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Index of Subjects David, David, David (Disclosure: my funding comes from WWF, and I was involved in the WWF SOEP presentations, but only minimally on the marine side.) On Thu, 29 Oct 1998, David M. Wimberly wrote: > An example of how taking the "strategic" position (like trading land for > birds' lives) can work disastrously was in the way that the World Wildlife > Fund tried to negotiate with the Sable gas corporations for protection of > the Gully. The WWF refrained from harsh international criticizm of the > project overall believing this gave them a better negotiating position. You're making the assumption that WWF's real position was the same as yours, and that a strategic error was made. The implications of your first statement are wrong. Your second statement is false. > The result is that the project went through and there is a feeding frenzy > going on among the multi-national corporations to put in more and more gas > and oil projects in the area. > You are implying that if WWF had expressed harsh international criticism of the project that it would not have gone through. Sorry, WWF just doesn't carry that weight. > And the protection for the Gully is very weak at best and more likely > tenuous or even illusionary. > > The Gully is some of the most important habitat on the edge of the > continental shelf, but it is not protected really even as a space and > pollution will increasingly threaten it. > > For instance, global warming brought on by burning fossil fuels - like > natural gas - is projected to dump increasing levels of pollutants into the > water and change water temperature through melting glaciers. The habitat > could be ruined, even if the actual space itself is not drilled in. But > even that is not guaranteed. > I agree with the above three paras > So trading land for not opposing pollution is a sad, misguided policy that > has resulted in great and avoidable harm. It also discredits the > environmental movement. > Sorry, there is a conclusion here that does not follow from either the facts of the SOEP proceedure or the information claimed here. No deals were made. WWF opposed what it thought was in it's mandate to oppose, and what it had the time and expertise to prepare. (This was perhaps less than we would have liked, but that is a different issue.) > Government and industry love having "environmental" groups who will > necotiate in this way. It allows the grassroots groups to be marginalized > and deals cut that benefit those who profit by non-sustainable consumption > and pollution. > I don't for an instance claim WWF as 'grasroots'. However there is a disturbing trend in this thread to imply that those of the same priorities and opinions as I are environmentalists, while those who somehow differ in priorities, emphasis or approach are just masquerading as such. > David Wimberly > ag487@chebucto.ns.ca > Halifax, Nova Scotia Colin Stewart
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