Pubdate: Mon, 08 Jan 2007
Source: Sun Times, The (Owen Sound, CN ON)
Copyright: 2007 Osprey Media Group Inc.
Contact:  http://www.owensoundsuntimes.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1544
Author: Paul DeFelice

PAPER FROM HEMP A GOOD IDEA

Editor:

(Re: Road Warrior: Paper here to stay so let's make it with hemp by Tim Wees.)

I heartily concur with Mr. Wees that it is time we quit liquidating 
our forest ecosystems to make something as disposable as paper. The 
U.S. Department of Agriculture reported in 1916 in Bulletin No. 404 
that one acre of cannabis hemp, in annual rotation over a 20-year 
period, would produce as much pulp for paper as 4.1 acres of trees 
being cut down over the same 20-year period.

The existing forest can be seen as capital and the rate at which the 
forest grows is the interest. In order to protect forests and their 
ecosystems we should live off the interest and not spend our capital. 
One only has to look at Google Earth to see that we have basically no 
forest capital left.

Try scanning the Canadian countryside for any contiguous forest. You 
won't find it. What you will see is a patchwork quilt of clearcuts 
everywhere except in the most inaccessible areas and the odd park. It 
makes me literally sick to my stomach and instills fear for the 
future of our planet.

It seems we're proving that we are no different from the Easter 
Island inhabitants who cut every last tree even though they could see 
that they had denuded their whole island, driving plants and animals 
to extintion and driving themselves into chaos and cannibalism.

Paul DeFelice

Nelson, B.C.
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MAP posted-by: Elaine