Globalisation and the environment

Globalisation Links to the environment

What is globalisation:

GLOBALIZATION: The generalized expansion of international economic activity which includes increased international trade, growth of international investment (foreign investment) and international migration, and increased proliferation of technology among countries. Globalization is the increasing world-wide integration of markets for goods, services, labor, and capital.
Extract from source: http://www.amosweb.com/cgi-bin/awb_nav.pl?s=gls&c=dsp&k=globalization

What does globalisation have to do with the environment?
My note: Apparently, a lot! Read on to see.

Globalisation risks and positives for the environment:
Extract from source:
Arthur Lyon DAHL
Coordinator, UN System-wide Earthwatch
United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP)*
Geneva, Switzerland
Site: http://www.bcca.org/ief/ddahl98b.htm

1) There is human societal impact:
Global warming: We have released enough carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases to have a measurable effect on global climate, while chlorofluorocarbons and other man-made gases have attacked and depleted the stratospheric ozone layer.

2) The human and animal body: A number of pesticides and other persistent organic pollutants are now distributed globally, and may threaten hormonal balances and the immune system in man and other animals.

3) Pollution of the food chain: Some toxic chemicals used in the tropics evaporate in the heat and are transported in the air to the poles, where they condense out in the cold and accumulate in the food chain, in a global distillation process

4) Depletion of natural resources: The globalization of trade puts pressure on natural resources around the world, helping to drive the rapid depletion of tropical forests, the collapse of many ocean fisheries, and even the global impoverishment of biological diversity

5) Disease: We travel so much that we are becoming more vulnerable to epidemics, helped along by the global spread of antibiotic resistance.

6) Plant life change: Global movements of invasive introduced species have had major biological and economic impacts on the Mediterranean, the Black Sea, the Great Lakes, grazing lands, forests, and other resources

7) The global movement of people - Refugees: an increasing risk of major flows of environmental refugees e.g. One underlying cause of the Rwandan tragedy was high population growth that overshot the carrying capacity of the limited land area. In many places, water shortage, resource depletion, climate change, or sea level rise could displace large numbers of people.

How can globalisation help with environmental problems?

1) A nested set of environmental information systems from the global to the local levels should be developed that can provide all stakeholders with scientific information on the status and limits of natural resources as a basis for their sustainable management. Global observing systems for climate, the land and the oceans are gradually being put in place, and new technologies are steadily increasing our ability to collect environmental information.

2) A success story?

Extract from source: http://news.mongabay.com/2007/0905-remittances.html
Globalization and other economic trends appear to be helping the degraded forests of El Salvador recover, reports new research that evaluated the impact of global trade, land policy changes, and remittances on forest cover.

The study, by Susanna B. Hecht of University of California at Los Angeles and Sassan S. Saatchi of the California Institute of Technology, used socioeconomic data, land-use surveys, and satellite imagery to document significant increases in the area of El Salvador covered by both light woodlands and forest since peace accords were signed in the warn-torn country in 1992.

"Even where rural population density exceeded 250 people per square kilometer, we documented a 22% increase in the area with more than 30% tree cover, and a 7% increase in the area with more than 60% tree cover," they write. "Woodland resurgence reflected processes including civil war, retraction of the agricultural frontier, and international migration and associated remittances. Agrarian reform, structural adjustment, and emerging environmental ideas also played a role in woodland dynamics."

"Remittances are an element of globalization that is actually producing forest recovery rather than forest destruction," Hecht told mongabay.com. "A real structural change in peasant economies has occurred. They can no longer compete with industrialized farming so their markets have contracted. This means that small-scale farming for export is no longer viable and rural populations are reliant on remittances and other sources of income.

Comparing changes in woody vegetation derived from satellite data in each province in El Salvador with population data, the distribution of average remittances, and the percentage of households receiving them, Hecht and Saatchi developed a model to test the relative impact of population and remittances on forest cover. They found that "for every percentage point increase in remittances, there is a 0.25 increase in the percentage of land with 30% or more tree cover." The correlation was even stronger in areas with higher tree cover. Unexpectedly, the researchers found no correlation between correlation of forest cover and population density.

"Remittances may be especially important for woodland recovery in El Salvador, enabling people in rural areas to buy food without all of them needing to grow and sell it," they [Susanna B. Hecht and Sassan S. Saatchi] write.

The profit problem?

Extract from source Arthur Lyon previously listed: If the productive economic institutions of society are only accountable for making a profit, then it is normal for them to do that well at the expense of everything else. This is a fundamental structural problem related to the values incorporated in our institutions; businesses are only responsible for business, and all the social and environmental problems are left to government. If we do not like the result, then we need to change the values inherent in our institutional structures and frameworks. The problem is aggravated by phenomena of rapid economic globalization, while the counterbalancing political structures have not kept pace and are losing their power over a globalizing world. Mechanisms for social services, for wealth redistribution through taxation, and for environmental regulation, do not now exist at the global level where multinational corporations and institutional investors are most active and an increasing amount of wealth creation is taking place.