Thirty years ago, a group of academic theorists called the Club
of Rome put forth the "limits to growth" theory, predicting
disaster for humankind unless we abandoned natural resource-
depleting economic and technological progress.
"Limits to growth" arguments are still championed by
"environmental protection" agencies, the United Nations and other
international organisations such as the World Bank and the
theory is being resurrected at the current U.N.-sponsored World
Conference on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg.
But "limits to growth" theories have been proved wrong in a
variety of ways, observers point out:
Energy resources are more abundant now than they were 30
years ago, not less.
So much food is being produced that famines are not
agricultural problems but the result of misguided
government policies in the Third World.
The air and water are cleaner in wealthy industrialised
countries that have the resources to clean the
environment.
And although the Johannesburg meeting will devote
considerable attention to the assertion that the world is
"running out of water," technological developments have
made water available in even the driest areas thanks to
desalinisation.
A United Nations-sponsored ban on Freon gas cost huge sums for
retrofitting refrigerators and air-conditioners even though
the "science" behind it was highly suspect.
Most recently, the environmental crusade to save the forests by
leaving them pristine and alone has resulted in fires that have
destroyed vast swaths throughout the western U.S. as well as
the creatures which live in them.
Source: George Melloan, 'Limits to Growth:' a Dumb Theory that
Refuses to Die, Wall Street Journal, August 27, 2002.
For text (WSJ subscribers)
http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB1030411924810318355-search,00.htm
For more on Sustainable Development http://www.ncpa.org/iss/env
FMF Policy Bulletin\3 September 2002