Greenpeace Co-Founder, Patrick Moore, on the Current State of Radical Environmentalism

"There is no doubt that the environments of wealthy, developed countries are considerably healthier today than on the first Earth Day. Air and water are cleaner. Human life expectancies are longer. Forests are abundant and growing. Developed countries have wanted improved environments and they have been wealthy enough to afford them......................................................................................But the story is much different elsewhere. Indeed, for much of the rest of the world, conditions are worse than they should be. Ironically, the very movement that made its presence felt in rallies across this country in 1970 and that thrives in the developed world today must shoulder much of the blame for the developing world's sorry state. It is impeding both economic and environmental progress due to an agenda that is anti-development, anti- technology and, in the final analysis, anti-human........................................................................................For example, today's eco-activists boast that they have blocked more than 200 hydroelectric projects in the developing world over the past two decades. It is true that hydro power has a large ecological footprint, creating lakes and filling valleys. But it is a renewable energy that makes it possible to read after the sun goes down, boosting literacy in poor areas. It provides controlled irrigation for better crop yields and mitigates flooding and the loss of life and property damage..........................................................................................Moreover, green groups have zero-tolerance policies when it comes to genetically modified crops. This includes the genetically modified "golden rice" that could help prevent blindness in Asian and African children (as many as 500,000 go blind every year, according to the National Institutes of Health) plus hundreds of millions of others who suffer from vitamin A deficiency. Because of activist opposition to GM crops, it will be at least five years before golden rice can be planted in many parts of the developing world. That means another 2.5 million kids could go blind even though no human or natural risk is associated with planting this crop............................................................................................Indeed, many GM crops such as cotton and corn can make impoverished families wealthy enough to have dignified lives, educate their children and afford clean water and sanitation -- things we in the developed world take for granted. Farmers in Indonesia, China, Brazil, India and the Philippines are now benefiting from this technology with no demonstrable harm. Yet Greenpeace and other environmental groups oppose all GM crops and are succeeding in blocking them in many countries...........................................................................................The fear of GM crops, fed by environmentalist hysteria in Europe and the United States, has prompted a number of African countries, including Zambia and Angola, to ban U.S. food aid because it may contain GM corn. Desperate Africans have broken into government silos to take GM food aid donated by the United States that is being denied them. Yet you can go into any supermarket in these countries and buy Kellogg's corn flakes and hundreds of other prepared foods that contain GM ingredients. There are no restrictions on these foods. The people who can afford to buy them do so; yet the people too poor to purchase their next meal are denied the same foods. These policies border on genocide in the name of environmental concerns, yet environmental groups support them.................................................................................................Or consider that the pesticide DDT has been proven to radically reduce malaria in South Africa, while activist groups such as the World Wildlife Fund push for a total ban on its use. It only needs to be sprayed inside houses, where it poses no threat to the external environment, to make it effective. Despite the ability to stop malaria in its tracks with DDT -- as the United States had already done before its use was prohibited here -- 300 million people will become infected every year and at least 1 million will die, according to the World Health Organization."........................................................................................He doesn't mention it here but Moore has also spoken out against the movement's hard-core anti-mining and anti-chlorine positions. He obviously thinks that those are anti-human, too.