I was mentioning this crazy scheme last night to Alex, so here's the link for documentation:The White List (or "clean list") is proposed policy which will extend government and corporate control over the possession, importation and movement of anything that is alive - plants, animals, fungi, microorganisms, everything. In other words, it's not obnoxious enough to make certain plants illegal, they want to make everything a priori illegal, and then make exceptions for just certain plants.The Plant Protection and Quarantine Safeguarding Review recommends that the United States Department of Agriculture "Consider adopting a modified 'clean list' approach for propagative material, specifying what is permissible subsequent to risk assessment, rather than the current 'dirty list' that prohibits or restricts specific articles only." The cover is that this legislation will protect us from evil invasive species, but you'd have to be pretty dim to think this is trying to protect anything except unbridled profiteering. Look who's behind it:"Monsanto, DowElanco, American Cyanamid, Zeneca, Dow AgroSciences, SePro, Helena and other herbicide manufactures and "life patent" corporations have funded tremendous propaganda in recent years hyping a spurious "invasive species" threat to natural ecosystems in order to sell more herbicides. (via ethel)
This is an ugly move. As you suggest, it's probably economically motivated, as these corporations are essentially amoral in their pursuit of profit, but it dovetails in an unfortunate manner with our current obsession with security and the eternal fantasy of total control.
Invasives are becoming a focal point for a variety of issues. Like anyone else, I'd prefer to see a native Bluebird, rather than the European Starling that stole its nest, but if we take measures to rectify the situation, we should remember that we're the ones who started the problem to begin with, and our counter-measures also run the risk of getting out of hand. Are we that much wiser than the people who thought bringing Starlings here was a good idea? A kind of political correctness has sprung up, where native is always good, and non-native is always bad. I'm beginning to detect a rising level of concern among eco-sensitive types regarding the zealotry of those who would enforce this standard, regardless of the purity of their intentions. Making money off it is merely venal, but there's a bigger danger in devaluing certain living things based on their point of origin.
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- jim 6-07-2002 6:18 pm
This is an ugly move. As you suggest, it's probably economically motivated, as these corporations are essentially amoral in their pursuit of profit, but it dovetails in an unfortunate manner with our current obsession with security and the eternal fantasy of total control.
Invasives are becoming a focal point for a variety of issues. Like anyone else, I'd prefer to see a native Bluebird, rather than the European Starling that stole its nest, but if we take measures to rectify the situation, we should remember that we're the ones who started the problem to begin with, and our counter-measures also run the risk of getting out of hand. Are we that much wiser than the people who thought bringing Starlings here was a good idea? A kind of political correctness has sprung up, where native is always good, and non-native is always bad. I'm beginning to detect a rising level of concern among eco-sensitive types regarding the zealotry of those who would enforce this standard, regardless of the purity of their intentions. Making money off it is merely venal, but there's a bigger danger in devaluing certain living things based on their point of origin.
- alex 6-07-2002 10:20 pm