Alternatives Journal articles from June 1997

Alternatives Journal archives from June 1997

Wolves may get Rhum. (wolf reintroduction in Rhum, Scotland)
June 22, 1997... Wolf reintroductions continue to breed controversy and even have some conservationists howling. One UK proposal centres on Rhum, a remote island off the west coast of Scotland. The island, a National Nature Reserve, has a small native Inner...

Clayoquot inventories creating false sense of scientific security. (Clayoquot Sound, Canada)
June 22, 1997... MacMillan Bloedel's temporary suspension of logging in the Clayoquot Sound area has not ended concerns about the future of the rainforest watersheds. International Forest Products is continuing to log in disturbed watersheds, (valleys where...

The VCR doesn't work; Canada's voluntary programme for climate change prevention is not doing the job. (Voluntary Challenge and Registry)
June 22, 1997... Canada's programme for climate change prevention is not working. Canada will not meet its target for greenhouse gas stabilization by the year 2000 and the failure seems largely due to the country's reliance on voluntary initiatives. Canada has...

Still the worst: an ambitious clean-up scheme failed and a cover-it-over fix was rejected, so it's back to square one for the Sydney tar ponds. (Sydney, Australia)
June 22, 1997... Canada's most toxic waste site is going to remain that way for a while longer. After a succession of unsuccessful studies, plans and experiments stretching back to 1980, a new committee is starting from scratch to identify clean-up solutions for...

Nukes aren't green; international judges stress ecological concerns in ruling on the legality of nuclear weapons.
June 22, 1997... International law has edged a little further toward rejecting nuclear weapons and accepting environmental responsibility as a significant constraint on human actions. The advances have come in an International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruling on...

The first little pig was right; Kim Thompson's straw bale house is sturdy and cheap.
June 22, 1997... Once upon a time, there were three little pigs, each with equal capital and access to resources. Despite sibling protests, one smart pig built a house out of straw with R-40 walls and a price tag of less than $25,000 for the entire 140 square...

Companies covet genes; ethics and profits compete in the patenting of human genetic materials.
June 22, 1997... A heated debate over the patenting of genetic material from a man in Papua New Guinea has led to an initiative that may improve the ethics of genetic research, especially where indigenous people are involved. On March 14, 1995 the US National...

Demanding good wood: some current approaches to forest certification are dubious merit, and even the best have significant limitations.
June 22, 1997... Environmental activists have found that nothing catches an industry's attention as successfully as a threat to sales. When unsustainable forestry practices in the world's tropical regions attracted attention in the 1980s, activists in some...

Forest Stewardship Council: Principles of Forest Management.
June 22, 1997... Compliance with laws and FSC principles Forest management shall respect all applicable laws of the country In which they occur, and international treaties and agreements to which the country is a signatory, and comply with all FSC Principles...

Canadian Council of Forest Ministers: criteria and critical elements.
June 22, 1997... Conservation of biological diversity Biological diversity is conserved by maintaining the variability of living organisms and the complexes of which they are part. * Ecosystem diversity is conserved if the variety and landscape-level...

Pacific Certification Council: principles.
June 22, 1997... Principle #1: Focus on what to leave, not on what to take.Timber managers must first identify the parts of a forest stand and forest landscape that need protection in order to maintain short- and long-term forest functioning. Only after this is...

Free nature. (interview with philosopher Arne Naess about nature, social justice and strategies for change)
June 22, 1997... In 1973, Norwegian philosopher Ame Naess published a short summary of a lecture entitled "The Shallow and the Deep, Long-range Ecology Movements." It was there that he coined the term "deep ecology" and summarized his view that all beings have...

Knowing home: NisGa'a traditional knowledge and wisdom improve environmental decision making.
June 22, 1997... The knowledge and wisdom of ancient and contemporary indigenous peoples, especially their traditional ecological knowledge of specific home-places, represents a treasure trove of important but historically neglected environmental knowledge and...

Conservation of indigenous knowledge serves conservation of biodiversity.
June 22, 1997... Indigenous ecological knowledge represents an invaluable data base that provides humankind with insights on how communities have interacted with their changing environment, including both domesticated and wild species of plants and animals....

Valuing Local Knowledge: Indigenous People and Intellectual Property Rights.
June 22, 1997... Reviewed by Linda Nowlan Can intellectual property rights, the Western legal regime of copyrights, patents and other tools used to protect knowledge-based innovations, protect indigenous peoples' traditional knowledge of nature as well as...

When Corporations Rule the World.
June 22, 1997... Reviewed by Sally Lerner There is an increasing tension in Canada between the belief that the market must rule no matter how many vulnerable people are harmed, and an uneasy sense that as a society we are losing what really matters. An ancient...

Get a Life!
June 22, 1997... Reviewed by Sally Lerner There is an increasing tension in Canada between the belief that the market must rule no matter how many vulnerable people are harmed, and an uneasy sense that as a society we are losing what really matters. An ancient...

The Working Centre: Experiment in Social Change.
June 22, 1997... Reviewed by Sally Lerner There is an increasing tension in Canada between the belief that the market must rule no matter how many vulnerable people are harmed, and an uneasy sense that as a society we are losing what really matters. An ancient...

Population, Consumption and the Environment: Religious and Secular Responses.
June 22, 1997... Reviewed by Louise Fabiani "The historic roots of our ecological crisis," according to Lynn White, Jr. in a 1967 paper, are in the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament. Since that paper appeared, its many citations have indicated an overemphasis...

The Green Corporation: The Next Competitive Advantage.
June 22, 1997... Reviewed by Gary Gallon The Green Corporation, a primer for corporate executives, is one of the "new economy" environment business books that have blossomed in the 1990s. It is not as insightful or provoking as Paul Hawken's The Ecology of...