The Third Millennium abounds with classic cases of vested interests vs enlightened self-interest. In a polarised situation, whom does one believe? The person who stands to make MONEY out of a public resource, or a member of the public who doesn't?
For example, the forests are a public resource, yet when taxpayers' dollars are used to subsidise an 'industry' that can't make a profit from a 'free' resource there must be some bad businessmen around.
As the forests are far smaller than they were when the 'industry' began 'farming' them, there must be something wrong somewhere, wouldn't you think?
As Australia has the worst record of species loss of any continent, perhaps we were listening to the wrong 'experts' until the environment gained a voice in politics and the planet?
I live in the bush, by the way, and everywhere you go you see ruined rivers, claypans without soil and salination - after a century in the hands of ignorant loggers and farmers who somehow think they know what they're doing - because their grandparents could make a 'living'.
It's possible to make money and have a healthy environment - if you're not lazy and stupid, quite frankly.
Now hare-brained Australian ‘scientist’ lackeys have found a way to determine which minerals lie beneath the ground – by studying the elemental composition of tree and plant leaves. Soon mining beneath forests will become a salient issue…