The Big Picture
The myopic pilots of planet Earth
The Earth seen from Apollo 17, source: NASA
Spaceship Earth (Boulding 1966), blue and beautiful, is majestically rotating around the sun. The universe seems peaceful - no major sun storms, no exploding supernovae close by, no sign of attacking Klingons or Yuuzhan Vongs. Kind Jupiter is catching most of the big asteroids with its gravity. The small debris that still reaches the blue planet's atmosphere is burned off by friction.
But the peaceful picture is deceptive. Earth is in deep trouble, its wonderful, but fragile biosphere is under attack. The planet's predicament is not caused by mighty physical forces. A rather small half-wit monkey who appeared to be harmless and weak, has managed to escape the laboratory of evolution(). It quickly usurped control of the Blue Spaceship, taking it on a wild and dangerous ride.
At present, this monkey who calls itself modestly Homo sapiens is clearly enjoying itself, making myriads of babies, populating every habitable corner of the space vehicle and voraciously eating out the planetary larder. Life is brilliant for the conquerors, especially since they discovered the goodies stowed in the cellars of Earth, such as aquifers, metals, coal, oil, gas or uranium.
But how long can Earth’s stores still provide for the quickly growing hordes of aggressive and greedy primates?
There is a little detail that has great consequences, the new pilots of Spaceship Earth are totally myopic! They have no concerns about the future consequences of their current consumption orgy.
Their carelessness is enhanced by their religion. All Sapiens believe in the Almighty God of Eternal Economic Growth. The high priests of this creed, the economists (3), teach the gospel to all people: Growth is limitless, follow the One God faithfully and the Great Party on Earth will never end.
Sadly, Sapiens is waging a merciless war against nature, has already exterminated many of its planetary cohabitants and a much worse extinction wave can be expected for the next decades. A single evolutionary adaptation mechanism has become more relevant for survival than all others taken together: be useful for Sapiens or die! A few slave species that provide food, fuel or fibre for the voracious monkeys have reached enormous population sizes. For most of the other species, the future is looking bleak.
The longer the myopic monkey is in control of the planet, the more precarious the situation is becoming. Sapiens is already severely stressing the basic life support systems. It uses the natural resources much faster than they can be replenished. And Earth's air, soil and water have to bear a rapidly increasing load of anthropogenic waste products, be it climate gases, nitrogen overshoot or plastic garbage.
The consumption and destruction cycles are turning faster and faster. The Sapiens are driven by limitless greed. They only know "more, more, more". Human consumption of planetary resources is accelerating every year, every month, every day (4).
Driving at high speeds without seeing where one is going, is a perfect recipe for disaster. What will be the future course of the Blue Planet? Will the predatory Sapiens steer the gentle Blue Ship right into disaster? Will human civilization end in ecological collapse and planetary resource war? Or is there still hope for more sustainable ways of living?
Maybe, there is hope. In the last years, a youth movement has gained momentum that is looking far further into the future than to the next quarterly business reports or the next elections. In most countries, the movement it is called Fridays for Future, in others Youth Strike for Climate. The youngsters are linking the demand to stop planetary destruction with the ethical imperative of intergenerational equity.
One of the most important tasks of the young activists is to try to put corrective glasses on the noses of the ruling myopic monkeys. Another is to challenge the irrational religious dogma of limitless economic growth on a limited planet. A third is to make the voice of scientists heard who struggle to exclude bias to find the best solutions for problems - in striking contrast to a social environment that has been called post-factual and where "the truth" is just what the rich and powerful declare it to be.
We would like to support these efforts with humble contributions of insights and information on the agriculture, biodiversity and climate nexus.
Sources
Boulding, Kenneth E. "The economics of the coming spaceship earth" http://arachnid.biosci.utexas.edu/courses/THOC/Readings/Boulding_SpaceshipEarth.pdf
Environmental Quality Issues in a Growing Economy (1966)
The metaphor of apes running wild in the laboratory of evolution was first used by Ronald Wright in his book "A short history of progress" (2004)
"Anyone who believes that exponential growth can go on forever in a finite world is either a madman or an economist." Kenneth E. Boulding
https://futureearth.org/2015/01/16/the-great-acceleration/
How everything is linked to everything else
Ten largest inter-regional flows of CO2 emissions embodied in international trade (Mt/y), Liu, X.. et al. (2017)
In 02 March 2018, EURACTIV France published a short article on the impact of refattened European powdered milk on milk markets of Sub-Saharan Africa.
"...Since the end of [EU] milk quotas, but also with the decline of milk consumption in Europe, the sector is looking for new opportunities in Asia and also in Africa.
For the EU, the end of the 2015 quota system has allowed dairy farmers to set their own production levels and this has resulted in greater market volatility and tougher competition, along with surplus production despite the support mechanisms set up by Brussels.
As a result, European milk is now found as milk powder sold at unbeatable prices in Africa, in direct competition with the local output. Since 2009, skim milk powder exports have increased three-fold according to a study published by Oxfam and SOS Faim.
“What is happening in Africa? We export our overabundant stocks as powdered milk and kill off local agriculture” said the Belgian socialist MEP, Marc Tarabella.
“Our real problem is the skimmed powdered milk, then refattened with palm oil, which is a lot cheaper than local milk and therefore kills off local production,” said Diallo. The supply costs for European milk powder are clearly lower than local milk, which requires transport and processing..."
In a nutshell, this report is linking many different stories. Apart from the main story told in this article, there are several implicit ones. Taken together, they span four continents: South America, Asia, Europe and Africa.
South America
Despite decades of protests, every year, primary forests in South America are cut down and burned to make way for cattle and cultivation of animal feed. The most species-rich habitats of the planet and the richest standing carbon stocks are destroyed. Indigenous Peoples lose their livelihoods. The beef and the animal feed from countries like Brazil, Argentina or Paraguay are exported to Asia and Europe. The Profits from agricultural exports mostly benefit a very small elite of large landowners.
Southeast Asia
In Southeast Asia, especially in Indonesia and Malaysia, rainforests are logged and burned and huge oil palm plantations are established. The native peat forests of Indonesia store two and a half times more carbon than an oil palm plantation. The loss of biodiversity is even more appalling than in South America because so little forest is left. The palm oil is exported to East Asia, Africa and Europe. Palm oil is the most consumed vegetable oil and is found in half of all packaged products, from shampoo and lipstick to ice-cream and refattened milk.
Europe
In Europe, high-performance "turbo" cows are fed like pigs, with grains and oil seeds, and produce huge amounts of milk. Europeans can't consume all those dairy products, so part of them are exported to Africa. European farmers are heavily subsidized, they can sell their agricultural commodities below production price and thereby inflict economic injury upon other countries. However, the subsidies are mostly for the largest farms - "whosoever hath, to him shall be given"(Matthew 13:12) - so small and medium-sized farms only have the choice of growing or giving up.
Sub-Saharan Africa
African farmers try to adapt to the often unfair competitive situation on the world market. Some follow the economic imperative of "grow or die", they enlarge their farms by converting ever more precious natural landscapes into pastures and fields. Demographic change has not yet reached Africa, the population will double until 2050, which will put enormous stress on natural and farm lands. Many Africans move to the cities in search of non-agricultural jobs. Others try their luck on the dangerous migration path to Europe.
China
Although apparently far from the locations of these stories, what happens in China influences nearly all planetary food and feed flows. China is both a major exporter and a major importer of food. What and how the Chinse population consumes and produces is shaping the global food production, the degree of climate change and the survival chances of much of Earth's biodiversity.
International trade and money flows link the entire world. Embedded in globalized trade are virtual carbon, water or nitrogen flows. The COVID-19-virus was carried by travellers around the world in no time.
Everything is linked to everything else.
Some of these linkages shall be explored in upcoming stories.
Sources
Whosoever hath, to him shall be given, Matthew 13:12
https://www.kingjamesbibleonline.org/Matthew-13-12/
Liu, X.. et al. (2017): Virtual carbon and water flows embodied in international trade: a review on consumption-based analysis, Journal of Cleaner Production, Vol. 146, 10.03.17, pages 20-28