6 the Base-Load Electricity Fallacy 6 Obscenity of Carbon Trading 6 Defence Greenwash on War Games 6 Indigenous Owners Reject NT Waste Dump 6 Earth Sanctuaries
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Chain Reaction The national magazine of Friends of the Earth Australia :: www.foe.org.au 100th issue 6 The base-load electricity fallacy 6 Obscenity of carbon trading 6 Defence greenwash on war games 6 Indigenous owners reject NT waste dump 6 Earth Sanctuaries Food Sovereignty Nano-Food vs Real Food Kokatha Mula World Water Day 100th issue NEWS & VIEWS Issue #100 - August 2007 It’s Time For Food Sovereignty Indigenous Owners Reject - Joel Catchlove 12 Nuclear Waste Dump Publisher - Natalie Wasley 35 Friends of the Earth Australia, World Forum For Food Sovereignty ABN 81600610421 Declaration 16 Munda Yumadoo Iliga - Leave The Chain Reaction Team Land As It Is Jim Green, Cam Walker, Joel Catchlove Nanotechnology And Agriculture - Breony Carbines & Simon Prideaux 38 In Food Production - Which Food Layout & Design Future? International Campaign To Natalie Lowrey - Georgia Miller 17 Abolish Nuclear Weapons [email protected] - Felicity Hill 40 Thanks to: Estelle Pham, Monica Haynes Famous Moments In FoE and Sophie Green for help with this edition. History - Exposing The Agua Viva! Live Water Thanks to the thousands of people who have Uranium Cartel In 1976 - Sam Cossar-Gilbert 41 helped with Chain Reaction from the first - Wieslaw Lichacz 20 edition to the 100th! 100 Editions Of BOOKS Printing Arena Printing and Publishing, Melbourne Chain Reaction 23 Free Market Missionaries Subscriptions The Base-load Electricty Fallacy Suiting Themselves, Sharon Beder Four issues: $A22 (within Australia) - Mark Diesendorf 26 summarises her two latest books. 43 Cheques, etc payable to Chain Reaction Earth Santuaries And The Failure Clive Hamilton’s Scorcher: The Dirty Politics of Climate Change 45 Subscription Enquiries Of Market-based Conservation Chain Reaction, - Jasmin Sydee & Sharon Beder 27 Paul Cleary’s Shakedown: Australia’s PO Box 222, Fitzroy, Vic, 3065, Australia. Grab for Timor Oil 46 Ph (03) 9419 8700, Fax (03) 9416 2081 Australia’s Environment Email: [email protected] Groups Climate Change Policy Mark Diesendorf’s Greenhouse Solutions with Sustainable Energy 46 ISSN: 0312 – 1372 Agenda 30 Copyright Obscenity Of Carbon Trading REGULAR SECTIONS & UPDATES Written material in Chain Reaction is free - Kevin Smith 31 of copyright unless otherwise indicated, or where material has been reprinted from EDITORIAL 2 another source. Please acknowledge Chain Defence Greenwash On War Reaction when reprinting. Permission to Games A Toxic Lie EARTH NEWS 4 use graphic material must be obtained - Kim Stewart 33 FoE Australia NEWS 6 from the artist. FoE International NEWS 8 The opinions expressed in Chain Reaction are not necessarily those of the publishers or Chain Reaction is produced in Melbourne, INSPIRATION: Olatunde Johnson 10 any Friends of the Earth group. Adelaide and Katoomba. We acknowledge the Chain Reaction is indexed in the traditional owners of these lands and the fact Alternative Press Index. that Indigenous land has never been ceded. Friends of Chain Reaction is published three the Earth times a year. CHAIN REACTION ADVISORY BOARD Cover Image: Front cover photo by Rodney Dekker. Karen Alexander - Biodiversity campaigner [Vic] Rodney is embarking on a project to Greg Buckman - Author/Researcher [Hobart] document global warming and its effects Damian Grenfell - Globalism Centre RMIT [Melbourne] on local communities. To support this Jo Immig - National Toxics Network [Bangalow, NSW] Damien Lawson - Adviser to Greens senator, Kerry Nettle [Sydney] project or for more information contact: Binnie O’Dwyer - FoE representative [Lismore, NSW] 0412 998 173, Chris Richards - New Internationalist Magazine [Melbourne] <[email protected]> Alison Tate ACTU - International Officer [Melbourne] and visit the websites: James Whelan - Co-director of the Change Agency (activist education) <www.flickr.com/photos/rodneydekker/sets> and board member of EDO Qld [Brisbane] <www.rodneydekker.com.au>. The board provides big picture thematic and political advice to the CR editors, advice on themes for future editions, as well as helping to ensure that a PRINTED ON RECYCLED PAPER broader range of sectors/ constituencies are represented in the articles. The CR editorial team are still responsible for content, editing and design and so any problems, omissions or other failures are ours! Photo by Sam Cossar-Gilbert See World Water Day Article page 41 EDITORIAL Chain Reaction 32 years on and still going strong ________________ BY CAM WALKER In the world of community publishing, a and local groups and we have limited ability 100th edition is something to be proud of. This to further develop the financial side of the magazine started its life as the Greenpeace magazine. Pacific Bulletin in 1974 and was transformed We are now at the point where we need extra into Chain Reaction in 1975. In its time it has support for the magazine. Prior to the election been run by an incredible number of people and of the Howard government, Chain Reaction collectives and has moved between Canberra, received an annual allocation of funds from Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide. It is currently FoE Australia’s admin grant from the federal a joint venture run by people based in Adelaide, government. This is now long gone, meaning a Katoomba and Melbourne. short fall of $7,000 a year we have not been able Chain Reaction editors have always been given to make up through advertising or other sources. a large degree of freedom and Friends of the We have perhaps the most understanding Earth, Australia has seen the magazine as printers on the planet but continue to clock up being something that ‘belongs’ to the broader a non-viable debt to them. Something needs to social movement rather than just acting as the change. mouthpiece of the organisation. Several years Ideas canvassed have included making the ago, it was decided to make it more overtly a FoE magazine smaller, printing on cheaper paper, magazine: that is, as a forum for FoE opinions reducing the print run or frequency, increasing and a campaign tool for our activities. Since 2004 the cover cost, etc. We don’t want to do any of we have run special editions covering most of our these: feedback on the journal is resoundingly national campaigns and made a number of other positive. But we do need your help. Here are changes to reflect the renewed focus on FoE’s some ideas: campaigns. * we need a volunteer to take on marketing and However, we still do seek to produce a magazine possibly building up advertisements; that any progressive individual or group can * we have launched a new ‘Chain Reaction write for, and created an advisory board of supporter’ category for people who give $100 or mostly ‘external’ people to ensure diversity of more when they subscribe; interests and opinions. With the last edition we * organising with your local bookstore to stock included our first major photo essay for some the magazine; and time and, with the positive feedback to this, * giving a gift subscription to a friend, your intend to keep doing so. The magazine continues workplace or local library. to evolve. We make Chain Reaction freely You can phone us on (03) 9419 8700 or email available via the FoEA website and visits and <[email protected]> downloads continue to grow. ___________________________________________ Cam Walker is on the Chain Reaction editorial team and The core editorial team is small and composed of is a national liaison officer with Friends of the Earth, people who are busy with their own campaigns Australia. 2 Chain Reaction #100 August 2007 100th issue Anti-nuclear Activists Awarded ABOVE: Sophie Green and Joel Catchlove recieving the Jill Hudson Award for Environmental Protection from SA Minister for Environment and Conservation, Gail Cago (centre). _______________________________________________________________________________________________Photo: Friends of the Earth Adelaide. INSET: Arabunna elder Kevin Buzzacott. Photo: Jessie Boylan. Friends of the Earth Adelaide activists Sophie The awards were presented by the SA Minister Green and Joel Catchlove, together with for Environment and Conservation, Gail Gago, Arabunna elder Kevin Buzzacott, have been in a ceremony on May 19. Past winners include awarded the SA Conservation Council’s 2007 Jill members of the Kupa Piti Kungka Tjuta, a senior Hudson Award for Environmental Protection. Aboriginal women’s council, who successfully campaigned against the federal government’s The award recognises the work of South attempt to dump nuclear waste near Woomera. Australians who have made “an outstanding contribution to protecting the environment”. The annual award is in memory of Jill Hudson (1948–1997), a passionate educator who believed Sophie Green and Joel Catchlove received ‘Life is an opportunity and its purpose is to stand the award for their outstanding voluntary for something and to make a difference.’ commitment to educate and engage the general public about environmental issues and for Kevin Buzzacott was also awarded the energising the campaign against the expansion of Australian Conservation Foundation’s 2007 the nuclear industry. Peter Rawlinson Award on World Environment Day, June 5, recognising two decades of work Kevin Buzzacott recieved the award in highlighting the impacts of uranium mining recognition of his long-term campaign to protect at Roxby Downs and promoting a nuclear-free his traditional country, near Lake Eyre, from the Australia. impacts of BHP Billiton’s Roxby Downs copper- uranium mine. ___________________________________________ www.foe.org.au Chain Reaction #100 August 2007 3 earth news EARTH NEWS COMPILED BY MONICA HAYNES Denmark builds world’s Norway, the world’s number five oil of the total energy consumption across largest offshore wind exporter, has also joined the carbon the bloc by 2020. The current level is farm neutral race, and wants to cut its net 6-7%. The Commission also committed greenhouse gas emissions to zero to a target of cutting European Union Denmark has built the world’s largest by 2050. Under the plan, domestic greenhouse gas emissions by at least offshore wind farm, generating 160 emissions would be offset by cuts 20% by 2020 from 1990 levels, rising to megawatts of power.