[CPEO-MEF] MUNITIONS, NATURAL RESOURCES: "Rewilding Kaho'olawe Island" (HI)

[Lenny Siegel <lsiegel@cpeo.org>]

Rewilding Kaho'olawe Island
In Hawaii, the massive clean-up of an old bombing range shows how  
careless land use costs the future huge.

By Andrew S. Wright
The Tyee (BC)
June 15, 2012

Sitting in an old military hut, Jamie's unexploded ordinance (UXO)  
briefing has my anxiety level rising. I am about to traverse a  
savaged land, a former bombing range still littered with live  
explosives. The region has been "cleared" with an 85 per cent  
probability that 90 per cent of the bombs have been removed. Not  
exactly cleared by my reckoning.

This is not Afghanistan. It is Kaho'olawe, Hawaii: an island unknown  
to the millions of surf-seeking tourists, forbidden to casual  
inquirers of Maui's southern cousin, yet treasured by the few who  
have contributed to its restoration. It's an island that has been  
ravaged by invasive species, ranchers and the military.

The cost of rewilding, or the art of returning land to a  
bioproductive state -- not explicit restoration -- has a price tag  
that exceeds $400 million. This is modernity's Rapa Nui (Easter  
Island) and the recovery costs are staggering.

The cost of indiscriminate land use in the area is now burdened upon  
future generations. Perhaps Canadian public policy-makers, currently  
busy dismantling environmental protection laws, should take a moment  
to consider the lessons of Kaho'olawe.

...

For the entire article, see
http://thetyee.ca/Life/2012/06/15/Rewilding-Kahoolawe-Island/

--

Lenny Siegel
Executive Director, Center for Public Environmental Oversight
a project of the Pacific Studies Center
278-A Hope St., Mountain View, CA 94041
Voice: 650/961-8918 or 650/969-1545
Fax: 650/961-8918
<lsiegel@cpeo.org>
http://www.cpeo.org

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