LETTERS TO THE EDITOR: CONSERVATIONISTS PROTECT PLANET FROM THE UNINFORMED

Editor:

Once again, while lauding the success of the Endangered Species Act in protecting the bald eagle, the Southeast Missourian takes an uninformed swipe at conservationists and resource managers by defining them as "overzealous animal lovers" (July 11, 1994) and by attacking natural resource management, biodiversity protection, and conservation.

I would like to make several points to the writer of this editorial.

Job losses in the timber industry preceded listing of the Northern Spotted Owl. Economic problems in those communities resulted from the decisions of the timber industry to mechanize and to export raw logs rather than process them in the U.S. Initially it was the drive for short-term profits on the part of the industry that cost timber jobs.

By causing massive soil erosion and stream pollution, current forestry practices have destroyed and continue to destroy the commercial and recreational fishing industries and the income of thousands of families employed in these activities. Furthermore, by reducing the tourist attraction of the area, forestry is also reducing the potential income of folks making a living out of tourism.

With current harvest rates and management practices, the northwestern forest ecosystems will continue to be destroyed as they are mined and transformed to tree farms, much of the process occurring at taxpayer expense due to below-cost sales of federally owned timber. While we know that a tree farm is a biological desert compared to a forest, we simply have no knowledge of the long-term consequences of the transition to tree farm for timber production.

Rather than harvesting and managing in a manner that would promote and sustain forest ecosystems, watersheds, and the thousands of species that occupy them, forests are being mismanaged for short-term profit. When the mining is complete, job-losses and economic disruption will be inevitable. Sustainable management, however, would maintain forests, the economy, and the jobs.

Only a totally uninformed individual would confuse natural resource managers and conservationists with animal rights advocates as is implied by your allusion to "overzealous animal lovers." The professionals focus on natural systems rather than individuals. Conservationists recognize the threat posed to natural ecosystems by, for example, feral horses and large deer populations, and recommend their removal or reduction. Animal rights advocates and "overzealous animal lovers" often stand in direct opposition to conservation. Those who would protect individual animals at the expense of natural systems, and who defend feral horses in National Parks (a position taken by the Southeast Missourian) or large deer populations are the menace; they are neither conservationists nor wise natural resource managers.

As a nation and a planet, our economic success is based on our natural resources and our natural ecosystems. If we mismanage these, we jeopardize our economic future.

Future generations will be less interested in how much money WE make this year than in the condition of the planet THEY inherit. The Endangered Species Act, up for renewal, is one important mechanism that allows those of us concerned about the future to protect the plant from those who are uninformed and from those who lack concern for the future.

ALAN R.P. JOURNET

Cape Girardeau