dam. The vari­ Gorges ous contributors include members of the Communist party, former senior party officials and eminent intellectuals, mak­ YANGTZE! YANGTZE! by Dai Qing, ing the book's indictment of the Chinese edited by Patricia Adams and John government and the dam proposal all the Thibodeau, Earthscan, 1994, £12.95/ more compelling. $14.95, 295pp. (pb) ISBN 1-85383-187-5 Compiled by Dai Qing, a journalist, former secret agent and communist party DAMNING THE THREE GORGES: member, Yangtze! Yangtze! was first pub­ What Dam Builders Don't Want You To lished in China at a time of increased Know, edited by Margaret Barber and media freedom a few months before the Grainne Ryder, Earthscan, 1993, £12.95/ June 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre. $13.95,183pp (pb) ISBN 1-85383-186-7 The book's attacks on the Chinese gov­ ernment certainly gave momentum to the Imagine a flood stretching the equivalent growing opposition movement and may of the distance between London and Ed­ have prompted the government to react inburgh, three miles wide and 500 feet more quickly to the protest than they deep. Some 1.2 million people — a popu­ might otherwise have done. lation the size of Birmingham's — have After Tiananmen, the Chinese pub­ had to be evacuated; 13 cities, 140 towns lishers of the book were blamed by the Damning The Three Gorges is a very and villages have been destroyed, and authorities for "engaging in preparing different book, put together by research­ over hundreds of factories, mines and opinions for the chaos" — in other words, ers from Canada's independent environ­ power stations flooded. for supporting and causing the unrest. mental advocacy organization, Probe In­ This will be the result of building the The book was banned, and Dai Qing ternational. Editors Margaret Barber and world's largest dam, 185 metres high, at arrested and told she would be executed; Grainne Ryder have drawn on the exper­ the Three Gorges on the Yangtze river in she was later released and exiled. tise of leading international experts on China. Such a dam has been planned One chapter in particular stands out in hydrology, engineering and geography to since the 1920s, but has received consid­ the English edition, not only because its produce a book which examines and re­ erable opposition inside and outside of author is Li Rui, Mao's former Industrial futes, piece by piece, the reasons given by the country, not least because of the huge Secretary, but also because of its frank­ the Chinese government and the project's resettlement and rebuilding involved. The ness and insight into the workings of the funders for building the dam. Originally project finally received the go-ahead in Communist regime. Not included in the published in 1990 in response to a Cana­ 1992 at an estimated cost of between $22 first Chinese edition, Li's chapter is in the dian-World Bank feasibility study of the to $34 billion. Excavation has already form of a letter to the leadership of the Three Gorges project, it has been reis­ begun and the first concrete has started to communist party in 1993: sued with additional chapters on sedi­ flow on the construction site — 1.4 mil­ "Mao wrote, 'We need an opposition mentation — which is likely to cause the lion tons of cement will be used each year opinion'. More than 27 years have reservoir to silt up entirely within about during its 20-year construction period, passed since that . . . was written; two hundred years — and a chronicle of the equivalent of almost 4,000 tons a day. however Mao's instructions are not political events leading to the approval of The Three Gorges on the Yangtze river out of date. Listen to both sides and the dam by the National People's Con­ are among the natural wonders of the you will be enlightened." gress in April 1992. world. Their beauty and size have in­ Yangtze! Yangtze! is at times very tech­ Each key issue relating to the Three spired generations of poets, writers, paint­ nical and is certainly not an easy read, but Gorges project — resettlement, sedimen­ ers and sculptors, and they have been an for the information and insights it pro­ tation, navigation, environmental impact, attraction for visitors since ancient times. vides and because of the circumstances finance — is clearly examined by appro­ Yet all may soon be confined to the his­ and passion surrounding its publication, priate world experts. Many of the argu­ tory books if the Chinese government and it is highly recommended. The book's ments are highly technical but they are its funders are allowed to continue with spirit is best summed up by a concluding dealt with clearly and accessibly, for the plans to dam the river, the level of which poem by Bei Dao: least scientific of minds. will rise by over 300 feet. "I do not believe that the Chinese Many construction and hydroelectric These two books, both collaborations will forever / refuse to think for experts have submitted evidence to the between Chinese and Canadians but each themselves; /1 do not believe that Chinese government stating that the sheer with a distinct approach, provide a com­ the Chinese will never / speak out weight of water behind the dam would be through their writings; / I do not prehensive and unique insight into the capable of causing an earthquake. A UK believe that morality and justice will workings of one of the world's most se­ hydrology expert estimates that it would / vanish in the face of repression; /1 cretive regimes and what may be one of do not believe that in an age in take 10 years to assess the environmental humankind's greatest follies. which / we are in communication impact of the dam and reservoir — and Yangtze! Yangtze! is a fascinating mix­ with the world / 'freedom of speech' that many possible consequences cannot ture of essays, interviews, observations will remain an empty phrase." be assessed because a project on this

The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No. 1, January/February 1995 33 scale has never been attempted before. wealthy nation moves hundreds of its In a chapter on 'Missing Energy Per­ factories to a much poorer country next spectives", the author, Dr Vaclav Smil, door? What happens to the dusty, half- puts forward some common sense alter­ forgotten, mostly rural towns when they natives to building such a monolith as the are sucked overnight into the industrial Three Gorges dam. Smil, a professor of world? And what happens when hun­ geography at the University of Manitoba, dreds of workers from the poor nation argues that the key to China's energy cross the border illegally to find jobs in problems is not to build one huge and the wealthy neighbour's economy? The flawed water management project, but picture, portrayed in On the Line, is one smaller, easier-to-maintain and manage of poverty, exploitation and a lack of projects, providing far more cost-effec­ democracy for workers on both sides of tive and efficient power. the dividing line. More efficient energy production by Clustered along the southern side of China's current power generation facili­ the US/Mexican border are over 2,000 ties would go a long to way to solving its export-assembly plants (maquiladoras), perceived lack of energy. Dr Smil has where half a million people, mainly calculated that it is technically feasible to women, work for an average of less than produce 11,103 hydroelectric dams in a dollar an hour. Dwyer gives a vivid China, with a total capacity 27 times that portrait of the appalling conditions in the of the Yangtze Dam. This cuts to the core plants. Health and safety violations of the argument:build small, efficient and abound and environmental regulations unemployment, the migrants face racism feasible projects with less*impact on the are ignored. Workers handle hazardous and discrimination on a daily basis. environment than the "boom or bust" chemicals with little or no protection, Dwyer suggests that it is the very sta­ glory project of a regime struggling to waste is dumped into waterways and un­ tus of workers as migrants with homes find its political legitimacy. regulated landfills, and gas leaks and ex­ and families in Mexico that makes them Dai Qing, who writes the foreword to plosions occur with alarming regularity. attractive as workers, as this makes them the second edition, puts the book in its Unfair labour practices, including the more flexible. They are prepared to work proper perspective: sacking of workers who attempt to organ­ extra hours and days when necessary and "It comes at a time . . . when the ize, are common, as is the sexual harass­ then return home when they are not green movement has received in­ ment of women and the hiring of minors. needed. In addition, they represent no creased understanding and support Alongside the plants, suburbs of shacks added social security costs for the com­ around the world because the dis­ house the workers and their families. pany, nor any social costs to the US mantling of communist systems in Crowded and dirty, they frequently lack economy, ^cording to Dwyer, rather Eastern Europe and the Soviet Un­ running water, sanitation or electricity. than depressing US wages, the migrants ion has led to a deeper understand­ The majority of maquiladora plants compete only against each other, filling ing of humanity and its relationship are owned by US companies. Machinery the gap which has resulted from an in­ with nature." and raw materials are "temporarily im­ crease in low paid, non-unionized work, The Probe editors add that "under the ported" to Mexico to be assembled and which is unattractive to many US Ameri­ current [Chinese] regime, someone would shipped out again. The companies are cans. Their very illegality is what makes be imprisoned for producing a critique of exempt from Mexico's two per cent as­ them so useful. a government feasibility study: because sets tax, paying only a small tax on the "What better way to keep the labour they cannot produce such a critique, we value added to the product, which then force docile, undemanding and must." goes back into the US, duty free. above all unorganized, than placing Mark Alwen When the first maquiladoras were built them under constant threat of de­ in the 1960s, the scheme was supported portation? American societies con­ Mark Alwen is a freelance journalist, political consultant and former by the US government, which hoped that tinue to fear migrants while hiring Parliamentary researcher. as well as increasing the profitability of them to trim their hedges and lawns, US companies, the industrialization of and buying the products they make more cheaply". the border zone would reduce illegal im­ Border Troubles migration by providing employment Intercut with well-researched historical within Mexico. As Dwyer points out, the and statistical detail, On the Line is opposite has been true, for in attracting brought to life by the stories of ordinary ON THE LINE: Life on the US-Mexi­ migrants from other parts of Mexico to Mexicans which Dwyer recounts — can border, by Augusta Dwyer, Latin the border region, the maquiladoras have maquiladora workers, union activists, il­ America Bureau, 1 Amwell St, London in turn encouraged the flow of migrants legal migrants — whose lives have been EC1R 1UL, (Central Books) 1994, £8.99 north into the United States. Thousands shaped by the conditions of poverty and (pb), ISBN 0-906-15684-X. of Mexicans cross the border each day, in injustice on the border and who are or­ search of employment and an improved ganising to resist exploitation and the Augusta Dwyer travelled through the cit­ standard of living. However, reality is destruction of their environment. ies of the US-Mexican border to explore often very different from the dream. One of those interviewed is Lupe three questions: What happens when a Blamed for rising crime, high taxes and Torres, a former maquiladora worker who

34 The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No. 1, January/February 1995 runs the Border Committee for Working genes from these peo­ Women in the city of Matamoros, teach­ ples is justified for the ing workers about their labour rights. "greater human GracielaErives, although unqualified, has good". The peoples practised labour law in Ciudad Juarez for themselves have 13 years, successfully suing for the rein­ rather different opin­ statement of maquiladora workers fired ions. Leonora for demanding better working conditions Zalabata, spokesper­ and pay. Argimiro Morales works with son for the Arhuaco the Mixtec Popular Civic Community, people of northern providing legal and social services to Colombia, explains: Mexicans in California, while Roberto "Our land, our cul­ Martinez, a fifth-generation Mexican liv­ ture, our sub-soil, ing in the US, documents abuses of Mexi­ our ideology and can immigrants along the border. our traditions have It is ordinary Mexicans such as these, all been exploited. This could be an­ Do the individuals who are giving these says Dwyer, who by organizing and work­ other form of exploitation, only this body samples know what is intended to time they are using us as raw materials." ing together can bring about change from be done with them? Are they consulted below. In the words of Mary, a George Annas, Professor of Medical Eth­ about further applications of the scien­ maquiladora worker from the border town ics at the Massachusetts Institute of Tech­ tific findings? Are they assured of a share of Reynosa: nology, agrees: of any benefits or profits? High in the Sierra Nevada in Colom­ "People know they have to unite. "We're taking from them their DNA, That way they'll be stronger, they'll which we now consider like gold. bia, geneticists from the Bogota-based find the courage to fight the compa­ It's even worse than standard colo­ Genetics Institute, accompanied by sci­ nies. That's why we've got to keep nialism and exploitation because we entists from pharmaceutical giant meeting and find a way to change are taking the one thing that we Hoffman-La Roche, draw blood from iso­ our situation." value. And after we take that, we lated Asario Indians and provide a telling have no real interest in whether they Emma Pearce answer to such questions. "In fact, we live or die." Emma Pearce is a freelance environmental don't tell every community that we are journalist who has worked in Peru and Ecuador. Nor has Ray Apodaca of the National immortalizing their cells", admits Dr Congress of American Indians much sym­ Alberto Gomez. On the contrary, the In­ pathy for the "pure science" justification dians are persuaded to allow the visiting of this research, that it will reveal the doctors to take their blood by offers of Genetic Goldrush history of human migrations: "We know where we came from, and we know who we are, and we THE GENE HUNTERS (video), Zef think we know where we are going. Productions (in association with Televi­ Why do we need to know anything M B H sion Trust for the Environment, Prince else? I mean, is this for their ben­ Albert Road, London NW1 4RZ, UK, for efit? It certainly isn't for ours." DEEP Deep .ECOLOGY Channel 4), Producer Luke Holland, Di­ Apodaca recalls earlier "scientific" in­ Ecology rector Ian Taylor, 1995, 51 minutes. FOR THE 1'"* vestigations into the unique characteris­ CENTURY FOR THE tics of Native Americans, which led to TWENTY-FlRST The wave of international concern for hundreds of Indian graves' being robbed Century vanishing biological diversity has identi­ in the last century to measure skull sizes Edited by fied a new field for prospecting — van­ and estimate racial intelligence. Taking George Sessions ishing peoples. The US-based Human people's blood and other tissues in the Genome Diversity Project is intent on name of science and global benefits today A comprehensive anthology of collecting body tissue samples from 700 is not very different and has led to bitter writings on a key environmental "endangered" indigenous societies, whom recriminations. movement and its implications for the next century. it refers to as "isolates of historic inter­ Behind the new rhetoric lie the same est". It aims to "immortalize" these peo­ attitudes which treat indigenous peoples as Presented here are thirty-six articles by the ples by establishing viable cell lines in leading writers and thinkers in the field, inferior and ignorant and therefore deny including essays by Thomas Berry, Arne Naess, laboratories so as to search for unique their rights. As Leonora Zalabata says: Fritjof Capra, Chellis Glendinning, Gary DNA sequences that may offer clues to Snyder, Dave Foreman, Dolores LaChapelle, "They haven't been honest. They Warwick Fox, and Jerry Mander. genetically-caused diseases and to poten­ haven't told the indigenous authori­ £16.99 paperback tially lucrative cures. ties what they are looking for. We This fascinating, well-researched and think the way they have taken away SHAMBHALA PUBLICATIONS, INC. sensitive documentary, The Gene Hunt­ these samples is arbitrary. We don't Now at your bookstore, ers, presents the moral dilemmas of this want to be guinea pigs for their or order from Shambhala Publications, Horticultural Hall, 300 Mass. Ave., "genetic goldrush". The proponents ar­ experiments." Boston, MA 02115 • 617-424-0228 FAX 617-236-1563 • Send for free catalog gue that the collection and eventually Her complaint highlights a key issue in Distributed by Random House patenting of rare human cell-types and this moral debate — informed consent.

The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No. 1, January/February 1995 35 one-off medical treatments, which these isolated peoples have little chance of ob­ taining otherwise. BOOKS DIGEST Nor are the communities informed about any subsequent scientific findings. • A VOICE FOR THE EXCLUDED: Popular Participation in Development: Patents on cell lines are being taken out Utopia or Necessity?, by Matthias Stiefel and Marshall Wolfe, Zed Books without the knowledge and consent of the Ltd, London and New Jersey (in association with UNRISD), 1994, £15.95/ local people. Indeed, in a startling test $25.00 (pb), 265pp. ISBN 1-85649-248-6. case documented in The Gene Hunters, "Participation", like "sustainable development", has become a catchword that the California Supreme Court has ruled everyone advocates, each defines — and few put into practice. Through that a biotechnology company may pat­ wide-ranging case studies, this book analyses the actions of NGOs, and ent a person's genes, even when that state and international agencies to encourage, co-opt or undermine person has not only refused to give their participation on the part of those "excluded" from development. The authors consent but has taken the matter to court. point out that "participation" programmes are often aimed at social control. Is it ethical to ignore tribal peoples'

rights and interests for the "greater good"? • UNEQUAL PROTECTION: Environmental Justice and Communities of George Annas thinks not: Color, edited by Robert D Bullard, Sierra Club Books, 730 Polk St, San '"It is virtually impossible to get the Franciso, CA 94109, 1994, $25 (plus $4.50 p&p) (hb), 392pp. ISBN 0- informed consent of indigenous 87156-450-5. people for this. Number one, I think, because if they understand the "The environmental justice movement is the confluence of three of America's project, they would refuse and, greatest challenges," states one contributor to this wide-ranging volume of number two, if they don't under­ essays. She details these challenges, all examined in the book, as "the stand, they can't give consent. So it struggle against racism and poverty; the effort to preserve and improve the is total exploitation." « environment; and the compelling need to shift social institutions from class division and environmental depletion to social unity and global sustainability". Scientists, however, are concerned that there may never be another chance to take tissue samples from these peoples: they • ENVIRONMENTAL NGOs IN WORLD POLITICS: Linking the Local and may soon die out, taking their genetic the Global, by Thomas Princen and Matthias Finger, Routledge, London secrets with them. One way out of this and New York, 1994, £14.99/$16.95 (pb) 262pp. ISBN 0-415-11510-8. conundrum might be benefit sharing: en­ The lobbying and educating activities of environmental non-governmental tering into contracts with indigenous peo­ organizations at national and international levels have proliferated in the last ples to ensure that they get a cut of any decade. Analyzing NGO involvement in the ivory trade ban, the protection of profits. This is a problematic suggestion. Antarctica, the UNCED "Earth Summit" and the Great Lakes water quality As the film points out, most indigenous agreement, the authors highlight the transformations — positive and negative people have learned to mistrust foreign­ — that NGOs have brought about at international conferences. ers' promises as they have invariably

proved to be false. But if there was ben­ • SEEDS OF HOPE: Local Initiatives in Thailand, by Sanitsuda Ekachai, efit sharing, how would it be ensured that Thai Development Support Committee, 409 3rd fl. TVS Bldg. Soi profits did return to the community, and Rohitsook, Pracharat-bampen Road, Huay Khwang, Bangkok 10310, who would oversee the honouring of such THAILAND, 1994, $20 (plus p&p $10 airmail; $5 surface mail) (pb), agreements? 223pp. ISBN 974-89199-1-9.

The film's sympathies for the rights of This collection of articles and photographs from an award-winning Bangkok indigenous peoples are clear, but it leaves Post journalist describes rural and urban village life throughout Thailand, the viewers to decide for themselves. The economic hardship communities face due to the country's rapid words of Leonora Zalabata will stick in modernization and development, and the myriad ways in which they adapt my mind: and extend local ways, embedded in particular cultures, to fashion their own "Science and technology solve prob­ future. lems, but they are also aggressive.

But our way of looking after hu­ • CROP PHYSIOLOGY OF FIBRE (cannabis sativa L), by H van der Werf, manity and helping to save the Wageningen Agricultural University, 1994, 153pp, $20. Available from world, of looking after the earth and International Hemp Association, Postbus 75007, Amsterdam 1070, THE making a brotherhood of mankind NETHERLANDS. is done without technology. Our technology is in the head, the heart In 1990, the Dutch government commissioned a £6 million, four-year study to and the spirit. That is different." investigate the potential contribution that paper made from domestically- The only just solution is to enforce a grown hemp could make towards protecting the world's forests and respect for human rights, not just immor­ improving the land. This informative, down-to-earth volume is the result. The author concludes that hemp cultivation would represent a profitable talize their genes. alternative source of raw material to paper, over 90 per cent of which is Marcus Colchester currently made from wood. Marcus Colchester is director of the Forest Peoples's Programme of the World Rainforest Movement.

36 The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No. 1, January/February 1995 World, since political economy is as much ignored. The author's case for a political about inherent processes and choices as economy is weakened by excluding it is about decisions imposed from without. insights from such crucial struggles. What It is fashionable in "progressive" circles she offers the reader instead — more today to describe the Third World as an accurately — is an illustration of (prima­ unchanging, antediluvian, pristine "Self" — rily) ecological abuses by investors and frozen in time and space — pitted against aid agencies, valuable information in itself, the forces of Western capital, technology but hardly constituting a political economy. and "Other" evils. Such a construction is Despite tangential references to as Orientalist as that which it seeks to protests or alternative actions in various counter, and not very helpful in advancing parts of the world, Pleumarom makes no the critique. It stands dangerously close to attempt to describe, much less evaluate Letters positions taken by right-wing reactionaries critically, the activities of many groups and who reject all things Western and seek a institutions around the world who have revival of an imagined past. been involved in tourism issues for more Thus, Pleumarom's assertion that than two decades; surprisingly so, since "many Third World governments re­ she has been an integral part of many of sponded positively . . . because [tourism] these for several years. They include the Third World Tourism brought access to foreign currency . . . Ecumenical Coalition on Third World and enhanced prestige", whilst "in many Tourism and several related networks and organizations, such as ANTENNA (Asian Anita Pleumarom's article "The Political cases they were offered 'tourism or Tourism Action Network), GNAGA (Global Economy of Tourism" (The Ecologist July/ nothing'", does not hold water if we Network for AntiGolf Action), TNT (Thai August 1994) is a good documentation of consider several cases (including those of Network on Tourism) and GAG'M (Global issues that have been addressed by Third India or Thailand) where tourism devel­ Anti Golf Movement). Actions taken by World tourism activists and networks oped alongside, or was built upon, other these and other organizations have led to worldwide for several years. Given the economic sectors in the period of mod­ an increasing realisation worldwide of the pace at which the international tourism ernization. As such, she presents a limited abuses in tourism, and has resulted in industry is growing — especially in the so- view of the politics of tourism, applicable some successes as well. called Third World (Asia and Pacific being primarily to "island economies" of the the fastest growing regions) and the Pacific and the Caribbean. Perhaps it is to these she refers as complex nature of issues involved, it is Third, her style of citing a wide array of "mainstream critics of tourism", if indeed both timely and appropriate to give this examples — especially in the sections on such an identity is possible. While it can issue cover page focus. I hope the debate eco-tourism — while testifying to her hardly be claimed that the existing body of will secure greater, diverse coverage in formidable documentation, has the Third World tourism critique and action is future issues. Nevertheless, there are limitation of skimming the surface, the be-all and end-all, an objective several shortcomings in Pleumarom's resulting in conclusions which are often assessment of their actions and effective­ articulation and effort to construct a implausible. Moreover, Costa Rica, Belize, ness would certainly contribute to political economy. Namibia, Botswana, Rwanda, Uganda, Pleumarom's very valid assertion that First, the article is primarily a discus­ South Africa, Zimbabwe, Nepal — all good "tourism alternatives must be part of a sion of some major issues related to examples in their own right — cannot wider debate" towards a "new world tourism, rather than a historical delinea­ simply be homogenized and a theory order". By positing (and not distinguishing tion of the relations between power and constructed as if they were a lumpen between) such discrete categories as capital, labour and land, modes of mass: that is the preserve of the Oriental­ "sustainable tourism advocates", "main­ production and the creation of value, ist. An example of her flawed analysis is stream critics", "tourist or touristed", and terms of trade, ideological content and the much cited ACAP project in Nepal. finally, her chosen identity as an "inde­ cultural production, and so on — funda­ Although, as she points out, the project's pendent researcher", she ironically ends mentals of political economy. As such, the economic aspects are questionable, the up polarizing and fragmenting the very title is both confusing and misleading. basic issues are those of the cultural debate she seeks. The harsh reality is: if Tourism in the Third World (which is what politics of King Birendra's government. the desire for debate is not merely wishful, the piece is about, rather than tourism in This has been discussed at length then we have to be open to others, not general, as suggested by the title) cannot elsewhere, including in a previous issue of merely those who support our own be seen apart from colonial history, the The Ecologist. persuasions. In an interdependent world, era of mercantile capitalism, and the Fourth, I am amazed that the one truly the notion of independence is fanciful to compulsions of global economies in the well-known and widely documented the extreme. post-colonial era. Rather than being a example of peoples' action against Given the preoccupation with issues model of development and a means of tourism is not mentioned even in passing: within tourism — widely articulated instilling modern values, tourism in the that of the JGF (Jagrut Goenkaranchi elsewhere, it must be reiterated — there is Third World is a logical and inevitable Fauz or Vigilant Goans Army) in Goa. Not little attention paid in the paper to extension of the history of colonial trade just because it is an example worth citing possibilities open to those who are and resource extraction. and has been an inspiration to countless concerned and willing to act. The luxury of Second, it is fallacious to imply that the others worldwide, but more because it is radical action (or radical thinking, even) is industry — in its modern sense — has one of the very few cases of activism seldom available to those whose immedi­ been created, almost, by the World Bank, ideologically based on an understanding ate concern is that of survival and meeting Western governments and myriad other of the political economy of tourism. Similar basic needs. An analysis of the JGF's forces external to the so-called Third cases from Hawai'i have been equally evolution — since 1987 to the present —

The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No. 1, January/February 1995 37 is instructive. Education and awareness challenges to the present global order strength of the struggle . . . demands that building remain the keys. Negation is should be procrastinated until "equally there be no deviation from local inspiration another strategy which has been at­ gigantic transnational" alternative coali­ and firmly rooted local thought". tempted successfully, often including an tions have been forged? alternative tourism. Not all action can be On the contrary, they are doing exactly Jakob von Uexkull confrontational, nor indeed is it always what Esteva and Prakash advocate, The Right Livelihood Award appropriate and productive. Building a namely strengthening the solidarity which 7 Park Crescent "new world order" is a worthy objective, "is now perhaps more needed than ever" London WIN 3HE, UK but it cannot take place without engaging by providing crucial information and with what exists. linkages. That is why local activists Finally, I find it remarkable that despite worldwide make use of such organizations Pleumarom's repeated pleas for a local, and events like The Other Economic Global Participation people-articulated vision of development, Summit, co-founded by James Robertson. the vast majority of her own 50-odd It is an illusion that "all global powers . . As a person who has committed my whole references are from Western sources, may be effectively opposed through career to the holistic problems of futures notwithstanding the rich availability of modest local action" — otherwise the research, I am one of the globalists who material on tourism today within the Third world would be in a better state. The have been so roundly criticized in the World. While I realise this has something prime example of purely local thinking recent editorial by Gustavo Esteva and to do with a notion of "academic quality", today is found in the boardrooms of Madu Suri Prakash ("From Global to Local even among visionaries of a new para­ transnational corporations where the focus Thinking", The Ecologist, September/ digm, it does little to transform that vision is on the next quarterly profits irrespective October 1994). It is extremely important into reality. of the wider consequences. The effects of for some of us to commit ourselves to a this narrow perspective are now, thanks to study of global forces and trends, to Paul Gonsalves GATT, imposed on every village. While it describe probable scenarios of future 36 Muni Marappa Garden is often possible to de-link from eating events and to explore alternative policies. J C Nagar imported food, it is not possible to de-link Such global thinking does not "twist the Bangalore 560 008 from the effects of another Chernobyl. humble satisfaction of belonging to the INDIA Working for a global nuclear ban is, cosmos into the arrogance of pretending to therefore, far from irrelevant to the know what is good for everyone". If you call Editors' Note marginalized majorities whose interest the me arrogant for thinking for myself and for The title of Anita Pleumarom's article "The authors claim to champion. To deny that trying to find policies which will give the Political Economy of Tourism" was given we share a common destiny is to ignore best future for ourselves, the planet and by ourselves. We are grateful to Mr the unique threat to life on earth which the our descendants, you condemn me to Gonsalves for pointing out our error. environmental crisis represents. ignorance and silence. That is an excellent Western individualism and "equality" way to preserve the dominance of the de has led to the rule of money. But the claim facto world government of transnationals, that individual rights are opposed (and not World Bank, IMF and their friends. complementary) to communal obligations It is wrong to suggest that "by framing Global Questions can only weaken solidarity and strengthen local efforts within the context of global those despots who have as little regard for thinking ... the issues become abstract, "From Global to Local Thinking" by individual as they have for community stripped of their content". Gustavo Esteva and Madhu Suri Prakash rights. Let me give a contrary example. We (The Ecologist, September/October 1994) As your Associate Editor Vandana face a concrete challenge locally in the raises more questions than it answers. It Shiva has written, "Democratizing Wairarapa, a farming area of New is easy to agree about the need for international interests is essential if Zealand. The power company, Wairarapa pluralism and "thinking of the scale where democracy is to exist at the local and Electricity, intends to build a dam, remove we can understand and thus know and national level", (The Ecologist, November/ the water from 22 kilometres of river, and take care of the consequences of our December 1992). I have attended many release it downstream in peak time actions". But it is not clear who Esteva and meetings where grassroots activists from pulses. It would cause much environmen­ Prakash are criticizing until one reads the South and North argue about how this is tal damage and is uneconomic, as well as references in their full paper, where the best achieved and also about which rights being a waste of money which could be "alternative global thinkers" they oppose should be protected globally. I have never better spent on energy conservation. are exemplified by the WorldWatch heard anyone claim that there are no such Some of us who are interested and Institute, David Korten, James Robertson rights. Or is opposition to slavery simply a active in global and national activities and Greenpeace. Western cultural prejudice? knew quite well what is going on. For However, Esteva and Prakash do not Such debates need to continue. But we decades, production has been greater provide any evidence to show that these do not need a new alternative thought than consumption for many goods. Private organizations and individuals are "pre­ police determining when the good enterprise then searches for additional tending to know what is good for every­ "transnational sharers" overstep the line to ways to invest capital and generate profit. one" or producing global master plans and become the bad "globalists". I cannot One key way has been to take over public universal solutions to "manage planet believe that this is what Esteva and goods; what was once run by the commu­ earth". Where have they advocated the Prakash have in mind, But then they nity for its own good is then run by a few "global dissemination of. . . basic should chose their words more carefully owners for their profit. amenities of modern life to every village for statements such as this one (from their New Zealand has shared this trend with on earth"? When did they argue that full paper) have a totalitarian flavour: "The much of the developed world. The

38 The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No. 1, January/February 1995 government changed previous elected We must think and act on all possible still secret. The terms of these are highly Power Boards into power companies, levels if we are to prevent that scenario contentious in Quebec as they throw the controlled by major shareholders. The from becoming reality. National govern­ cost of constructing the dams required to ruies of the game have changed com­ ments are important — that is the level at provide such electricity to the other pletely. The privatized board must tell us which sovereignty can be asserted to Quebec rate payers. Hydro's claims for the date of their Annual General Meeting allow local input, and that is the level at carbon replacement are largely contra­ (when shareholders are meant to have a which we can determine input into dicted by the greenhouse gases produced say) just two weeks in advance. But international forums. by the aluminium smelters. nominations for directors, and notices of Finally, the Hydro Quebec letter is most motion, must be filed much earlier — six Dr John Robinson outrageous in its claims concerning the weeks in advance. As a suspicious 21 Oxford St animals and about the impacts on my globalist, with a feeling for what was going Martinborough people, the Crees. The letter states that on, I wrote and found out the date of the NEW ZEALAND "mercury levels ... are dropping quickly", AGM, with just two days to spare. So we leaving it unexplained whether they speak got in some motions and some nomina­ of mercury levels in the flesh of the fish in tions for director, and gathered lots of the reservoirs or in the people. In fact, proxy votes from small shareholders. Cree Lands Hydro Quebec's claims that the levels in As expected, we were slaughtered. The the fish are dropping and will be in normal big shareholders voted down the motions I am writing to respond to the letter from ranges within 30 years after flooding, are and voted for the sitting directors — who Hydro Quebec published in your Novem­ contradicted by work from the Fresh had intended to sneak back in unopposed. ber/December 1994 issue. Water Institute which projects high levels It is now obvious to everyone in the The letter contains several examples of for up to 100 years. As far as people are Wairarapa, just as it was obvious to us misinformation. It is an attempt to mollify concerned, the Crees of Wemmindji, beforehand, that on a local level we are your readers rather than inform them Eastmain and Chisasibi are afraid to eat practically powerless. The rules have to about the real impacts of the destructive the fish. We refer to mercury poisoning as be changed at the national level before mega-projects which are in the plans of "fish sickness" in our language. While the people can regain what they have lost. Hydro Quebec for our lands in the James there have not to my knowledge been We cannot fight or overcome global forces Bay Territory. instances of Minimata disease, it is still a "by acting, and thinking, locally". The letter pretends that Hydro Que­ question what the long-term exposure will The Green Party of New Zealand has bec's power serves Quebecers and not do. It is moreover a problem because of realized this. We need a share of power in "power hungry" Americans and that the the fear that this controversy has caused. order to change even our local communi­ mega-projects are somehow therefore The pike and predator fish in the reser­ ties. The Greens are now partners with justified. In fact, the six million power voirs have enough mercury in them to be four other parties in an Alliance which is hungry Quebecers are also a problem. classified as toxic material. Moreover, the set to become one of the three dominant New York State with three times the sturgeon in the reservoirs appear to be political parties in the next parliament, the population of Quebec has the same unable to survive and migrate upstream first to be run under proportional represen­ installed capacity (over 30,000 mega where they overpopulate as yet untouched tation. watts) as Hydro Quebec. areas. Our participation is desperately Hydro Quebec says that it planned only The letter states that the number of needed. The new wave of unemployment to dam some of the rivers in James Bay in caribou has gone up from 200,000 to described by Jeremy Rifkin (in the same 1971 when it first announced the James 700,000 since 1975. In fact, the tech­ issue of The Ecologist) for the US is Bay Project. It, in fact, announced the niques for counting the herd have a 40 per getting under way here too. The reduction destruction of the ten largest rivers in our cent margin of error so these figures are of manufacturing, the worsening of territory. The total reservoir area of the to be treated with caution. The folly of the working conditions, the formation of an planned projects was to be over 25,000 letter was to state that the "vastness of the underclass are here just as in the US. For square kilometres, larger than Northern frozen reservoirs provides them security "African-Americans", just read "Maori", Ireland. from predators". Can you imagine and the statistics of higher ethnic unem­ In the letter, it is stated that Hydro hundreds of thousands of caribou ployment and other consequences of Quebec relies primarily on energy standing on the reservoirs with the wolves inequality are repeated. efficiency programs to meet new demand. circling? What would the caribou eat? The future is even more worrying. In fact, Hydro Quebec is today proceeding Caribou moss does not grow on reser­ Having just completed a hopeful book, with the damming of the St Marguerite voirs. Rebuilding New Zealand, on policies River, Lake Robertson and proceeding In fact, the caribou are largely located which could take us away from selfishness with the Eastmain River project planning. to the north of the La Grande Project into caring, I am preparing a very honest Hydro Quebec was only reluctantly drawn south of Ungava Bay and in the upper report on the probable events of the into energy efficiency programs when the reaches of the Great and Little Whale coming several decades. This forces me bottom fell out of the American export Rivers. The Cree elders say that the herd to bring together information from diverse market. goes through large population swings sources and to consider historical In addition to exports, Hydro Quebec every couple of centuries. They say that precedents. sells electricity for under one half the cost the caribou have been disturbed in their As so often happens, the research has of production to the aluminium industry. usual migration route by the reservoirs. taken over and the book is controlling the One such contract was contested under Nobody, including Hydro Quebec, writer. I am forced into bleak pessimism — the Free Trade Agreement between knows the reasons for these increases in we can expect a truly catastrophic 21st Canada with the United States, and Hydro the caribou population. The frightening century. Quebec lost. The other 12 contracts are thing is that without really understanding

The Ecologist, Vol. 25, No. 1, January/February 1995 39 this, Hydro Quebec was ready to go on the first phase of development was eventually be replaced by temperate ahead with the Great Whale River Project because we fought against the govern­ species like maple and oak. This will be a until it was put on hold last year by the ment of Quebec who had proceeded with gradual process that could take several Premier for political reasons. the project without even speaking to us. centuries. This process is being rapidly The letter claims that such projects Since then, we have learned some accelerated, however, by clearcut logging, have to be reviewed and that "all informa­ lessons. The diversion of large rivers and which removes forest over wide areas, tion must be submitted to the government flooding on a vast scale are not compat­ allowing the invasion of temperate species before any development is approved". The ible with our traditions. If development is much more quickly than would other wise reality is that Quebec wanted a closed to come, it must be on a more modest occur. door review of the projects and did not scale which preserves the integrity of the One crucial factor controlling the rate of want Canada to undertake a review of environment and includes the Cree people forest decline is the "carbon pulse" — the matters under its jurisdiction (marine as owners, partners and coworkers in the large release of carbon from peatlands, mammals, fish, navigable waters, management of our lands and resources. soils and dying vegetation expected as the aboriginal peoples) until it was ordered by climate changes. The boreal forest the courts to allow such a review. Grand Chief Matthew Coon Como contains as much carbon as the earth's After over $300 million of studies on Grand Council of the Crees (of Quebec) atmosphere. If a significant portion of design and environment, the report Embassy of the Cree Nation boreal carbon is released into the produced by Hydro Quebec was judged to 24 Bayswater Avenue atmosphere, the rate of climate change be incomplete by the panels, committee Ottawa and forest decline could be much more and Commission that reviewed it. How­ Ontario K1Y2E4 rapid. ever, the present Minister of the Environ­ CANADA There is strong evidence that this ment criticized, in turn, the report of the decline has already begun. 1994, for panels, calling it "an inquisition". example, was globally the fourth warmest Our fear now is that the forces within year ever recorded, sparking fires that the Quebec government who want the Carbon Pulse burned over five million hectares of forest project will find a way to build it. The in Canada alone — an area larger than Premier, Mr Parizeau, has said that the I am writing to correct an error that crept The Netherlands. project is frozen until the result of the into the abstract of my article "Finger on "Public Debate on Energy" is known. This the Carbon Pulse: Climate Change and Kevin Jardine debate has, however, been set up to the Boreal Forests" (The Ecologist, Greenpeace Canada include Hydro Quebec on the panel to November/December 1994). The article 185 Spadina Avenue judge Quebec energy options. The fox is should not say that from 50 to 90 per cent Toronto now in charge of the chickens. This of the boreal forest will decline "within the Ontario M5T 2C5 means that the technical input to the next 30-50 years". CANADA debate will be largely done by those with Over the next 30-50 years, greenhouse an interest in building the next mega- gas levels are projected to double in the project. The debate process does not earth's atmosphere. This is likely to cause allow for any significant independent an abrupt and catastrophic climate change Correction technical resources to be put together to that will, over a period of time, cause the counterbalance this influence. For these decline of most of the existing boreal The photograph which appeared on page reasons, the Quebec environmental forest. The rate of decline will vary 133 of The Ecologist, Vol 24, No 4, July/ groups are boycotting the process. considerably, depending on local climatic August 1994 in the article "Living Under If we are to continue to protect our way conditions. In drier areas, climate change Contract: The Social Impacts of Contract of life and our lands, we must have public would dramatically increase the frequency Farming in West Africa" by Michael J support for our efforts. To date, we have and extent of fires and insect outbreaks Watts was mistakenly credited. The been successful in protecting our lan­ causing rapid decline. photograph was taken by Dr David guage and life on the land, not because of In many other areas, boreal species will Gamble in the course of his field research the mega-projects but in spite of them. fail to reproduce because of temperature in The Gamiba. We apologize for any The reason that there was any agreement and reproductive stress, and will inconvenience this may have caused. Classified

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