Challenging the "Resource Curse"
Published by MAC on 2007-11-28
Challenging the "Resource Curse"
28th November 2007
Last month, Papua New Guinea's leading daily, the Post Courier, delivered a surpringly strong attack on the country's over-reliance on mining:
See: http://www.minesandcommunities.org/Action/press1694.htm
Now it has published a cogent think-piece, putting forward alternatives to mineral and petroleum extraction.
"Currently, the presumption is that, because an ore body or petroleum resource is found, there exists an inherent right to mine it. Little mental energy is put into understanding the non-monetary value of the environment, or alternative developmental strategies."
Mining gains pose woes
Focus: Post Courier
28th November 2007
Economic self-reliance that is staked on one-off windfall gains of the mineral resources boom has obvious environmental costs.
The Prime Minister recently announced that the Government intends to ensure that Papua New Guinea's economy gains self-reliant status in the next five years.
This would presumably coincide with increased mineral and petroleum exploration and extraction, high metal prices on the global market, and the insatiable resource appetite of Asia.
Because of mining policy incentives, some 50 mineral exploration licences were approved in the past year. About K430 million in taxes from the resource sector is anticipated for 2007. Obviously, confidence in the mining sector is the perceived trigger for economic self-reliance.
The costs of self-reliance
The Government's intentions are based on two assumptions, which could well be the initiatives for economic independence:
* the present windfall gains of the mineral resources boom are thoroughly reinvested in long-term and broad-based sectors of the economy; and
* the present hard-earned revenue would not be squandered on political projects, exorbitant perks and privileges of public office-holders which provide no real benefits for the general public, and an inefficient, bloated public bureaucracy.
Moreover, if the revenue from this short-term minerals resources boom drives PNG towards economic self-reliance, what will be the environmental cost and the cost of socio-economic security for future generations?
The trend by successive governments to rely on mining revenue to sustain PNG's budgets has no exit strategy.
A post-mining scenario must be envisaged as the starting point in any thinking on the sustainable use of the environment, and maximising the present economic gains.
Failing that, future generations will have to come to terms with two scenarios:
* a depleted natural resource base; and
* because previous generations extracted the earth's prized resources and the damages inflicted on our oceans, reef systems, forests, rivers, wetlands, shorelines and mangrove ecology, the environment will not be capable of sustaining a larger population.
Recent projections show that Papua New Guinea's population could reach 20 million in 2050. Obviously, this spells trouble for the vulnerable habitats in Papua New Guinea.
Hence, the policy implication of risking human survival on the increased acceleration of the exploitation of the natural environment is far too important to be left to politicians.
Environmental sustainability and population growth
In keeping with the current global response to climate change, the mitigation of any further destruction to the environment should be the responsibility of humans through their present life patterns and decision making.
Papua New Guinea's contribution to the climate change action should begin by addressing the high population growth rate.
Second, it should involve political restraint in the destruction of the ecosystems, through policies that tax the state's capacity to monitor compliance to the environment.
In 2007, two Papua New Guineans commented on the implications of unplanned population growth in the country, which affects health, food security, and human survival.
It is estimated that more than 200,000 babies are born in PNG each year.
Dr Glen Mola stated that, in a rural-dominated society where 87 per cent of the population live in the rural areas, the need for water, fuel wood, food and bush materials to build houses will continue to increase. Some atoll communities are struggling to find such resources.
Dr Sergie Bang predicted the inevitable stress that population growth can have on the environment, and its wider implications on food security.
Where subsistence agriculture is practised and people rely on land productivity, the reef system, the rivers, and other aquatic resources, the life-support system would not be adequately replenished through natural processes to meet the growing needs of an increasing population.
Environmental pollution in large-scale industries could leave PNG with a problem of impoverished "environmental refugees". With a recorded per capita agricultural output of 1.7 per cent, compared with a rapidly growing annual population of 3 per cent annually, hunger and poverty could beset the country.
The communities sharing the Bismarck Archipelago provide some 90 per cent of the island population's protein intake.
Information from the tuna tagging program carried out by the National Fisheries Authority and the Secretariat of the South Pacific Commission, reveals that this area alone is a significant habitat and route of the migratory skipjack and yellowfin tuna.
However, interest has been shown in mineral exploration, with the inevitable production on some of the islands in the Bismarck Sea.
Hypothetically, should submarine tailings discharge be employed in any potential mining projects in the vicinity of this area and disturbances to the river systems that feed the reef systems surrounding the Bismarck archipelago, the potential for the destruction and contamination of the food chain of the fish stocks in that part of PNG's EEZ could result.
Recent studies suggest that PNG has a somewhat malnourished energy-protein population.
One cannot dismiss the potential destruction of an environment which is important to the nutritional and dietary lifestyle of the local population.
The future inhabitants of the Bismarck area have no say in our present activities to mitigate the safety of their potential source of food and sustainable income.
Some suggestions
Landowners in the Middle Ramu, in Madang Province, have agreed to conserve their natural resources, including the forest through a generational binding deed, which is an enforceable precedent for environment-conscious communities in PNG.
As an alternative to the large-scale resource exploitation, such initiatives should be supported by multinational corporations in industrialised countries, for example, through carbon trading arrangements (notably carbon sequestration from forest resources). The Government should be bypassed by landowners, who should collaborate with serious partners outside PNG. When "payment for environmental services" serves as an incentive in global collaboration to preserve the life-support system of the planet, it should be allowed to be developed by landowners who wish to conserve their environment.
Currently, the presumption is that, because an ore body or petroleum resource is found, there exists an inherent right to mine it. Little mental energy is put into understanding the non-monetary value of the environment, or alternative developmental strategies.
There is also no provision for foreign mining companies to collaborate with local companies to diversify or think about alternative long term services they could provide.
For example, mining companies should venture into recycling and investing in alternative material science research that employs renewable resources as well as reforestation.