It's not really grasslands. It's what in Brazil we call "cerrado", a semi-arid woodland. The soil is too mineral-poor to support the kind of grasslands you're thinking of.
I think that gets into a messy area though - why should poorer countries have to limit the exploitation of their natural resources, often their only practical path towards wealth - to suit the activist needs of wealthier populations in developed countries that have service based economies? I would actually say that we need to subsidize those countries, essentially paying them to retain biomass that absorbs carbon. Is it any different from paying for carbon sequestration?
100%. North America had massive land clearance happen with European settlers (and some before then), and Europe itself has had land converted to farmland for even longer.
To me, 2 things are clear:
1. It's in individual's self interest to extract the maximum economic value from the land that they control, which usually means drastically changing it from the natural state.
2. It's in everyone's best interest that we preserve a large fraction of each biome to prevent partial or total collapse of the earth's ecosystems.
How this is best fixed depends on how you think government and society should solve problems, but simply approaching it from "here's the problem, what does the end goal look like" point of view shows that something radical needs to be done.
And yes, I would include turning large amounts of farmland, even high yielding farmland, back into natural habitat.
It's of relevance only in that it shows how quickly forestation can affect climate, but North America had massive _reforestation_ in the late 1500s right before the land clearance by European settlers.
This is not a one-way sacrifice from poorer countries. Richer, importing countries like the EU, East Asia, North America will pay more for agricultural products if bans like this are imposed.
We need market mechanisms that encourage countries to respect global commons (ie. the capacity of the Earth to absorb our CO2 output).
Countries that do not respect that should be removed from global markets.
We cannot rely on individual retailers, importers, or customers, because they will just orient towards the lowest price, without consideration of environmental impacts. It is clearly a responsibility of Governments to act.
That's insane. Brazilians don't deserve the economic development anymore? After Americans got rid of their wildlife? Rich Californians have to pay for Brazil the real price of not growing economically at directions that benefits them.
"deserve"? Sanctions are not about people deserving anything, they are about trying to influence to preserve one owns interests. Iranien people do not "deserve" sanctions, nor do North koreans sufferings from lack of food.
In addition, Economic development is not linked to deforestation.
Brazil has now less forest coverage than Japan and South Korea who have wayyyy higher population density, and both used to be poorer than Brazil.
Brazil was on its way to development previously when the industry started to settle there and services started to follow, but bad governance and corruption made it all too fragile and some official just chose another way.
As usual, natural resources are more a curse than a good thing for development as it encourages lazy politics and low productivity.
It's more like we shouldn't pay for things that don't benefit us... no one is owed economic development.
Also the marginal value of forests and wildlife have changed significantly over time as they have been depleted. The tradeoffs that made sense then don't make as much sense now.
This video from Mark Rober was eye opening for me. As a meat eater myself I'm convinced that eating meat is unsustainable. It's just a matter of time until we can't keep up with demand and meat will become something only the 1% can afford.
CRISPR has become so easy, I’d be surprised if someone didn’t create a gene drive to prevent the reproduction of animals used in industrial farming. PETA has the funding for this sort of endeavor. Compared to convincing an entire planet to eat less meat (which is never going to happen on the timeline needed considering greenhouse emissions), seems like less of a schlep.
Let's not focus on either/or. I feel that that causes division, and we waste valuable time.
At this point of the crisis we need as much help as possible.
We need to do both.
I've been biking and using public transport for long distances for the last two years... Though I did rent a car for a week half a year ago.
I've almost entirely stopped eating beef, but I still have room for improvement when it comes to chicken, fish, and pork.
I've been sorting my waste, and recycling plastic bottles, cardboard, and glass; though I admittedly should learn to compost.
The thing that has been the hardest for me is to stop consuming plastic altogether. That's almost impossible in grocery stores.
I think that grocery stores and restaurants should try to shift their supply chains to allow to refill standardized (glass?) containers, but I don't think this will happen unless there is some sort of regulation to pressure them into changing.
We don't need to buy beef from Brazil, and we ought not. It's nearly impossible to audit every meatpacking supply chain in a foreign country if the local government doesn't cooperate. JBS does business with American fast food companies, yet it repeatedly gets caught with its pants down in the Amazon.
Sanctions are supposed to provide a disincentive for otherwise incentivized behaviors, by using revenue as a pressure point to turn marginal returns negative for those bad behaviors. Deforestation is one of the most discoverable activities on the globe due to satellite imagery, so it would be easy to modulate sanctions in real time.
Trade is a two-party business, and there is no ethical reason to continue enriching businesses or countries that do bad things for money.
This article is very short and the study it references is behind a paywall. Anyone know what the carbon sources are? I understand that fewer trees means less carbon absorbed, but is carbon being emitted by deforestation activities (like fires) or something else?
One theory for the decline of the Mayans was slash/burn/plant only works until you run out of forests, and they paved the region with cities all doing that, instead of using fertilizer.
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[ 3.0 ms ] story [ 70.7 ms ] threadOr, more simply, to 'ban' agricultural exports from countries like Brazil, until land clearance ceases.
To me, 2 things are clear:
1. It's in individual's self interest to extract the maximum economic value from the land that they control, which usually means drastically changing it from the natural state.
2. It's in everyone's best interest that we preserve a large fraction of each biome to prevent partial or total collapse of the earth's ecosystems.
How this is best fixed depends on how you think government and society should solve problems, but simply approaching it from "here's the problem, what does the end goal look like" point of view shows that something radical needs to be done.
And yes, I would include turning large amounts of farmland, even high yielding farmland, back into natural habitat.
https://phys.org/news/2011-10-team-european-ice-age-due.html
We need market mechanisms that encourage countries to respect global commons (ie. the capacity of the Earth to absorb our CO2 output).
Countries that do not respect that should be removed from global markets.
We cannot rely on individual retailers, importers, or customers, because they will just orient towards the lowest price, without consideration of environmental impacts. It is clearly a responsibility of Governments to act.
In addition, Economic development is not linked to deforestation.
Brazil has now less forest coverage than Japan and South Korea who have wayyyy higher population density, and both used to be poorer than Brazil.
Brazil was on its way to development previously when the industry started to settle there and services started to follow, but bad governance and corruption made it all too fragile and some official just chose another way.
As usual, natural resources are more a curse than a good thing for development as it encourages lazy politics and low productivity.
Also the marginal value of forests and wildlife have changed significantly over time as they have been depleted. The tradeoffs that made sense then don't make as much sense now.
This video from Mark Rober was eye opening for me. As a meat eater myself I'm convinced that eating meat is unsustainable. It's just a matter of time until we can't keep up with demand and meat will become something only the 1% can afford.
https://youtu.be/-k-V3ESHcfA
While it's so profitable to burn down forests and grow cattle people will keep doing it. Until there's nothing left .
https://youtu.be/sGG-A80Tl5g
Stopping meat consumption would make a negligible difference in emissions. It's more valuable to focus on minimizing food waste instead.
At this point of the crisis we need as much help as possible.
We need to do both.
I've been biking and using public transport for long distances for the last two years... Though I did rent a car for a week half a year ago.
I've almost entirely stopped eating beef, but I still have room for improvement when it comes to chicken, fish, and pork.
I've been sorting my waste, and recycling plastic bottles, cardboard, and glass; though I admittedly should learn to compost.
The thing that has been the hardest for me is to stop consuming plastic altogether. That's almost impossible in grocery stores.
I think that grocery stores and restaurants should try to shift their supply chains to allow to refill standardized (glass?) containers, but I don't think this will happen unless there is some sort of regulation to pressure them into changing.
What are your thoughts on this?
Sanctions are supposed to provide a disincentive for otherwise incentivized behaviors, by using revenue as a pressure point to turn marginal returns negative for those bad behaviors. Deforestation is one of the most discoverable activities on the globe due to satellite imagery, so it would be easy to modulate sanctions in real time.
Trade is a two-party business, and there is no ethical reason to continue enriching businesses or countries that do bad things for money.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/jul/27/revealed...
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-021-01026-5