[extropy-chat] FWD [PvT] Terraforming Earth

[Brent Neal]

 (2/13/04 19:25) Technotranscendence <neptune at superlink.net> wrote:

>The Brazilian government actually subsidizes ranching and agriculture in
>the Amazon basin and has been doing so for decades -- as well as pushing
>the natives off their land and not recognizing any ownership rights to
>it.  The Brazilian government also puts in lines of communication and
>the like, reducing the costs even lower.  Absent that government
>intervention abd recognize the natives' right to property in the region
>then, chances are, there'd be a lot less farming and ranching in the
>Amazon basin.

I wasn't aware of the subsidies, but I've been following the displacement of the Amazonian basin natives in the news. I'd always assumed that the governments policies on the latter drove the deforestation in absence of anything else (i.e. push the subsistence farmers farther away from civilization, and then use the cleared land for large scale agriculture - at least the land that is still arable after the slash-and-burn.

B
-- 
Brent Neal
Geek of all Trades
http://brentn.freeshell.org

"Specialization is for insects" -- Robert A. Heinlein