John Munro\’s Blog
Poetry, stories and thoughts by John MunroArchive for April, 2007
Environment and Economy
Environment
As countries like Canada try to adopt action plans to cope with the looming disasters of Climate Change and Global Warming, there seems to be confusion about what is the most important in the long run, the Economy or the Environment.
Many politicians seem to think that these critical environmental threats can besolved without much impact on the economy. There may be some modest adjustments to the economy, like changing to florescent light bulbs and tinkering with ‘intensity targets’ for industry, but after this things will more or less go on as before.
Nothing could be further from reality.
The causes of Climate Change and Global warming are the highly polluting economies of the Industralized and developing world, and nothing short of the building of new clean economies, based on clean technologies, will ameliorate the problems we face and allow us to survive on this planet. This means we have to put the Ecology of the planet first and develope economies and lifestyles to fit within these constraints. It is an enormous challenge and the ecological clock is ticking, while in Canada we still can’t agree on a plan of action.
What sort of world are our grand-children going to inherit from us?
J Munro
Letter to Hon. David Baird
Letter to the Honourable John Baird, Minister of Environment:
The Honourable John Baird
Minister of Environment
H ouse of Commons
Ottawa, ON
K1A 0A6
Dear John,
Recently I watched your meeting with the Standing Committee on the Environment on TV. I was discouraged when I realized that your position seemed to be that you were preparing a new Environmental Program for Canada that would have new targets for emissions controls, but that would not impact the Economy. I gathered from this, that your position is that the economy comes first and any environmental programs are secondary.
If this is true, then I don’t have much hope that you or the Conservative Party will do anything to significantly reduce Canada’s ongoing destruction of the environment. You may be just playing around with political window dressing in preparation for the next election. Politicians still can’t seem to get it that if we are to survive on this planet, the Environment has to come first in Government priorities, and the economy has to adapt to it. Otherwise the path of environmental destruction that the developed and developing world is presently on will just continue, and the results will be catastrophic for future generations.
Your job as Minister of the Environment is to lead the transition in Canada to an environmentally sustainable industrial and social way of life. To me, you just don’t seem to get the gravity of the situation and the enormity of the task ahead of the government and all Canadians, as responsible world citizens. This is a crisis and a time for real leadership. I hope you and Prime Minister Harper and the Government are up to the task.
The other thing I noticed is how Ministers like to announce programs in terms of how much taxpayer’s money they are spending instead of in terms of what they are going to accomplish. I hope we will see more information in terms of real goals to be accomplished (such as real reductions in carbon emissions) for money spent in future.
Sincerely yours
John A Munro
17 Fox Glove Lane
Halifax, NS
B3M 2R7
April 6, 2001
John Munro\'s Blog 