at what point does environmentalism become ’stopping economic development for other nations’?
Interesting article here from Mark Mardell on the BBC Website, on Romania and problems regarding development versus conservationism/environmentalism - while its not the main thrust of the article these few paragraphs made me pause;
It’s a bit passé to call environmentalists “conservationists” but it’s a good word. Many do want to conserve the status quo. All three of the special habitats I looked at were, to a greater or lesser extent, created by man. Most of the environment in Europe is made what it is by farming. But at what point do we shout: “Freeze!”
Doubtless, environmentalists would have wanted to stop the British enclosure system which gave us the hedgerows and their birds. No doubt much was lost even earlier, when grasslands were ploughed up for farm land. What marine species were lost when Holland was rescued from the sea?
On my visit to Andalucia I asked Guido Schmidt of WWF whether in 50 years’ time his successors would be arguing to save the strawberry farms because a rare sort of butterfly had learnt to thrive on them. He laughed, and said that technology had reached such a pitch, and such fundamental changes could be made by man, that what was left untouched had to be saved.