Tuesday, 30 March 2021

Birds of a Feather?

News about the 'Dutch' Green Business group gets weirder and weirder. First, we hear that well-known environmentalist Nigel Farage has been appointed to their advisory board. Then we are told that one of the group's major share-holders is a British businessman. It turns out, he is another Trump enthusiast and a QAnon propaganist (https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2021/mar/29/nigel-farage-green-employer-qanon-john-mappin). This doesn't augur well for the motivations of a company who claim their prime focus is to solve environmental problems by planting trees. I wonder if they would quote me the number of trees needed for a bit of Space Tourism? How about running Formula 1 or a major International Football competition? Clearing a few hundred square kilometres of Amazon rainforest? Perhaps, I need to first find out a) where the trees would be located; b) the species involved; c) how long they would remain in place and d) what would happen to them subsequently? Or should I just trust them to do the right thing?

1 comment:

Paul Brain said...

Perhaps the clearest indication of their primary motivation would be seen if disease wiped out many of the trees planted by this group (always likely, if they go for monocultures). Would they feel duty bound to replant the area at their own cost or would they see it as an opportunity to sell more carbon off-setting?

Birder's Bonus 241

Noted a Curlew ( Numenius arquata ) on the Loughor estuary at Bynea.