Ludwig & Hasbeen,
I too have struggled with the meaning of sustainability.
One statement I saw recently was from memory a political party or
follower was "Sustainable Growth".
Now to my mind that is a straight contradiction of terms.

The best definition I have seen is that promoted by the Transition Movement.
I believe they have it as near right as you can get.
Their name says it all, they don't disconnect their power line and
they do use solar cells, they like to grow as much of their own food
as they can and the rest they buy from local farmers.
They buy as small a car as they can use and they shop locally.

They encourage local industry and in some areas they even have local
currencies. Totnes in the UK has its own money which they buy from
their organisation and shopkeepers and other businesses in the town
will accept. It keeps the profits in the district rather than it being
dragged off to remote business HQs.
It appears to work well.

There are Transition groups all over the world.
There is a very active one on the Sunshine Coast in Qld and quite a
number in other parts of Australia.

Here is their web site;

http://www.transitiontowns.org/

Have a look, they won't frighten you.

Dear Ludwig,

I'm so pleased that you liked the Engineers Australia
response to the Government's Issues Paper. It made
a great deal of sense to me and as you point out
that's what governments should be doing.

Lexi,
I went back and reread that article.
I agree with everything he said about the current position.

I don't think that the need is just to reduce the rate of population
increase, but we need to adjust the way we live.
Indeed we have no choice but to adapt, as it is slowly being imposed
on us. I saw a program on the BBC recently about people in Greece
going back to their family farms when they lost their jobs and had no hope of work.
Farms that had been run by aging grandparents or parents were being
revitalised to support the younger families.
The effect was positive for the local town and the local schools.
How that would translate to places like Australia I don't know.

Sorry folks, too much motherhood, & mot enough real information in either paper, particularly the professors. Not a damn thing to tell me what they really want to do, or when, or by how much. They could want to tie me in a straight jacket, or just not run the air conditioning.

Also far too much reference to global warming, a now very useless topic, soon to be abandoned. The most important thing we could do is scrap this damn fool wind power, & get back to proven, cheep coal.

I can still only see it as something the greens want to use to belt me with, & until I see some definite facts about what proponents want to do, count me out.

Any one who can see the Murray Darling plan as anything but a smart ploy by South Oz to pinch everyone else's water to fill their damn at the mouth, has lost me. Shutting down irrigators just to supply Adelaide, with water & a fresh water water ski lake is not a great idea in my view.

Chucking water uselessly down the Snowy river is another. Green garbage, tacked onto what could be realistic schemes will not help anyone but the fools who want grandiose gestures.

So on the great sustainability project, count me out, if you cant become much more specific.

Dear Bazz,

We've covered this ground previously.

If world population continues to grow rapidly,
if industrialisation spreads around the world,
and if pollution and resource depletion continues
at an increasing rate - sweeping social changes
await us all. But you're right. Making appropriate
changes does become politically difficult as
vested economic interests are a powerful political
lobby - and they're unwilling to commit the
necessary resources to the task.

Also, part of the problem is that we're so
used to exploiting natural resources and dumping
our waste products into the environment that we
frequently forget that resources are limited and
exhaustible and that our lifestyles can disrupt
the ecological balance on which our survival
depends.

Dear Bazz

How can we have sustainable growth when the limit on world population of 11 billion will be well and truly overshot by 2050?

Problem is that governments are following the advice of irrational technocrats like gingerbeers instead of listening to rational arguments being put forward by historians, anthropologists, sociologists, etc. because these people don't have trade degrees and don't deal with the practical things in life.

The Forum chorus: Historians, anthropologists, sociologists? What are they?