The attempt by businessman Johan Eliasch to encourage others, like him, to purchase and thereby protect Brazilian rainforest is commendable. When the proposed solutions to environmental problems too often involve higher taxes and intrusive regulation, it is good to see a privately-funded approach.
Mr Eliasch’s model is similar to the way the National Trust buys and protects historic buildings and gardens in Britain.
The countries that place the greatest concern on environmental concerns are inevitably those where living standards are highest. They can afford that luxury. Given that average incomes are less than £5000 a year in Brazil, it is unrealistic to expect the Brazilian government to simply force farmers, seeking to grow soybeans or graze livestock, to leave the rainforest alone.
While it is easy for affluent, environmentally-conscious first worlders to complain about the destruction of the Amazon, for the Brazilian people, unfarmed land means less prosperity.
It is unfortunate, therefore, that Mr Eliasch’s idea seems to have caused some disquiet in Brazil, highlighting the need for sensitivity. The Brazilian President, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, says that the Amazon belongs to the Brazilian people, and argues that, while there is a need to preserve the rainforest, there is also a need for development.
Yet Brazil has widely engaged in the global economy, in many ways doing for agriculture what China is doing for manufacturing, so allowing foreign conservationists to write cheques for land would be consistent with its international outlook, while protecting a historical asset for future Brazilians.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2008/05/27/dl2704.xml
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