Editorial page column, The Evening Paper
Issue of 26 October 1995
A whole year before Time magazine picked up the trend, we in trade journalism already had a growing inkling of how the tradeoff worked, thanks to an international network of industry-focused writers working at ground level to document swiftly changing currents in global trade.
So it was actually in March 1994 that we learned how industrialists and environmentalists were coming together in a shotgun marriage now known internationally as "carbon offsets."
But let me tell you the story from my desk then as editor of one of the internationally circulated trade magazines of a multinational publishing group.
******
The special assignment had gone to our Chicago bureau, which coordinated Latin American coverage for all group publications. We had asked for a straightforward spotlight on the Brazil fashion industry. In that sense, it was supposed to be a cut-and-dried trade story.
That is, except for one sentence in the report on one company--a vertically integrated garment manufacturer, with more than 17,000 workers, that has pioneered in residue-free shorts and undershirts woven from its own organically grown cotton and produced with the least environmental impact: dyes from roots and herbs, reduced noise pollution in mills, an intensive industrial sewage-treatment program.
Targeting the picky and meticulous European market and with German technological push, the family-owned Brazilian company had initiated its own voluntary carbon-offset commitment. "It preserves 17 square meters of Atlantic coastal rainforest for every constructed square meter the company owns," was how our Brazil writer described the program.
Following up on this tip took my research all around the Southern hemisphere countries, including Paraguay, Guatemala, Peru, Ecuador. Time magazine reporters in April 1995 would add to the practice of carbon offsets such Asian converts as Malaysia and Indonesia.
But the very first Latin American country to sign up for carbon-offset agreements with US utility firms was Costa Rica.
That is, except for one sentence in the report on one company--a vertically integrated garment manufacturer, with more than 17,000 workers, that has pioneered in residue-free shorts and undershirts woven from its own organically grown cotton and produced with the least environmental impact: dyes from roots and herbs, reduced noise pollution in mills, an intensive industrial sewage-treatment program.
Targeting the picky and meticulous European market and with German technological push, the family-owned Brazilian company had initiated its own voluntary carbon-offset commitment. "It preserves 17 square meters of Atlantic coastal rainforest for every constructed square meter the company owns," was how our Brazil writer described the program.
Following up on this tip took my research all around the Southern hemisphere countries, including Paraguay, Guatemala, Peru, Ecuador. Time magazine reporters in April 1995 would add to the practice of carbon offsets such Asian converts as Malaysia and Indonesia.
But the very first Latin American country to sign up for carbon-offset agreements with US utility firms was Costa Rica.
******
In 1994, ecotourism overtook bananas as Costa Rica's main source of foreign exchange. In the next three years, the Costa Rican government would earn anywhere from $600 million to $1 billion in revenues from ecotourism. Before the year 1995 was over, a total of 800,000 tourists would spend their precious dollars in Costa Rica's 28 parks and reserves spread over active volcanoes, cloud forests, tropical parks, and palm-lined beaches.
By its decision to devote one quarter of its national territory to protected biosphere and wildlife reserves, Costa Rica would show the whole world that conserving the country's natural resources could be not only a sustainable but even a more lucrative option to destroying its forests.
So successful has the ecotourism approach been that many local landowners, wanting to share in the largesse, would soon allow their forest lands to grow again in areas that, for decades, had been denuded by logging and agriculture.
At a Pacific Coast rainforest, a Reuters reporter described groups of squirrel monkeys, once near extinction, swinging across the paths of tourists, howler monkeys growling from treetops, capuchin monkeys begging for nuts by the beach, and giant iguanas lying motionless for the tourists' cameras. He saw scarlet macaws, toucans, elusive coatis, resplendent quetzal birds, leather-back turtles, red-eyed leap frogs, and poisonous dart frogs moving around, their routines undisturbed by the tourists.
The whole effort has been a determined preservation of the unique isthmus ecosystem native to the geography and topography of the country. In exchange, the country has won plaudits, even from the most critical and exacting environmentalists.
"Costa Rica has shown that ecotourism is not only competitive with more destructive land uses but can, in fact, be a greater generator of foreign exchange," testified the president of Conservation International, a Washington-based environmental organization.
Aside from carbon-offset programs with US utility firms, the Costa Rican government also pioneered in biodiversity conservation by signing the first bioprospecting tie-up with pharmaceutical giant Merck and Co., which will provide local laboratories with investment and technology for the successful screening of biological compounds.
The presence of tourists has not always been beneficial to Costa Rica's rainforests and reserves. Park managements have now banned camping and limited visitors to 800 a day to reduce their impact on the park's privileged residents--the animals and birds. Of course, entrance fees were also raised tenfold to make up for any income shortfalls.
Urban development is also being monitored closely. While all kinds of hotels, restaurants, bars, and honky-tonks have sprung up, the government is using gentle persuasion on capitalists to make sure they go by one model: studio apartments which, during construction, necessitate the felling of only one tree. Even now, the smell of guavas is said to pervade the grounds around apartments situated in forests, which are still home to sloths, monkeys, iguanas, snakes, and butterflies.
By its decision to devote one quarter of its national territory to protected biosphere and wildlife reserves, Costa Rica would show the whole world that conserving the country's natural resources could be not only a sustainable but even a more lucrative option to destroying its forests.
So successful has the ecotourism approach been that many local landowners, wanting to share in the largesse, would soon allow their forest lands to grow again in areas that, for decades, had been denuded by logging and agriculture.
At a Pacific Coast rainforest, a Reuters reporter described groups of squirrel monkeys, once near extinction, swinging across the paths of tourists, howler monkeys growling from treetops, capuchin monkeys begging for nuts by the beach, and giant iguanas lying motionless for the tourists' cameras. He saw scarlet macaws, toucans, elusive coatis, resplendent quetzal birds, leather-back turtles, red-eyed leap frogs, and poisonous dart frogs moving around, their routines undisturbed by the tourists.
The whole effort has been a determined preservation of the unique isthmus ecosystem native to the geography and topography of the country. In exchange, the country has won plaudits, even from the most critical and exacting environmentalists.
"Costa Rica has shown that ecotourism is not only competitive with more destructive land uses but can, in fact, be a greater generator of foreign exchange," testified the president of Conservation International, a Washington-based environmental organization.
Aside from carbon-offset programs with US utility firms, the Costa Rican government also pioneered in biodiversity conservation by signing the first bioprospecting tie-up with pharmaceutical giant Merck and Co., which will provide local laboratories with investment and technology for the successful screening of biological compounds.
The presence of tourists has not always been beneficial to Costa Rica's rainforests and reserves. Park managements have now banned camping and limited visitors to 800 a day to reduce their impact on the park's privileged residents--the animals and birds. Of course, entrance fees were also raised tenfold to make up for any income shortfalls.
Urban development is also being monitored closely. While all kinds of hotels, restaurants, bars, and honky-tonks have sprung up, the government is using gentle persuasion on capitalists to make sure they go by one model: studio apartments which, during construction, necessitate the felling of only one tree. Even now, the smell of guavas is said to pervade the grounds around apartments situated in forests, which are still home to sloths, monkeys, iguanas, snakes, and butterflies.
******
It was well after the 1992 Rio de Janeiro Earth Summit that carbon offsets took off. The consensus was reached then that the buildup of carbon-based gases spewed by industry into the atmosphere was turning the planet into a giant greenhouse. The 155 countries at that summit pledged to reduce carbon-gas emissions to 1990 levels by year 2000. The question was: How?
Governments could either crack down on their industries and force them to install high-efficiency machinery, a time-consuming and expensive process. Or, they could opt for the drastic and unacceptable, which is to curb economic growth.
Tradeoff ideas such as international carbon offsets immediately allow "smokestack countries" like the United States to get credits for helping preserve rainforests in, say, Borneo, Cambodia, or Bolivia.
One US utility firm went about its program the whole way, with enthusiasm and verve. It introduced environmentally friendly logging techniques to its partner, a Malaysian timber products company, to reduce unintentional damage, promoted tree replanting and regrowth, monitored the progress of the partnership, and measured the reductions in carbon dioxide emissions on site.
When the accountants took over, their figures proved beyond doubt that the US utility company saved more, with no reduction in efficiency and capacity, with its carbon-offset program half a world away.
Perhaps they will work just as well, if not better, when implemented within a country.
Governments could either crack down on their industries and force them to install high-efficiency machinery, a time-consuming and expensive process. Or, they could opt for the drastic and unacceptable, which is to curb economic growth.
Tradeoff ideas such as international carbon offsets immediately allow "smokestack countries" like the United States to get credits for helping preserve rainforests in, say, Borneo, Cambodia, or Bolivia.
One US utility firm went about its program the whole way, with enthusiasm and verve. It introduced environmentally friendly logging techniques to its partner, a Malaysian timber products company, to reduce unintentional damage, promoted tree replanting and regrowth, monitored the progress of the partnership, and measured the reductions in carbon dioxide emissions on site.
When the accountants took over, their figures proved beyond doubt that the US utility company saved more, with no reduction in efficiency and capacity, with its carbon-offset program half a world away.
Perhaps they will work just as well, if not better, when implemented within a country.
-- NBT
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