Who’s Copping It ? The other side of climate change

by Patricia Melander

The price of food

There seems to be complete disconnect between power and the elites and the people who provide our food. Because of this chasm, governments’ uninformed interventions, and their increasing use of a new ‘green authoritarianism’, grave mistakes are being made.

Something of this rift has always existed. The Chinese leader Mao Tzedong decided in the late 1950s to slaughter all sparrows as part of the ‘four pest campaign’ during the ‘Great Leap Forward’. The birds were suspected of consuming many kilos of grain but after a brutal campaign an ornithologist intervened to explain that they also ate numerous pests. It was too late and their demise had resulted in a surge in insects, which in turn led to the destruction of crops, exacerbating the Great Chinese Famine.

The ill-informed decree that farmers in Sri Lanka should suddenly stop using fertilizers, amid an economic crisis was no doubt linked to financial issues but also aimed at pleasing the UN and the Anglo sphere with their ‘net zero’ obsession. However, it didn’t go as planned and the result was catastrophic with low yield in all the important sectors. We know what happened next!

In India, Punjabi farmers were given hastily produced ordinances which seemed aimed at handing over crops into corporate hands and weakening the minimum support price. This led to massive protests for over a year but after rounds of negotiations and much public support, the laws were stayed then repealed. Farmers are still being harshly fined for ‘stubble burning’ for which they have no choice due to the mindless interdiction to plant during the dry season.

The Netherlands are the second largest exporters of agricultural produce in the world, with a strong agrarian and livestock sector, consequently the tyrannical decision to clamp down on so called ‘nitrogen pollution’ seems ludicrous The Dutch government following EU directives set unrealistic targets to halve the nitrogen by 2030. This would cause farmers to drastically decrease livestock and lead to the closure of 30% of farms. If they do not comply land can be bought forcibly. They have been protesting for three years.

Bill McKibben, author of ‘The End of Nature’ speaks emotionally about the ‘destruction of nature’, ‘there is no part of the world that humans have not treaded’ he says. But like many climate activists, he believes that the world would be a better place without humans, that nature is a benign God. Nature is a savage place, full of danger and threats, tamed by us humans and by farmers who have little social standing and no voice. It has always been tough to make a living from growing crops and raising animals and the rate of suicide in this sector the world over is soaring.

It’s not that there shouldn’t be reviews and reforms in agriculture. Dealing with the over production of rice in India, the harvesting of water, potential alternatives to pesticides, diversification but these reforms take time and need negotiation and I would argue that hasty ‘green alternatives’ always by governments, remote to the issues do not work; farmers know best.

A Festival of Narcissism

The COP or Conference of Parties is the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change is part of the problem these days. COP is in its 27th year with two hundred countries coming together annually to discuss how to tackle climate change i.e. the rise in temperature on the planet. Attendees are country leaders, NGOs the EU, powerful individuals such as Bill Gates; it is significant that Russia and China, two of the biggest countries on earth have always abstained. Besides a great deal of hype, there seems to be little significant scientific data, and a great lack of diversity of opinions or debate. In nearly 30 years, COP has brought little to the table in terms of practical solutions.

Furthermore, participants continue to arrive in cavalcades of diesel guzzling luxury cars and on private planes; it is a revelry of luxury and emotion rather than results of pragmatism and science. . Michael Shellenberger, US author of ‘Apocalypse Never’ calls the event ‘a festival of narcissism’. It seems ever more hypocritical and the only outcomes, draconian new initiatives. To add to the scepticism, corporate globalist companies often promote such events and can be seen to use this role to ‘green wash’* their nefarious activities.

It is unbearably ironic for example, that Coca Cola sponsored COP 27 in Egypt last year and although the company claims to be working towards ‘zero carbon emissions by 2050’, its rhetoric does not count for much on the ground. In Uganda, rivers and the Victoria Lake are filling up with single use plastic bottles, in Kerala India Coca Cola has a dark history relating to the massive use of ground water and polluting of wells which has led to factories being closed.

Its sugar laden beverage is not exactly salubrious and the company, like other big globalist corporates has been linked to health problems and obesity. Nestlé (Milo) and Ikea, the Scandinavian furniture giant also engage in such green washing, i.e. the use of PR to persuade customers they they are environmentally friendly and compassionate.The most dangerous people in history were motivated by the desire to do good as they understood it. Konstantin Kisin, the Russian/British author and satirist made this statement in an article

Today we could say this of climate activists whose activities are more infuriating than effective; in Europe for example, the destruction of artworks, blocking of busy public roads, damage to buildings and petrol stations garner little support from Joe public who often links them to elitists protesting for a vague cause in ‘laid back’ western societies, funded by philanthropic billionaires such as the US Climate Emergency Fund which includes Aileen Getty (granddaughter of Getty, the oil baron!)

One such organisation in the UK, ‘Just Stop Oil’ with a typical lack of resolve and eloquence wants to stop all exploration for fossil fuels (or fracking). This is rather naïve as 75% of UK’s electricity is dependent on them and even a reduction would cause a serious slowing down of the system. Furthermore fossil fuels could be imported from other countries, something that already happens when so called ‘green’ governments want to avoid criticism.

The great ‘Greenpeace’ of the 1980s who helped ban whaling and nuclear testing in the Pacific by its courageous interventions are now criticised by their former president Patrick Moore for ‘peddling fake narratives and drunk science’ and for their vociferous campaign against chlorine (used to kill bacteria in water.) Suffice to say that public support for this new eco-terrorism is diminishing ; campaigns are hated by many for their disdain for ordinary peoples’ lives, the manipulation of science, increasing nihilism and Malthusianism; a belief that the human population growing more rapidly than the food supply will lead to our demise.

(To be continued next week)

From the book of the same name by Patricia Melander, 2022
Bio: Patricia Melander is from England but has lived and worked extensively in other countries in the field of education, and journalism; she presently lives in Sri Lanka.