It is gratifying to see environmental issues being openly debated in the letter pages of the Independent. Not being a climate scientist, it is difficult for me to evaluate the scientific evidence. However, an extraordinary number of those who do study climate change maintain that the earth is warming and that this warming is exacerbated by human activity.
Importantly, there are many other indicators that suggest that human activity is having an adverse effect on our planet. Industrialisation regards the environment as a valuable resource to be exploited for the production of commodities. Everything nature has is seen as a potential commodity to be bought, sold, transformed and used. This has led to the depletion of fish, deforestation, soil degradation and desertification. It has also produced considerable waste, which is disposed of in the atmosphere, in land-fills and in the sea. The result has been atmospheric, water and land pollution on a massive scale
As such, global warming is only one, albeit important, indicator that we are having an adverse effect on our planet. The rapid disappearance of species, resource and mineral depletion (fish stocks, logging, mining), deforestation and desertification (due to soil erosion and mineral leaching associated with deforestation), among other things, should be ringing alarm bells. If not, why not? Who is benefitting from the status quo?
Cary Bennett
