Welcome to the Environment Show, exploring issues and events of the planet.
I'm Thomas Lalley.
The Environment Show is a national production made possible by Heming's Motor News, the
monthly Bible of the Old Car Hobby from Bennington Vermont, 1-800-C-A-R-H-E-R-E.
Your host is Peter Burley.
Thanks Thomas, coming up on this week's Environment Show, we'll remember the life of Ken Sarawewa,
the Nigerian writer and activist hanged for speaking out against environmental and human
rights crimes, and we'll find out how and why he died and hear some of his writings.
Then we'll explore the world of greenwashing.
Many corporations spend millions of dollars to portray themselves as environmentally friendly,
but oftentimes they're just empty claims.
And in our Earth calendar we'll explore the world of glaze.
These seemingly barren lands are actually filled with dynamic plants and animals which
are now making rubbery, stummy mats.
This should catalyze your imagination.
These stories are more coming up this week on the Environment Show.
On November 10, 1995, Ken Sarawewa was executed by Hanging in Port Harcourt, Nigeria.
I learned about Mr. Sarawewa last year when he was awarded the Golden Prize, an honor
that is bestowed by the Golden Environmental Foundation of San Francisco to the outstanding
individual from each continent who has done the most to protect the environment.
Duane Silverstein, executive director of the Foundation, describes Ken Sarawewa's crusade.
Royal Dutch Shell struck oil on the Agoni lands in 1958 and according to a Wall Street
Journal article has extracted some 30 billion dollars that the billion would be worth of
oil since then.
Yet even by Africa's standards, the Agoni's people remain desperately poor and the Wall Street
Journal article went to say that it has been left with a ravaged environment as well.
Ken Sarawewa, who is a very noted prominent author in Nigeria, has become the lead spokesman
on behalf of the Agoni people and behalf of the environment there and he's done it with
a lot of courage and he's paid a very, very serious price for speaking out.
At one point, Sarawewa organized a protest against the oil companies which included 300,000
of the 500,000 Agonnes.
He was arrested numerous times and ultimately charged with having responsibility for the
death of four people who were killed during a demonstration he was not at.
His imprisonment in trial was closely watched by international human rights organizations.
Kurt Gurring is deputy director of the U.S. branch of Amnesty International.
This is the latest indication of the Nigerian military's utter contempt for the most basic
international human rights standards.
I actually cannot recall another recent incident in which a government has spurned the
police from around the world to spare the life of someone who is clearly an environmental
and human rights activist against whom the charges of complicity and murder are quite
weak and who was subjected to a trial which lacked the most elemental standards of due
process.
Despite those serious problems, despite the widespread police reclamancy, the Nigerian military
just snubbed its nose at the world community and went forward with the execution.
Barika Idonkwe, who is the director of the organizations Sarawewa founded, describes
his imprisonment and trial.
Ken was not tried in the normal Nigerian court.
He was detained for eight months without charge, without access to his lawyer or his family
or medical attention.
He was stabbed.
He was detained for 65 days, came to his cell for 65 days.
He was not charged.
He did not see any lawyer.
Nobody saw him.
He was held in Communicadu.
And so they think they thought of what to do and because there was no evidence for them
to try him in the normal court, they had to set up a special military tribunal and they
pried witnesses, bred people to bear force witnesses against him.
They also charged that by inviting Nigerian troops to Ogoni lands to protect oil installations,
Shell was responsible for the incredible oppression the Nigerian army inflicted on Ogoni people.
The environment at Shell repeatedly tried to contact a spokesman for the Nigerian government
and from Shell, without success.
But Shell did forward a statement from Brian Anderson, managing director of Shell and Nigeria.
Shell denies all allegations of bribery made during the proceedings which resulted in
the conviction of Sarawiva and Shell does not accept that oil activities have caused
devastation in Ogoni land or anywhere in their area of operations in the Niger Delta.
Growing of amnesty international disagrees.
The undeniable point that they can escape from or remove themselves from is that they
carry a great deal of responsibility for the air, the soil and the water pollution that
has devastated that land.
Shell response has been strong.
Steps taken by the Clinton administration are described by Mac Deshazer of the National
Security Council in the White House.
In addition, the U.S. Ambassador to Lagos has been called home and the U.S. Ambassador to
the United Nations has been instructed to explore further international sanctions.
So far, governmental authorities have been cool to the demand of a number of private groups
to establish an international embargo of Nigerian oil.
Ken Sarawiva well understood the plaintiff as a Ghani people resulted from forces that
were not confined to Nigeria.
Ken Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch, reads from one of Sarawiva's writings
in which he reflects about the role of world oil markets.
What has happened and what is happening to the Ghani is strictly not the fault of the
Nigerian elite and Shell company alone.
The international community has played a very significant role in it.
If the Americans did not purchase Nigerian oil, the Nigerian nation would not be nor would
the oppressive ethnic majority in the country have the wherewithal to pursue its genocidal
intentions.
Indeed, there is a sense in which the Nigerian oil, which the Americans, Europeans and Japanese
buy is stolen property.
It has been seized from its owners by force of arms and has not been paid for.
Therefore these buyers are receiving stolen property.
Also it is Western investment and technology which keep the Nigerian oil industry and therefore
the Nigerian nation alive, oil being 94 percent of Nigeria's gross domestic product.
Also, European and American shareholders and multinational oil companies and manufacturers
of oil mining equipment have benefited from the perlining of a Ghani resources, the devastation
of the Ghani environment and the genocide of the Ghani people.
We conclude with Roth's reading of Sir Wee was poem of spiritual exhaustion called
Tussaroga, which means rainmaker.
We have returned with empty hands and hollow minds from the thunderstorm raining blood,
O mighty one whose wink brings rain.
We did not pray for war.
Wash the stain of strife away.
We'll speak no more of coups and kernels and raids at dead of night.
We'll forget the bombs, build scores of tombs and bury the dead.
Receive us mighty one with a cleansing shower.
We honor Ken Sir Wee who gave his life fighting for the freedom of his people and the health
of their land.
I'm Peter Burley.
We've all seen ads touting the environmental sensitivity of chemical oil and timber companies.
These ads are part of the broader world of public relations.
Last year, the top 15 PR firms collectively took in a billion dollars.
Some environmentalists say wealthy corporations mount so-called greenwashing campaigns to
divert attention from their environmental shortcomings.
But the PR companies save their only employing the same tactics of many environmental groups.
Thomas Lally reports on the battle for public opinion.
Dow lets you do great things.
Beef, real food for real people.
Without chemicals, life as we know it wouldn't exist.
GE, we bring good things to life.
All of these slogans serve as cornerstones for advertising and public relations campaigns,
while these kinds of campaigns are nothing new.
The widespread use of environmental awareness as a selling point is.
But can we believe what they say and how pervasive is their influence?
It's completely pervasive and very ubiquitous every time you watch television news or read
an article in the paper.
You're being influenced by a public relations campaign.
John Stauber is the executive director of the Center for Media and Democracy and co-author
of the book, Toxic Sludge is Good for You.
Lies, damn lies, and the public relations industry.
He says while all industries today employ similar PR strategies, greenwashing is today particularly
popular.
But PR is a lot more than just advertising.
PR firms also lobby politicians who then go on to write legislation.
They also buy for the attention of journalists who go on to write the news.
However it's done, PR campaigns are often successful.
Some major polluting corporations have had tremendous greenwashing success.
Companies such as Dow Chemical, through spending millions of dollars on greenwashing public relations
campaigns, have, according to opinion polls, really changed their ranking with the public
and their work has, I believe, misled many people into thinking that they have a renewed
environmental responsibility when what they really have is an infigurated environmental
public relations campaign that's changed their public image.
One of the ways Stauber says these so-called greenwashing campaigns work is by giving print
journalists pre-written stories.
PR firms also provide video and audio material, including fully produced stories to the electronic
media.
So some of the news you hear and see is a product not of a journalist, but of someone paid
by a PR firm.
But those in the PR industry say there's nothing wrong with this.
John Palusek is the president of Catch and Public Affairs, the world's seventh largest
PR firm.
If I were a news director at a radio or television station, I would take great umbrage and be
rather angry with Mr. Stauber because what he is saying is an effect of an insult to their
intelligence and that it always becomes a matter of the editor as to whether to use it and
how to identify it.
Palusek's firm specializes in what's called crisis management or damage control.
This is the process of minimizing negative publicity when an event like the Exxon Valdez
oil spill takes place which jeopardizes an organization's reputation.
While many people like Stauber question how a PR firm could represent for instance a tobacco
company to help them advertise their message that tobacco has no link to cancer.
Palusek says PR firms provide an important and necessary service.
I have no problem in representing a chemical company, a nuclear company, any number of
other companies at Stauber attacks.
What he fails to appropriately weigh is the fact that these companies and these industries
provide a very valuable service to society that our entire civilization and society is largely
based on how we handle chemicals and how we handle energy and responsible work in that
area is to be represented with honor.
But PR is not just for chemical and tobacco companies.
Virtually all organizations from your neighborhood church to Fortune 500 companies use PR methods
to cast themselves in the best light.
While corporate interests represent the overwhelming majority of public relations, nonprofits are
also getting into the act.
Environmental Media Services is a nonprofit PR firm representing environmental groups.
Politically sharp is the executive director.
He says being viewed as environmentally friendly is today crucial to any organization's public
image.
See that in every time you turn on the television or open a magazine and see these huge spreads
of, for example, the timber companies, the public, the gorgeous two-page full-color spreads
in all the big national magazines where a father and son are looking out over a beautiful
forest and the father is telling his son how proud he is that his company is helping
to preserve and protect and regenerate forests for future generations and so on.
It's clearly something that corporations feel is an extremely important part of their
public image.
John Stober says issues today are not just lobbied but managed.
This means that a disaster like Union Carbides accident in Bhopal, India is mitigated on
all levels, from community outreach to advertising to press conferences and finally to lobbying.
He encourages people to pay attention not only to what is being said but who is saying
it and finally to take everything with a very large grain of green salt.
For the Environment Show, I'm Thomas Lalley.
We're entering the holiday season, a time when Americans consume more in just a few weeks
than some people in third world countries consume in a lifetime.
Are there enough resources to let us do this forever?
Probably not.
So how can we achieve a sustainable Christmas or Hanukkah?
Some suggest using less wrapping materials and avoiding styrofoam, others advocate organic
foods.
We want your suggestions about how each of us can achieve a sustainable holiday and we
will broadcast them on a later show.
Let us at 318 Central Avenue, Albany, New York 1 2 2 0 6.
Or you can reach us by email at env.showw at aol.com.
That's env.showw at aol.com.
I'm Peter Burley.
Still ahead, in our ear to the ground segment, you'll meet the woman who led the fight to
return wolves to Yellowstone National Park.
Then a Wyoming rancher will lock horns with an environmentalist over whether we should
continue to release wolves in the west.
And our earth calendar will explore the dynamic world of blaze.
These seemingly barren areas are now making the transition from a hot dry summer to the
wet winter by creating rubbery, stummy mats.
These stories still ahead on the environment show.
I'm Linda Anderson and this is Ear to the Ground, the stories about people affecting
changing the environment.
This week, Renee Askins returning wolves to the wild.
For thousands of years, the wolf roamed freely throughout our continent.
Perceived as a threat to livestock by settlers in the west, wolves were systematically slaughtered.
By the 1930s, the wolf was exterminated in the west, including in the nation's first
national park, Yellowstone, an area protected to preserve wildlife and natural wonders.
Wolves now have been returned to Idaho and more symbolically, last March, in Yellowstone.
Largely responsible was Renee Askins, founder and executive director of the Wolf Fund.
Personally passionate about wolves, Askins, a Yale educated biologist, recognized Yellowstone
as the perfect place to restore wolves to the wild.
I really think that it's an extraordinary place.
The largest temperate ecosystem, certainly in the lower 48.
It's an international biosphere reserve and it offers a sizable wilderness that really
there are nowhere else in the lower 48 offers any longer.
It's really one of the few places that can support free-ranging predators like bears and mountain
lions and wolves.
And so it was very important, ecologically, but it was also very important, ethically,
that this was our first national park.
Askins' role with the Wolf Fund has been that of educator and advocate.
For 14 years, she has tirelessly devoted herself to this cause, never believing that it
wouldn't happen.
She traveled and talked to everyone from environmentalists, politicians, celebrities and ranchers.
Askins says so many issues are framed as us against them, and she felt it was important
to build bridges rather than dig trenches, which meant working with ranchers.
To many ranchers, Askins says the reintroduction of wolves represented a threat that was bigger
than the wolf itself.
It meant giving up control and accepting the social change in the West.
The wolf issue she sees as a vehicle for opening dialogue on many of these difficult
issues.
With the wolves back in Yellowstone, there is now one complete ecosystem, same as it was,
before Europeans entered this continent.
The distinct action of actually seeing the wolves come into the park, and then, of course,
three months later seeing them released was just a tremendous delight.
And beyond our wildest dreams, having somewhere between the reports that are up to 10 to 15,000
people actually see the wolves throughout the summer was just so wonderful.
We never ever thought that the wolves would be as visible in this early stages.
So that was just really a great reward, I think, for the public that it really worked
so hard to make this happen.
With Eard to the Ground, this is Linda Anderson.
And now it's time for locking horns, an environment showed debate.
The introduction of wolves in Yellowstone National Park has raised the ire of many ranchers
who say their livestock is put in danger by these predators.
But environmentalists say wolves are an important part of the ecosystem and rarely attack cows
or sheep.
Joining us are Roger Schlichhausen, president of the Defenders of Wildlife, a national
environmental group, and Larry Burrett, vice president of the Farm Bureau in Cheyenne,
Naomi.
Liking horns over the question, should the introduction of wolves in Yellowstone National
Park continue?
Mr. Schlichhausen?
Well, the answer is yes.
First and overwhelming majority of Americans strong, we support wolf reintroduction to Yellowstone.
The law requires that the wolf be returned, and scientists say it will be good for the
ecosystem's health.
Not only that, it should produce about $20 million in annual tourist revenue to the region.
Even while the cost of wolf predation on livestock and there may be no net increase because
of displacement of coyotes by wolves will be minimal.
And even that minimal amount will be fully reimbursed by defenders of wildlife, which pays
ranchers at market value for any losses.
The rational arguments are all on the side of returning the wolf to Yellowstone.
There is no reason to delay moving forward with the second round of reintroductions this
winner.
And Mr. Burrett, in reply?
We do not feel it should continue.
In fact, we'd like to have the wolves that are there now returned to Canada because they're
not essential.
In fact, it's a non-essentialist experimental population.
They're not endangered.
They're 60,000 of them in Canada, 2000 in Minnesota, and 5000 in Alaska.
They're not biologically endangered.
Therefore, this is a waste of time and scarce resources.
And in fact, this is so non-essential that we check this morning and the Yellowstone National
Park wolf biologist is working today.
Mr. Schlich hasn't in response.
Well, Larry's arguments are nonsense, and they've been shown to be such over and over again.
The lawsuit they're bringing is a nuisance lawsuit brought only for political reasons, and
it has no chance of prevailing in court.
I'll make one final point.
The symbolic importance of restoring the wolf to Yellowstone makes the event one of the
real watersheds in conservation.
Like it or not, living nature is now hostage to human attitudes, and maybe by agreeing
to save the wolf, we can begin to improve society's attitude toward nature and other species
of life.
Mr. Burret, the last word.
Well, when we talk about reality, the government is shut down today because of a shortage of
money.
We're spending money on this case on a vision that some people have, but it's not an
essential vision.
It does not take any consideration.
All of the problems this nation has and many other arenas, it is just we'd like to have
it, and that's just what it is.
And now it's time for the Earth Calendar.
Glades are common in many parts of the southeast and Midwest.
They're also known as barons, since the soil is thin and only grasses and some small
trees can grow there.
But these places display a rich variety of life as many as 250 species of wildflowers
can grow in a single glade.
During the summer months, glades get hot and dry, boasting life commonly found in the desert.
But this time of year, glades begin to change.
Plants that were once subject to searing heat are now covered with snow and standing
water.
George Scevich is a botanist with the Missouri Department of Conservation and curator
of plants at the Missouri Botanical Gardens.
Many of the most interesting creatures that live on glades are things that one might
think of more from the southwestern United States have extensions of their ranges into
these glades systems.
For example, in Missouri and our glades is where one finds scorpions and tarantulas.
So in some ways it's sort of a prairie-like environment because it has lots of grasses,
the difference being that there's not as much soil.
Well, one of the really fascinating things about glades for nature study is that there's
a real sea's analogy and that there is a changing of what is active and interesting.
During the spring and late spring months we have really nice wildfire blooms on some
of these glades, which is when things are starting to dry up but not so dry that everything
has become crisp.
As we move into the dryer summer months, a lot of things tend to go dormant.
Within the fall after they start shedding their fruits, a lot of things are shutting down
on the glades and as we move into winter, actually it's the lichens and some of the algae
and some of the blue-green bacteria that really come into their own because they're able
to deal with these wetter conditions and that's really a good time of year for them and
their dormant then during the hotter dryer parts of the year.
Dr. Yuskevich says that right about now the blue-green bacteria formerly known as blue-green
algae are forming rubbery scummy mats on the glades.
Could it be that some of these bacteria have reached Washington and that's what really
shut down the government?
Thanks for joining us on this week's Environment Show.
I'm Peter Burley.
For a cassette copy of the program, call 1-800-747-7444.
Ask for program number 307.
The Environment Show is a presentation of national productions which is solely responsible
for its content.
Thomas Lally is the producer.
Dr. Alan Chartalk is the executive producer.
The Environment Show is made possible by Heming's Motor News, the monthly Bible of the
Old Car Hobby, 1-800-CAR-HER.
So long, join us next week for the Environment Show.
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