Customer Reviews

Plan B: Rescuing a Planet Under Stress and a Civilization in Trouble

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Lester Brown recently wrote Eco-Economy: Building an Economy for the Earth in which his thesis was that "the environment was not part of the economy...but instead that the economy was part of the environment." (p. xv)

Here he presents an upbeat and positive plan for saving the world from the consequences of what he calls the planet-wide "bubble economy." His central argument is that we are about to face a food shortage of crisis proportions as our aquifers and rivers run dry. The relative price of food, which is directly dependent upon ready water supplies from underground and through the diversion of rivers, he argues, is about to skyrocket as China and other grain-hungry nations begin to import grain.

His plan B is a combination of interventions that would include environmental tax reform, that is, taxing products in terms or their true cost including pollution and the use of non-renewable resources. Thus the consequences of pollution-induced illnesses like asthma, etc. be factored into the cost of gasoline. In this way non-polluting energy sources such as windmills and solar energy cells would become cost-competitive with fossil fuels almost immediately.

The first half of the book is devoted to describing the problem, which he calls "A Civilization in Trouble." The second half is devoted to his Plan B which includes adopting "honest global accounting," stabilizing the population, and raising land productivity. He wants not only to shift taxes from the environmentally sound ways of doing business to the ecologically harmful ways, but to shift the subsidizes that many countries now give to fossil fuel producers and to fishing and logging industries to environmentally safe products and industries. He points out that it is foolhardy to subsidize the destruction of our environment as we are now doing.

Brown quotes Oystein Dahle, former Vice President of Exxon for Norway as saying: "Socialism collapsed because it did not allow the market to tell the economic truth. Capitalism may collapse because it does not allow the market to tell the ecological truth." (p. 210)

A striking example of what Brown means by shifting taxes comes from former Harvard Economics professor N. Gregory Mankiw, who wrote: "Cutting income taxes while increasing gasoline taxes would lead to more rapid economic growth, less traffic congestion, safer roads, and reduced risk of global warming..." (p 214)

Incidentally, Brown asserts that rising temperatures adversely affect crop yields. He notes that crops are grown in many countries "at or near their thermal optimum, making them vulnerable to any rise in temperature." He cites a study by Mohan Wali at Ohio State University showing that photosynthesis increases until the temperature reaches 68 degrees F. and then plateaus until it hits 95 degrees whereupon it begin to decline, and ceases at 104 degrees. (pp. 62-63)

The problem with his solution is that, as Brown points out, the body politic, especially that of the United States, must take action to implement the changes. Unfortunately, President Bush, who represents corporate interests (as most American politicians do), will continue to call for more studies, and nothing will be done. More particularly, taxing destructive practices will only work if all (or at least a substantial majority) of the countries of the world cooperate. Polluted air, acid rain, depleted aquifers, and rivers run dry cross borders. Consequently we have a daunting task in front of us.

A crucial psychological problem is that our instincts were honed in the pre-history when the resources of forest and savanna were effectively inexhaustible, where it didn't matter how much we burned and polluted since we could just move on. Our numbers were so small relative to the land that it would renew itself as we were despoiling other lands. With six billion-plus people on the planet there are no "other lands" and there is no time for the land to renew itself. We can no longer toss our waste over our shoulders, defecate in the stream, and slash and burn.

This is just one respect in which we have to ask, are human beings as presently evolved able to cope with the modern world? The tribal mentality, with its violence toward outsiders and toward the environment, is still with us, but the tolerance of the environment for such behavior is not. The myth of the noble savage and indigenous people living in harmony with nature needs a reality check. We are savages in headsets, neither noble nor ignoble. We are indigenous people whose lands have gone the way of the Garden of Eden. We are clumsily and incompletely adjusting to a different landscape: the modern world.

The race is on. Which will come first: our adjustment to the needs of the planet or the collapse of our great civilizations? Note well it is the needs of the planet that come first. Note also that the collapse of our civilizations will usher in a period of immense pain and suffering, even for those of us sitting atop Mount Olympus, as it were, in our garden homes sheltered from the storms in our inner cities and in Bangladesh and Pakistan.

A great deal of human suffering can be averted by anticipating the consequences of globalization, of diminishing resources resulting in diminishing returns. But it is also true that a great deal of human suffering can be averted by not doing something stupid that may have unintended consequences. We must use our abilities and our knowledge to choose between the two. Lester Brown is trying to help us do that. This book is a fine introduction to the problem and to a possible solution.

An important contribution to the environmental debate. I was suprised by the critical review below that gives 1 star to Plan B and cites "The Skeptical Environmentalist" by Bjorn Lomborg as a refutation of Brown's work. Readers of that review may not be aware that "Skeptical" has been discredited, refuted and rejected by the scientific community. Critical reviews of Lomborg's book can be found in leading science journals, including Nature, Scientific American and Science. The Danish Committees on Scientific Dishonesty issued a decision that declared Lomborg's research "to fall within the concept of scientific dishonesty," and to be "clearly contrary to the standards of good scientific practice." (Lomborg is Danish). Readers will not be persuaded by references to junk science coming from an anti-environmentalist.

This book is in three sections - the first part provides facts, figures, charts and tables to define the problem; the second part - Plan A - projects the future under the business as usual scenario; the third part - Plan B - is Brown's recommendations of what we must do. The problem has the following components:
- over the last 50 years world population has doubled, the global economy has expanded seven fold and our claims on the earth are excessive;
- we are cutting trees faster than they can regenerate, overgrazing rangelands, over pumping aquifers and draining rivers;
- soil erosion of cropland exceeds new soil formation;
- we take fish from the oceans faster than they can reproduce;
- we are releasing CO2 into the atmosphere faster than nature can absorb it, creating a greenhouse effect raising the earth's temperature;
- habitat destruction and climate change are destroying plant and animal species faster than new species can evolve.

Throughout history man has lived on the earth's sustainable yield but humanity's collective demands surpassed the earth's carrying capacity in 1980 and by 1999 exceeded carrying capacity by 20% creating a global bubble economy. "The sector of the economy that seems likely to unravel first is food. Eroding soils, deteriorating range lands, collapsing fisheries, falling water tables, and rising temperatures are converging to make it more difficult to expand food production fast enough to keep up with demand. In 2002, the world grain harvest of 1,807 million tons fell short of world grain consumption by 100 million tons, or 5%. This shortfall, the largest on record, marked the third consecutive year of grain deficits, dropping stocks to the lowest level in a generation." Trying to fill the 100 million ton shortfall, feeding an additional 70m people each year, reducing the number of under-nourished and rebuilding stocks is likely to further deplete aquifers, increase erosion and raise food prices. Farmers face two challenges - rising temperatures and falling water tables. The 16 warmest years on record have all occurred since 1980 with the three warmest in the last five years and this adversely affects grain harvests, forcing traditional grain exporting countries like Canada to reduce or cease exports. World wide 70% of water is used for agriculture, 20% by industry and 10% for residential purposes. Water mining due to governments' failing to limit pumping to sustainable yield has increased pumping costs and reduced profit margins when grain prices are at a historical low, obliging many farmers to withdraw from irrigated agriculture. Industrial demands are increasing and industry can afford to pay much more for its water than farmers. Sandra Postel in 'Pillar of Sand: Can the Irrigation Miracle Last?' details a bleak picture of what is in store for us regarding falling water tables, rivers which don't reach the sea and the impact on food production. China is such a populous country that whatever happens there impacts everyone in the world. China's deserts are expanding and the US Dust Bowl of the 1930s is being reproduced there but on a much bigger scale. China's forthcoming grain deficit will force up grain prices. "Many of the most populous countries of the world - China, India, Pakistan, Mexico, and nearly all the countries of the Middle East and North Africa - have literally been having a free ride over the past two or three decades by depleting their groundwater resources. The penalty of mismanagement of this valuable resource is now coming due and it is no exaggeration to say that the results could be catastrophic for these countries and, given their importance, for the world as a whole." Many countries are living in a food bubble economy; the question for these countries is not whether the bubble will burst, but when.

The food bubble economy is just the first of the bubbles that the author explains. If we continue with business as usual - Plan A - the troubles described will continue or worsen; the world is failing environmentally and will eventually fail economically. "In sum, no one knows exactly the extent of our excessive claims on the earth in this bubble economy. The most sophisticated effort to calculate this, the one by Mathis Wackernagel and his team, estimates that in 1999 our claims on the earth exceeded its regenerative capacity by 20%. If this overdraft is rising 1% a year as seems likely, then by 2003 it was 24%. As we consume the earth's natural capital, the earth's capacity to sustain us is decreasing. We are a species out of control, setting in motion processes we do not understand with consequences that we cannot foresee."

Einstein told us that you can't hope to get out of a problem with the same thinking that got you into the problem so we cannot expect Brown's proposed solutions to be readily accepted or popular. However, they all practical and make sense. Most proposals are familiar but few holding positions of responsibility have been willing to implement them because Plan A gains more votes and today's politicians are unlikely to be around when the leaders of tomorrow have to pick up the pieces. "Plan B is a massive mobilization to deflate the global economic bubble before it reaches the bursting point. Keeping the bubble from bursting will require an unprecedented degree of international cooperation to stabilize population, climate, water tables, and soils - and at wartime speed. Indeed, in both scale and urgency the effort required is comparable to the US mobilization during World War II."

This book is not just for environmentalists; it is of interest to every housewife who will shortly see her housekeeping money pay for less and less. This book should be required reading for everyone who hopes to be alive in a few years time.

Wow, after reading this book, I am left speechless. I read this book in conjunction with a Native American Studies class that I took, and I have never learned more terrifying facts in my entire life. Lester Brown, although he admits that the task is too great for one book, describes bluntly the thin line our species is walking between self preservation and self destruction. He does not pull any punches in describing how the human race is pushing Earth dangerously close to its breaking point. Brown outlines the clear reality that if trends continue the demand put on the environment by humanity will overtake its carrying capacity. He makes many interesting points but he also stays true to the title of the book, not only spreading blame, of which there is plenty to spread, but also offering possible solutions to the most important of problems. I thought I was environmentally conscious before I read this book, boy was I surprised. This book brought my environmental consciousness to a whole new level. It also unfortunately made me realize that unless the rest of the world gets on the same page as Brown in a hurry, the environmental damage will be irreparable. I'll agree once again with what that other reviewer said. Read this book and buy 10 copies to hand out.

Clearly gives readers a broad grasp of the major problems humanity faces AND rational solutions. A must read for everyone, especially the U.S. president and the U.S. Legislature. Its great for anyone who is concerned about the near future of of Earth and is feeling hopeless. This book gave me some hope. The language is clear, the sources are well documented, and the path of solutions offered is logical and possible.

Pass the words of this man to as many readers and talkers as you can. This book is clearly written and easy to read. This is an emergency situation that we are living in now.

At least as far as the California San Joaquin River Valley, is concerned, Lester Brown's water observations are absolutely correct. During the Depression a farmer with a shovel could hit the water table in a couple of minutes. Now deep wells are not hitting water. In Fresno the Federal government's recharging of water has resulted in chlorinated water and the developer's buying their way into more suburbs towards the eastern Sierras. In the 1980's overwating farms in the Kesterston Wildlife Refuge started killing birds and fish. Chemical analyses of tissues from both birds and fish indicated toxic levels of selenium. The flow of Hispanic and Hmong constituency immigrants constantly impacts water and air quality. We in central California are much like Brown's depiction of the millions of immigrants in the current dust bowl and water decline in China, not to mention the current water table decline in the U.S. midwest. Much like they were in the early twentieth century, many Chinese and Indians will be hungry soon. Was the late 20th century mankind's only Golden Age?

When grains like rice, wheat, and soy fail to germinate due to high atmospheric temperatures, then we are in real trouble. As their water tables have been falling since 1999, watch the Chinese compete with Americans for U.S. and Canadian grains in the next couple of years. Relatedly, watch the price of meat skyrocket as grains to feed those animals skyrocket in price.

Only when the people in power recognize a world-wide emergency need to limit population growth and convert from a petroleum to hydrogen based economy, will we have any ability to continue our "Golden Age" of wealth and consumerism. But the power brokers can't see the need for radical change. As we have reproduced to the billions beyond the earth's ability to provide food, shelter, and energy, we may see the chaos and diversionary military solutions to non-military problems: over-population and petroleum energy consumpition.

First, recognize the problems as solvable. Then mobilize all appropriate government and market forces to respond, as Iran has done with contraception. I see the population explosion as the primary cause of all of our health and social problems worldwide and population reduction as the solution to those problems.

Three cheers to Lester Brown for writing this book. He is a visionary. But how do we get the people in charge to understand the message sooner rather than after chaos and anarchy become the law of the land? I only wish I were exagerating.

Pass the words of Lester Brown to as many readers and talkers as you can. This book is clearly written and easy to read. This is an emergency situation that we are living in now. As a result of reading this book, I have joined Earth Policy Institute and Population Connection on the World Wide Web.

Do you think that our misuse of global resources has made it impossible to avoid a huge global economic and societal collapse in the near future? The author of this book doesn't think so. He says that although we're headed in the wrong direction right now, there are some actions we can actually take to turn things around.

Most of us understand the concept of an economic plan. A family that spends plenty of money has a successful plan if it consistently makes more money than it spends. It also has a successful plan if it consistently spends more money than it makes, if it has so much capital that it will last for a very long time. In all this, the family has to measure the true costs and risks involved in its economic decisions, but that is the gist of it.

If a family spends more than it makes and runs out of money, it can go bankrupt. And that can mean being unable to purchase necessities. It can mean being unable to purchase extremely inexpensive items that had not previously been a factor in one's budget. And it can mean not being able to spend money on items that will enable one to earn money (or to earn much more money).

All this means that we tend to learn about the prices of items and judge purchases accordingly.

Well, the same is true for a global economy. We can run out of resources. We can use them up faster than we are accumulating them. And one step we ought to take to prevent this is to measure the true cost of non-renewable resources and of items that do environmental damage that will be costly in the future.

Of course, questions of overconsumption become more dramatic as the planet's population goes up. In times of high population, we need to worry about the costs of fossil fuels, health care, education, computers, food, water, high-meat diets, yachts, jewelry, fine clothes, mansions, and the like not just in terms of the cost in paper money but in terms of effect on our resources and on the environment.

As the author points out, the quality of life is going to depend on the population, and we need to control our population to be able to manage a global economy. He proposes trying to improve education to help stabilize the Earth's population at about 7.5 billion. But can we maintain such a population without ruining the environment or running out of resources? If we can't, then human society will be in serious trouble.

Brown offers a note of hope. Although we'll be in trouble if we pursue a course of "business as usual," there is a Plan B that could work fairly well. It consists of stabilizing our population, as mentioned earlier. And it means raising water and land productivity, as the author explains in detail. Taking more advantage of drip irrigation alone would significantly increase water productivity. And we'll want to cut carbon emissions in half in the next ten years. We'll need to take this seriously, and put our planet on something like a war footing to do it. We'll need to restructure our tax system, and place a heavy tax burden on environmentally destructive activities (such as fossil fuel burning). We need to incorporate these ecological costs, and "get the market to send signals that reflect reality."

And Brown makes it clear that we need to do something soon. Our global population is already reaching a level that is difficult to maintain indefinitely. We're seeing the collapse of some fisheries, the melting of glaciers due to global warming, falling water tables, and food shortages in the most populous areas. Right now, for example, although the Chinese financial picture has been improving, water shortages have caused grain harvests to fall there.

If we do something to address the problems Brown discusses here, and do it soon, we may avoid a future in which most of us are poor and miserable.

Plan B is a quick read that brings you up to speed on today's global climate crisis and what can be done about it. Lester Brown does an impeccable job using primary sources to build the Big Picture in a gripping way. Surprises abound. For example, countries with threatened water supplies will import grain. Why? Because it takes 1,000 tons of water to produce a ton of grain (p. 24). Brown also warns of increased storms and climate change due to global warming, remarking that "New Orleans would be under water" (p. 74). If anything, the severity of polar melt and other changes has been worse than Brown predicts, and he was writing in 2003!

Plan B offers a three-fold solution to these problems: (1) tax-shifting, i.e. reducing income taxes while increasing taxes on toxics and carbon emissions. This would mean much higher gas taxes. (2) A re-mobilization of resources modeled after wartime economies that would rapidly build out energy efficiency, hydrogen, wind and solar power infrastructures. (3) A $62 billion / year plan to uproot the social causes of runaway population and environmental stress. This would provide universal basic education and health care, reproductive health and planning (serious business with 29 million HIV cases in Africa --p. 82), school lunch programs (the only reliable meal millions of children may have), etc. Compare this to the U.S.A.'s 2002 budgets of $10 billion in foreign aid and $343 billion for the military (pp. 219, 220).

And here is where the book falls a bit short for me. There's not much mention of what can be done locally, even individually, other than (implicitly) go through top-down political channels that many believe are corrupt. Words such as "organic," "permaculture," "new urbanism," etc. do not appear in the book. It does condemn water-based sewage (in favor of composting toilets - p. 126), but that's as far as it goes for individual choice. With tax-exempt contributions, people can begin their own "tax shifting" and exert political pressure. I'd have liked to see at least a few hints along these lines.

Perhaps Plan B. 2.0, to be published in January 2006, will addres these issues. According to the Earth Policy Institute, the new book will directly address Peak Oil, Urban Farming, and other topics that have come to the fore in the three short years since the first edition. Things are changing fast; I'm betting on Brown to keep us informed.

The author outlines the problems that we face today with water, energy, pollution, aids, global warming, etc. and he proposes solutions.

In other words there is a way out of this mess but it will take a great deal of will and courage by all peoples of the world, particularly governments, to move us to Plan B because Plan A, business as usual, will ultimately lead to catastrophe.

This remarkable book discusses the major environmental issues threatening our planet today. I was pleased with the fairly careful use of evidence and the relative lack of hyberbole. My favorite aspect of this book is that after the author discusses the problems, he makes some rational suggestions about solutions. It really would be a joy if every human on the planet would read this book.