Are conserved areas really important to us anymore?

Having spent my early working career in Government trying to protect conserved areas, (Kruger National Park Coking Project, for one), I am beginning to wonder if the assault on protected areas is commencing once again, as population expansion, food and land demands, and cultural pressures are calling for “pristine” land to be handed back to “the people”.

Population pressures are threatening water and energy supplies. Pollution from uncontrolled human development is introducing contamination into those previously clean surface and subsurface water supplies. Keeping human habitation from the vital Mountain catchments has been a critical element that has protected our fresh water supplies for so long. These catchments are now being eroded and invaded to the detriment of those critical pristine ecosystems.

It doesn’t help that corruption in politics and government is causing decisions to be made that benefit select individuals rather than the People at Large. Living for today and ignoring tomorrow is a fatal life approach. We still have not understood the significance of the now age-old definition of sustainable development, “…a way of life that meets the needs of the present while also ensuring the ability of future generations to meet their own needs…”

Once upon a time, nomadic bands of humans moved around the continent sustainably utilising the natural resources that were then so freely available. They would move on when natural capital returns began dropping off. This was to find fresh food sources and to give the used land a chance to recover, ready for the next “visit”. These times are long gone, but now, Society must be responsible enough to protect those areas on which they depend for future food, water and energy.

The influence of humans through their massive urbanisation projects and overwhelming infrastructure systems (monoculture farming, roads, irrigation systems, etc.) has taken us beyond the ability of nature to adapt to accommodate these massive demands upon natural systems. Ex-Vice-President and Environmentalist, Al Gore, said, “…Through all these new, imaginative, and creative approaches to the problem of sharing our earth with other creatures there runs a constant theme, the awareness that we are dealing with life – with living populations and all their pressures and counter pressures and surges and recessions…”

If we are to live in harmony with the Natural Systems that we ultimately depend upon, we need to do far more to minimise our negative impacts and consider many more activities that allow natural recovery and rejuvenation. We also need to do far more to reduce our growing resource demands on a planet that is groaning under the weight of human exploitation.