TRANSCRIPT
(1,167 words, slightly edited for clarity):
What is the most significant environmental
change since the Rio Earth Summit?
Climate change has moved ahead much faster than one ever
would have predicted ten years ago!
What about the whole security aspects
of this? Why do the military authorities not understand that the
major threats are from environmental and ecological sources? Is
it not time for the global military institutions to really start
looking at spending their money on addressing these underlying causes
that lead to war and social unrest?
It is of course not just the military. The military has
perhaps a rather restrained view of the world, since their job is
just to do war or protect from war. I think that restrained vision
should be changed, at the levels of Governments and Heads of State.
We know that environmental security is intrinsically linked with
effects that could lead to war. We have been talking about water
wars for a long time, but today we are seeing the conflict –
even in the negotiations here, where people don't want to agree
on a trans-boundary river approach. That's a clear signal that something
is wrong. But there are other aspects. We have seen also positive
things. I remember less than two years ago we had a summit in Bucharest
where nine Heads of State came together and talked about common
management of their river basin. All of them said that their interest
was regional stability, that was the reason they were doing it.
What a nice proof of the fact that natural resource management could
lead to more stability and less military intervention!
How serious have the effects of agribusiness
and intensive agriculture been on biodiversity in the world, and
in Europe, in your view?
Well, intensification of agriculture of course has had
a whole variety of disastrous environmental effects, particulary
on water use. 70% of the accessible freshwater is used in agriculture
for irrigation. That alone tells you the story. And often, freshwater
use is actually linked also to the chemical input into agriculture;
it's a sign of intensification which often goes along with the use
of pesticides and fertilisers. So while we are not saying the world
will not need more food production, it is a good question where
the future will lie. There are terrible side-effects of pesticide
use. For example, there are stockpiles in Africa which are a real
danger; there are thousands of tons of redundant chemicals lying
around on open ground in Africa, which need to be cleared under
the Stockpile Agreement. Other effects of course are the POPs, the
persistent organic pollutants that you find anywhere in the Arctic,
and Arctic populations are particularly badly affected. So these
are some of the trade-offs of agriculture intensification.
How do you feel about the use and testing
of genetically modified living organisms?
Well, the truth of the matter is that genetically modified
food crops are increasingly being used. There is a very rapid growth
of application of some genetically modified food crops already.
It has obviously been a concern of conservation organisations like
ours that the release of genetically modified organisms could have
a negative impact on biodiversity. We have seen certain signs of
cross-pollination which can effect biodiversity. And we believe
that world-wide, the safeguards have not been put in place, quite
contrary to what most people believe.
What are the issues that you think
are most important for the general public to consider, now that
we are going into the 21st century?
OK. If we want to eradicate poverty, through sustainable
development, this is interlinked: you cannot do poverty eradication
if you're not serious in terms of sustainable development. You need
to analyse carefully what limits sustainable development, and in
every analysis you will see that macro-economic issues are the source
of it! Trade issues, questions of subsidies, market access; all
of these factors have a chilling effect on sustainable development.
This is the reason why this summit here in Johannesburg was actually
called, that we would look to addressing these problems, the limitations
for sustainable development. And it is so sad to see that the world
government community is unable to do anything about it! And therefore,
the prospects for sustainable development, and for poverty alleviation,
are very limited.
How do you imagine the world fifty
years from now?
Well this is a hard prediction, but we know that fifty
years from now, as the WWF Living Planet Report shows, what we call
the ecological footprint will be twice as high as what can be regenerated.
It will increase tremendously, at current trends of course, in the
next 50 years. I think the pressure for the world community to address
questions of sustainable development will rise, there is no way
around it! Otherwise the suffering will not just be in developing
countries, it will also increasingly affect industrialised countries.
You cannot just withdraw into national boundaries! Quite ironically,
we were accused some years ago of wanting to put humanity back into
caves, while in fact we have made contributions to sustainable development.
Now you see governments withdrawing into their national caves, as
if they could live on islands...
What about changes in the European
Common Agricultural Policy (CAP)? Will they realistically make it
easier for a revival of organic farming?
The reform of the Common Agricultural Policy is of course
a very important one – we have always been on it – and
the subsidy structure. Not to say that agriculture in Europe and
elsewhere could do without the subsidies, but the redirection of
subsidies in the direction of less harmful agricultural practices
and furthering organic agriculture could be an important aim. I
know, for example, Swiss mountain agriculture very well. There is
no way a Swiss mountain peasant could, just from his own products,
live from it. They will have to rely on some sort of subsidies,
be they called direct payments or whatever. So it's more a question
that the objective of these subsidy structures is quite clear. And
the potential for organic agriculture is great! I'm seeing it in
my own home country, where organic agriculture has become a real
market factor.
Finally, just a few words on biodiversity.
What is the rate of species loss, and at what point does it become
a serious problem for ecological stability?
Species loss is a very difficult measure, simply because
we do not know how many species there are on the planet, and because
we have very rudimentary data on the actual loss off species currently,
despite all the red data books of IUCN. What we know better is the
decrease of the natural wealth, as we measure it with the Living
Planet Index, which has diminished by about 35% over the last 30
years, and that is a measure of the abundance of all those animal
and plant populations for which we have such long-term data. And
that's a pretty shocking decrease. It's worst in freshwater ecosystems
and in the marine environment.
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