At Man's Expense (NY Times Eco-Stupidity Alert)

Media: The New York Times blubbers about how Cuba's environment will suffer in a post-U.S. embargo era of increased tourism. Better to preserve a "priceless ecological resource" than to free people from oppression.

It is becoming increasingly more difficult to take the environmental movement, and science and environmental reporters, seriously because of stories such as the Christmas Day hand-wringer "Conserving Cuba, After the Embargo."

Given great latitude by New York Times editors, reporter Cornelia Dean goes on for more than 2,000 words about "why many scientists are so worried about what will become of (Cuba's environment) after Fidel Castro and his associates leave power and, as is widely anticipated, the American government relaxes or ends its trade embargo."

There was precious little, though, about the obvious — except to intractable left-wingers — advantages to humanity. It's as if the beneficiaries of the fall of communism in Cuba and the ensuing spread of commerce would be only greedy capitalist exploiters.

The New York Times, with a wide reach and influence far out of proportion to its lack of wisdom, has found yet another backhanded way to praise Castro's Island Prison and malign the free market.

Maybe its plunging stock price — now below $18 a share, down from its all-time high of nearly $50 in 2004 — soon WILL teach its staff a valuable lesson in capitalism.

Until then, the Times and the rest of the mainstream media will continue to worship at the green altar. In the meantime, let's bring some clarity to the murky swamp of environmental agitprop.

“THE CHAOTIC SITUATION OF THE BEACHES

For Cubans and foreigners alike it is no secret that the beaches of Cuba constitute one of the principal tourist attractions in the country. However, the beaches too have not escaped, to a greater or lesser extent, the onslaught of environmental degradation. The famous beaches east of Havana have been the victims of sand removal for use, by the Cuban government itself, in the construction of buildings.
But perhaps it is the oil spills from production wells along the coast and the wastewaters from sewers that are the worst pollutants of the sand and the water of the beaches. The coastal area west of Havana has also suffered a similar fate. Highly polluted rivers, such as the renowned Quiba, spill their waters into the beaches of this region of the province of Havana. The contamination of the Quiba even prompted a popular song about it.

Meanwhile, even Varadero, one of the most beautiful beaches in the world, has not managed to survive the ecological chaos that reigns in Cuba. Much of its sand, previously so white, fine and clean, was also removed indiscriminately during these last three decades. A worse fate has been suffered by the southern beaches, such as Caimito, Rosario, Mayabeque, Cajio and Guanimar, famous for their medicinal waters, which have been impacted by discharges from nearby sugar mills. These discharges consist primarily of hydrocarbons and highly toxic chemical substances.

The construction in this region of three bull breeding centers created another overwhelming source of pollutants. Each one of these three centers discharged daily to the ocean an amount of waste comparable to that produced by a city of 100,000 inhabitants. To the south too, the extensive mangroves that served as spawning habitats for marine and other species have decreased considerably, and, consequently, the populations of fish, birds and mammals have diminished in that region.

GROUNDWATERS OF THE SOUTHERN REGION

The southern coast of the province of Havana used to have fresh groundwater of high quality, but, during the first years of the Castro government, rice-growing projects in the region resulted in the desiccation of vast areas of wetlands. Autochthonous forests of great value disappeared along with their animal populations for the same reason. The cultivation of rice requires much water, and for this purpose a great number of drainage canals were installed along with huge numbers of high-capacity pumps each of which extracted 30,000 gallons of water every eight hours. Of this quantity, only a minimal amount was actually used. This caused a lowering of the water table that resulted in the intrusion of sea water and the salinization of the fresh ground water. The plans to grow rice were abandoned, but the damage was irreversible.
The salinization of areas in Pinar del Rio and Havana worried the government, as it threatened to destroy some of the most productive agricultural regions of the country. The affected lands were not producing as before. Due to this situation, and without a serious study of ecological impacts, a new project called the Southern Dike was constructed. The Southern Dike has as its objective recharging the ground water system. But, in actuality, the waters used for recharge are loaded with chemical agents that will prevent making drinkable the already contaminated ground water. The danger that this dike represents is of incalculable proportions given that the contamination it causes affects the supply of drinking water to the city of Havana and nearby locations.

THE CONTAMINATION OF THE RIVERS

Few rivers are as mistreated as those of the Havana region. The Almendares River creeps like a corpse toward the sea. All the industries located on its banks—tanneries, breweries, factories for manufacturing paper and chemical products—use it as their private dump.
Another river that has a similar situation to that of the Almendares is the Luyano River, which spills its waters into Havana Bay. This small river has become one of the principal sources of pollution to the bay because it carries the wastes of numerous industries and sewers that discharge into it. But it is not the only river that has ruined the water quality of the bay. Another that performs an equally destructive function is the Martin Perez River.

The rivers of the southern Havana region, among them the two main ones, the Ariguanabo and the Mayabeque, are also polluted to an alarming degree. The Ariguanabo, which recharges the ground waters of the southern region, receives its main influx of contaminants from the town of San Antonio de los Banos. A few meters away from the river are the disposal drains of factories, among them a yeast plant and one that processes spices, as well as several automobile repair shops.

The Mayabeque River is in even worse shape. This river, considered the largest in the southwestern watershed of Cuba, has an extensive fluvial network that encompasses the municipalities of Gueines, San Jose de las Lajas, Jaruco y Madruga. The waters carried by its secondary tributaries have high levels of contamination. The industrial region of San Jose de las Lajas delivers to the river, via a secondary stream branching off the main tributary of the Mayabeque, the wastes of a milk processing facility, a paint factory, an aluminum processing plant, an asphalt processing plant, and those of the Institute of Animal Science (ICA), a center for the investigation of exotic and tropical diseases of cattle.

The ICA facility discharges into the Manposton River, at a point near its juncture with the Maybeque, wastes that are highly noxious for human health owing to the fact that the investigations performed at this center involved the slaughtering of sick animals. The water from this river flows into the municipality of Gueines, where it is distributed throughout the city and used to irrigate nearby fields. In Gueines there were as many cases of hepatitis reported in the first three months of 1994 as occurred in all of 1993. Other illnesses, of the ears, eyes, the mucous membranes of the lips and the liver, have been common among those who swim in the river.

Local environmentalists have petitioned the government to inform the population about the danger of these waters, but the authorities have refused to acknowledge said danger and have forbidden any type of publicity about the matter. Analyses of the river water reveal that it contains 1,150 fecal coliform bacteria [per 100 ml]. The maximum tolerated by humans is between 50 and 150.”

http://www.fiu.edu/~fcf/enviromental.crisis.html

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