Editorial: The Forests that Burn
12/27/97
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Headline: Editorial: The Forests that Burn
Source: The National
Date: 12/27/97
ACCORDING to the World Wide Fund for Nature, more forests have
been burnt this year than in any other year in recorded history.
Several million hectares were burnt, mostly in Indonesia and
Brazil, but also in Papua New Guinea, Colombia, Peru, Tanzania,
Kenya, Rwanda and the Congo, not to mention Greece, Spain, Italy
and France. And, of course, Australia. The organisation naturally
emphasises the loss of habitat and threat to endangered species.
But the impact of the fires is much wider.
Globalisation has overtaken the economies of most countries,
touching their agricultural and environmental policies. A forest
burns and the world is concerned, not just for the harm to people
immediately affected, or wildlife, but also - and perhaps more so
- for the impact it might have on the global environment.
The Climate Change Convention in Kyoto earlier this month
reflected this global concern. The destruction of trees adds to
the problem of global warming; trees that are preserved - or
better still, young and growing - help counter the problem.
Australia, justifiably suspicious of a climate change convention
first drafted to suit an unrepresentative coalition of nations
attending the Kyoto conference, argued for, among other things,
credit for its contribution to reducing the effects of global
warming through the growth and regrowth of forests and through
land clearance policies conducive to the preservation of trees as
"sinks" for the main greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide. Having won
this argument in Kyoto, Australia now faces the task of giving
proper effect to the implied commitment to do more to arrest the
destruction of trees which might help reduce carbon dioxide and
so global warming.
What does this mean down on the farm? In NSW, there are laws
limiting farmers' right to remove trees. But such measures,
arising from general conservation concerns, do not necessarily
mesh with Australia's commitment in Kyoto to curb and counter
carbon emissions. More specific measures, not just for NSW, but
in nationally applicable legislation, will be required if
Australia is to deal seriously with its Kyoto commitments. There
is no reason why farmers should bear any additional cost involved
in meeting Australia's national commitments to greenhouse goals,
which it promised to do through changed land clearance policies.
It is possible that some useful measures can be taken at no cost
to farmers. But if there is a cost, it should be met by the
Australian taxpayers generally, as part of the national
commitment to help solve a global problem.
It will not be simple to determine what precise measures -
including, presumably, incentives for, and compensation to,
farmers - should be taken to help meet Australia's greenhouse
commitments. And even if Australia pulls its weight in this one
small area of effort needed to meet the challenge of global
warming, there will be other countries which do not. And so one
of the ghosts of Kyoto will come back to haunt those who shaped
the global warming agreement there. Australia was unfairly
criticised in Kyoto for wanting developing countries - big
contributors to the problem already and rapidly becoming bigger -
included in the climate change agreement. Now Australia must
adopt land management strategies with the Kyoto agreement in
mind. But what is to be done about the fires that ravage the
world, not the accidental ones, but those, especially in
developing countries, which are part of deliberate land clearance
policies contrary to the Kyoto goals?
Guns buyback
THE hostile reaction by the NSW Shooters Party MLC, John Tingle,
to the guns buyback figures released on Christmas Day is an
attempt to maintain the interests of a gun culture that has been
severely discredited by the Port Arthur tragedy. The final figure
for guns handed in under the Commonwealth scheme by the October
deadline is 643,238. About $315 million has been paid to owners
of weapons that have been surrendered. According to Mr Tingle,
though, the buyback has been a total failure, with vast numbers
of shooters flouting the new gun laws and defying fines of up to
$5,500 and a possible 10 years in jail if they are found to be in
possession of banned firearms. This is an argument, however, that
disregards the huge number of weapons that have been returned (in
many cases, admittedly, with extreme reluctance) and the
widespread community hostility to further manifestations of the
gun culture.
The figures indicate that NSW had the worst return of guns, with
a rate of 2.54 guns handed in for every 100 people. Only the ACT
recorded a smaller rate, with 1.8 guns being handed in for every
100 people. But even these figures are quite high, given the
efforts of the gun lobby to discredit the buyback scheme. Before
the national hand-back scheme was put in place, too, few people
in the cities, where the need for privately owned guns except for
sporting purposes does not exist, would have been aware of the
great number of weapons available throughout Australia.
The report indicates that there will an expected surplus of about
$170 million from the increase in the Medicare levy that funded
the buyback scheme. There is a strong case for using some of this
money to fund a concerted effort to clean out the recalcitrants
Mr Tingle is supporting. Other parts of this surplus, too, should
go towards making the registration procedures run by the States
as efficient and effective as they can be made.
The policy behind this use of at least part of the surplus is
that the buyback scheme was never intended to be an end in
itself. It was part of a package of reforms all designed to
utilise the national revulsion of the gun ethic that rose up
after the Port Arthur tragedy. The point of the package was to
prevent another tragedy. With the handing in of an enormous
number of guns, the need now is for strong registration
procedures to prevent a new stockpile growing.
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