Eating our future

Forest and Bird, Issue 295, 1 February 2000, Page 2

Eating our future

What will the next one hundred years bring? For most of existence, humans have engaged in what Tim Flannery calls ‘future eating. We’ve been jolly successful! A huge chunk of the Earth’s ecological capital has been consumed. In his book The Future Eaters, Flannery tells us that all colonisation of ‘new lands’ follows a similar pattern. Colonists arrive at what they consider to be virgin territory. All find untapped resources. All experience a short boom period when resources seem limitless. Typically, colonists use up one resource then look for another. Faced with resource depletion from the land, people look to the sea as another limitless supplier of food. The pattern is repeated. As the accessible fisheries are destroyed, fishers invest in boats that travel further and fish deeper. The orange roughy Hoplostethus atlanticus, a small 50-centime-tre-long fish, lives in deep water off the continental shelves of Australia and New Zealand. It spawns around ancient sea mounts where the fish form enormous aggregations. These huge shoals were discovered in the late 1970s and early 1980s, providing a huge fishing bonanza. Everything seemed rosy until fishery biologists found that orange roughy live for much longer than humans. They may not breed until they are between 20 and 30 years old. It is axiomatic that small fish that live for 150 years must grow very slowly. This is because they live in resource-poor, dark waters with little nutrient input. Everyone now knows the orange roughy fishery is doomed without tight regulation. Indeed, so much damage has occurred they may be doomed without it. Yet the

fishing industry fights regulation. Previously, there has always been another fishery a bit further out, but the orange roughy must be close to the end of that line. Small populations are still being discovered but the huge aggregations have gone: perhaps forever, certainly for the foreseeable future. The development of technology allows humans to speed up

evolutionary change. Humans don’t have to wait for the evolution of a sharp tooth to tackle large prey; they simply fashion a spear. Nowadays, people can put on an aqualung or a space suit, travel in an aeroplane or car, think with computers and fight disease with manufactured drugs. All this speeds up the rate of human adaptation relative to other species; from a snail’s pace to the speed of light. This fundamental shift in evolutionary speed has upset the ecological balance throughout the world. But humans are different from other creatures. We can think, reason, understand and act, to make our lives better and sustainable. Despite these advantages, and our technology and intellect, we’ve made a disastrous series of mistakes. However, there are signs we may be taking the first wobbly steps toward recovery. It is essential that New Zealand, and indeed the whole planet, evolves a culture that will help us survive long term. This brings two questions to the fore. What laws and what values should we encourage? Flannery says the critical values we must enshrine are dictated by the impoverished nature of our ecosystems. Populations should remain small. Attitudes to growth

should be revised so that rapid growth and big ventures are carefully assessed. We need to retain flexibility in our decisions relating to the environment. Because resources are so limited and our demands so great, painful choices must sometimes be made. The environment is complex and difficult to understand. We must do all

in our power to ensure people have intimate contact and a working knowledge of our ecosystems. After population, the most important of these elements is a new sense of flexibility. Achievement will be as difficult

as it is essential, for it will encounter opposition from special interest groups at every turn. We have a new Government, and we stand on the threshold of a new era. So where do we start? We must stop plundering the oceans. Global warming is intimately linked to energy consumption. New Zealand is notoriously energy inefficient. Alien invasions, so ably assisted by free trade, must be curtailed. Above all, we’ve got to get serious about habitat and species protection.

‘A huge chunk of the Earth’s ecological capital has been consumed.’

KEITH CHAPPLE is national president of Forest and Bird.