sust-mar: deja vu all over again

From: "Don Black" <dblack@chebucto.ns.ca>
To: <sust-mar@chebucto.ca>
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 01:33:08 -0300
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Dear friends

The stew that's currently brewing about helicopter spraying the herbicide
Vision in Nova Scotia woodlands gives me a strong sense of deja vu since I
was writing about this issue for The Scotia Sun, a weekly newspaper in Port
Hawkesbury, exactly 20 years ago last month.

Since then, I've come to the opinion that the real battle is about the
destruction of our remaining woodland at the least possible cost to the
corporations who are doing it.

Cheap application of toxic chemicals is only one component of a systematic,
on-going program of cooperation between Nova Scotia governments and powerful
corporations to convert large parcels of Nova Scotia woodlands to industrial
tree farms.

The program goes like this: clearcut, so it's "efficient" to use heavy
harvesting machinery, and to spray from helicopters. Plant a softwood
monoculture. Spray a herbicide to suppress all competition (diversity).
Later, spray pesticides to kill the insects that will thrive on the
monoculture. In 30-60 years, cut and chip, so as little as possible is left
to nourish the soil. Re-plant and repeat. When growth rates fall, abandon.

In the end, just as in the fishery, we lose both the jobs and the resource.

The point of using Vision is to help engineer a monoculture, a tree farm
designed to meet the corporations' need for the cheapest possible access to
the raw materials basic to their profits. It's cheaper to harvest from a
tree farm than selectively from a mixed woodlot.

Spraying chemicals from helicopters is cheaper than paying trained
silviculture workers to remove competing species selectively with a brush
saw.

In both cases, "cheaper" means fewer jobs in the woods.

Because this program is already in place, regardless of whether Vision is
used in the present situation, woodlands all over Nova Scotia are right now
being systematically destroyed. Worse, the fragile underlying ecology that
produced what was once a great mixed forest, is itself being destroyed by
clearcutting, an unsustainable level of extraction, roads, machine tracks,
erosion, stream damage, elimination of diversity and contamination with
toxic chemicals.

The net loss to the public from the value of the original woodland is nearly
total. In my opinion, it is in no way in the public interest to support this
corporate agenda; government that supports the agenda is not acting in the
best interests of the people of the province.

I think the health issues around pouring more toxic chemicals into our
environment are now much more widely understood than they were in 1984, yet
for twenty years, we have heard Nova Scotian government ministers repeat the
big lie: that glyphosate-based herbicides like Roundup and Vision are "safe"
. They are not. They are toxic chemicals, and for that reason are approved
for use by the federal government only under clearly defined conditions.

However, it is the responsibility of the provincial government to provide
and enforce the regulations that govern the actual use of toxic chemicals in
agriculture and forestry, to ensure the level of public safety prescribed by
Health Canada. Trust evaporates when government promotes an industry agenda
over sound precautionary public health policy.

It is absurd to speak of the "safety" of spreading chemicals in the
environment when we have literally no idea what new compounds they may form
with other chemicals they encounter, nor of the damage those new compounds
may cause.

And the question has to arise as to why governments and the departments
concerned would still be supporting the use of these chemicals, in spite of
a history of significant public opposition that goes back at least 20 years,
and at a time when the public generally has become more aware of the health
costs of toxic loading on the environment?

By now, we're all familiar with the concept of "following the money". Who
profits if the chemicals are used?

Monsanto, the manufacturer of Vision for sure, not so much for one large
sale, but for the precedent, the ability to say, "Well, they're using our
product in Nova Scotia", and of course for the prospect that this will more
and more become the kind of chemical-dependent "forestry" we do here in Nova
Scotia.

The helicopter companies that profit by spraying the chemicals are also
large corporations tied into the aerospace industry and equally interested
in assuring future income.

Then of course there are the modern timber barons of the world who operate
in Nova Scotia, like the Irving family of New Brunswick, and the Swedish
giant Stora Enso (originally Stora Kopparberg, the oldest corporation in the
world, founded 200 years before Columbus "discovered" America, with sales of
EUR 12.2 billion in 2003).

All of these--and more--large, powerful and wealthy corporations can reduce
their costs if the Nova Scotia government continues to support the
destruction of Nova Scotia woodlands by conversion to industrial tree farms.

Using helicopter spraying of toxic chemicals that kill insects, plants and
fish and suppress diversity is only one part of a bigger, and much more
threatening picture. To be realistic, the leverage of these multinational
corporations, the kinds of influence they can bring to bear on politicians
and the public service, can be overwhelming.

Individuals in the public service who oppose the industry program need clear
and significant expression of public opposition to the corporate agenda to
help them resist corporate pressure.

The widest public support might be gained by relating sustainable, diverse
woodlands to the quality of life we want for ourselves, and the
opportunities we want for our children.

Diverse, sustainably-managed woodlands can provide employment, fuel, timber
for sale, building materials, a habitat for wildlife and birds, and a place
of peace, relaxation, and recreation indefinitely into the future. There is
at least one woodlot in Nova Scotia (Windhorse Farm) that's been doing all
these things for well over 150 years, that still has the same amount of
standing timber as it had when records were first kept. A tree farm provides
only cheap fodder for the mills, leaving desolation behind.

People and their organizations stopped the spray in the eighties, and their
influence on public awareness and government policy has persisted. But the
corporate drive to minimize costs is also persistent. So for me the
challenge in 2004 is to expand our goal, and make it our business to
communicate all this to the general public and to our children in a
meaningful way, so that 20 years from now, they'll have been able to move on
to much more creative concerns.

Any suggestions or assistance will be gratefully considered. And thanks to
all those who are working so hard-again-to bring this to public attention.
Cheers.

Don Black
Bluedoor.chebucto.net







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