QUOTE OF THE WEEK"Greenpeace feels free to criticize others, but does not seem to feel others have the right to criticize it!" -Forbes Magazine, 1991. |
"Natural" pesticides are better than "chemical" pesticides is a common claim. The Toronto Department of Works distributes literature recommending home-made preparations (Tel. 397-7100 or fax 392-2974). Two thousand years ago, the Romans got into the act. Pressing olives yields oil. It also results in a vegetable water, which can be a serious pollutant. The Romans called this residue 'amurca' and used it as a natural herbicide and insecticide.
In 1960, the bacterium Bacillus thurgingiensis was registered by Nutrilite of Buena Park, California. If a soft-bodied insect happens to ingest the bacterium’s spores, a toxic protein is released in the intestines of its unfortunate host. The original strain that is specific to the larvae of Lepidoptera, Bacillus thurgiensis thurgiensis, was discovered in Germany, where it was infecting caterpillars of moths feeding on various stored products. Mercifully, it is usually known amongst its supporters simply as B.t. So why did not the Parks Department spray the black oaks of High Park when they became infested with caterpillars this past season? Just because of its being specific to all caterpillars, most of which are harmless and some positively beneficial. The larvae of Bethune's Pinion, for example, feasts upon the Eastern Tent Caterpillar. The American Dunbar enjoys other caterpillars plus oak leaves.
Other strains of Bacillus thurgingiensis are known. According to Carl Schreck, a culcidologist, or mosquito expert, with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, an estimated one trillion mosquitoes inhabit this planet. B.t. isrealensis kills both them and those other pests all too well known to Canadians, black flies. But if we wipe out all the mosquitoes what will many wild birds feed on? Besides, it is the female mosquito which bites. The males sip nectar and are effective pollinators. Certain mosquitoes are even carnivorous, eating others of their own kind. B.t. san diego is relatively specific against certain beetle grubs. Milky spore disease, Bacillus popilliae, is trademarked under the name "Doom" and is specific to Japanese beetles and other grubs found in some areas of southern Ontario. Yes, "natural" controls have been registered and trademarked. Apparently chemial companies are not alone in attempting to protect their commercial interests.
Howard Stern delighted in chanting a mantra: "To Hell with Shell." Why not turn to home brews? Why not, indeed? Whip up something interesting in the blender, strain through coffee filter paper, add a few drops of pure liquid soap for better "sticking power." Garlic comes in near the top of the list for such applications. It certainly smells as if it must be doing something. There is also an additional benefit: those that use it report that never once in their gardens have they been attacked by a vampire. Hot peppers may be added to the mixture.
Others are convinced that rhubarb leaves should be added to the witch's brew in the kitchen blender. Of course rhubarb leaves are very poisonous to humans as well. If everything is not very thoroughly cleaned before use for culinary purposes, there will be no need to wait for the effects of cursed chemicals. Rhubarb leaves are effective by themselves. Like virtually all homemade sprays they are also exactly what we are seeking to leave far in the past.
Technically, they are "broad spectrum". They kill all the insects and similar creatures that they hit. Good guys suffer with the bad. This is undesirable in both home and chemical sprays. Yet the Toronto Works Department literature recommends such.
Those bothered by raccoons in their gardens are often told about the wonders of mothballs. Scatter them around and it discourages them, it is claimed. The truth is that it would be as effective to throw them at the critturs. True, it may guarantee that the local raccoon population is never attacked by clothes moths, but moth balls are very poisonous. Isn't that just what we are trying to escape from?
Companion planting, cry others. Certain plants are natural companions, warding off from neighbours all those nasty enemies without the need to resort to chemicals. Extensive university testing found less than a 5% gain. If a chemical company claimed such it would be laughed out of court. However, as any good gardener knows, onions should never be planted alongside potatoes as it this brings tears to the tuber's eyes.
In the final analysis, there are no rights or wrongs, only sensible decisions. One of the best decisions would be to take a course through the Independent Study of Guelph University (519-767-5050). If that does not appeal, consider using the best control devices ever invented. They are located at the end of the wrists and called hands. Alas, squashing, whether of insects or modern myths, seldom appeals to the socialists in life.
Wes Porter is a horticultural consultant
Greenpeace has never lost its slick approach in coming up with ideas to make money.
On Aug. 16, 1999, Greenpeace activists from 11 countries hung a giant banner on the Frambren glacier in Svalbard, Nordic Arctic stating: "The Arctic poisoned by the Chemical Industry." According to a Greenpeace press release, "Participating activists working under the midnight sun, came from Australia, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Russia, the UK, the US and Yugoslavia."
"Greenpeace identified a dozen chemical companies as manufacturers of the type of pollutants which can be found in the Arctic by placing barrels with company names in the foreground of the glacier."
Greenpeace media friends carried the picture world wide.
Their latest tactics prove that Greenpeace hasn't lost the Midas touch it gained after signing a contract with a major fundraising consultant with spin doctors at the top of their class.
"How do you raise money for an outfit like Greenpeace?, asks a sidebar story, 'Crisis Ltd.', in Forbes Magazine. 'You need a sense of urgency, and you need an enemy'," replies William Dodd, a director at the San Francisco office of Craver, Mathews, Smith & Co., fundraising consultant for Greenpeace U.S.A. since 1985.
"The firm has been a major factor in Greenpeace's financial success. Urgency? 'Half the world's shorelines have been destroyed,' trumpets one mail piece. Or,'We've already slaughtered 94% of our whales.'
"The exaggeration works. Greenpeace U.S.A. raised $64-million last year, 60% from the 43 million letters prepared by Craver, Mathews.
"Dodd explains that a mailing to new prospects is doing well if it merely breaks even; the real money is made on the renewals. Let's say Greenpeace sends out 1 million circulars and gets back cheques from 1.6%, or 16,000. With an average donation of $25, the income is $400,000. How much did the mailing cost? Postage, at subsidized rates for tax-exempt groups like Greenpeace, would run 11 cents apiece, or $110,000 altogether. Design, printing and production wold run $225,000 and list rental another $65,000.
So far, Greenpeace is breaking even on a cash basis, but the organization now has 16,000 believers, who will respond to the next year's worth of mailings at a rate more like 50%, not 1.6%.
"An efficient way to raise money? Yes, Greenpeace U.S.A. and its lobbying affiliate Greenpeace Action together spent $19 million on fundraising campaigns that raised $31-million in 1989. Greenpeace claims that its letters of solicitation educate as well as plead and that, therefore, they should be counted in part as spending on programs. Accounting standards require that nonprofit financial statements footnote how much of joint costs went to fundraising and how much to programs. But Greenpeace doesn’t follow the standards and won't reveal the information."
Thanks to the internet, we picked up this August 16 letter from anti-corporation 'journalist', Charlie Cray, sending a goodbye letter to his Greenpeace 'comrades', proving once again that truth is stranger than fiction.
"Dear Colleagues and Friends;
For those few who haven't heard, next month I will be leaving Greenpeace to take a position as Associate Editor at the Multinational Monitor, the magazine founded nearly 20 years ago by Ralph Nader. I will let people know what my email address is when I arrive in D.C.
Thanks for all of your support and feedback in the recent and distant past. This has been a wonderful place to work for 11 years. I know of no other group of activists who have made such a profoundly positive contribution to solving environmental issues such as the spread of toxic substances from citizen's backyards to the pristine polar circles. I don't think I would have endured so long had it not been for the inspiration and professional support I've received from my colleagues in the Greenpeace Toxics Campaign in particular, as well as from the toxics movement as a whole.
Greenpeace's work on PVC, chlorine, dioxin, POPs and related issue will of course continue. If you need other contacts here before I leave let me know.
I look forward to working at the Monitor, where I will learn about and report on a wide set of issues--environmental and otherwise--with a specific focus on corporate power and influence (corporruption?). For me this will be a kind of "activist's graduate school"--a position I have considered for some time.
Yours in the struggle",
Charlie Cray
Original Greenpeace activists, some flower children of the 70s, retain an image as the Peter Pans of our oceans and seas. With at least a handful of Greenpeace top executives controlling money donated by the public at large living in the lap of luxury, Greenpeace has a kind of Robert Louis Stevenson appeal that sends young lads off to bed with visions of pirates and crossbones.
At the end of August, when many parents were getting the crayon set ready for school, the MV Greenpeace was to have set sail for Europe. Mission of the sail was to remind European governments of their commitment to eliminate the release of hazardous substances into the environment within one generation (by 2020) as agreed at the OSPAR ministerial conference in Sintra, Portugal last year. OSPAR, also known as the Oslo-Paris Commission, is the regulatory body to prevent pollution in the Northeast Atlantic.
OSPAR member states, including the EU, need to take their commitment seriously and phase out the manufacture of all POPs (persistent organic pollutants), said Greenpeace campaigner Jan Soendergaard, aboard the vessel.