No. 113 July 2007

Now for some sensible talk about climate change

By Janet Albrechtsen

11 July 2007

PHEW, Live Earth is over. The seven concerts on seven continents featuring a bunch of jet fuel-addicted rock stars summed up the problem with much of the talk about change. Hypocrisy aside, the climate change rockers and other zealots would have us believe there is no problem more uniquely modern than climate change. When it comes to mapping out solutions to this most 21st century of problems, history can teach us nothing. We are on our own. Right? Well, actually, no. Wrong. Dead wrong… Live Earth was promoted as yet another episode in raising awareness on climate change. We needed that like a hole in the head. Instead of repeating dire predictions about the future, a better goal would have been to educate people about the real world. About the social and economic realities confronting the real world. Realities such as poverty… But poverty is old hat these days. Live Aid has been replaced by Live Earth. Cool cats talk about climate change. The reality is that if we are to include the world’s main emitters in long-term climate change initiatives, they need to feed their people first. Just don’t expect to hear about it from Snoop Dogg or Madonna. Click here to read article.

This article was first published in The Australian 11 July 2007
Articles in the Perspectives series plus a large library of books, studies, speeches, articles and DVDs on a wide range of public policy issues can be found at www.nzbr.org.nz

Related studies and commentary:

It’s Time to Cool It
An article first published in the Otago Daily Times
30 April 2007
By Roger Kerr
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Overview Submission on the Government’s Discussion Documents on Climate Change
A submission by the New Zealand Business Roundtable
March 2007
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Human Progress – and Collapse? (A Review of Jared Diamond’s Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed)
An essay published by the New Zealand Business Roundtable
August 2005
By Wolfgang Kasper
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The Real State of the World
The 2003 Sir Ronald Trotter Lecture by Bjorn Lomborg
2003
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