Neoliberal Environmentalism

Eureka! I think I've found the keyword for my study.
Very interestingly, much of the literature appears to be located within Geography. Must do more google search for relevant literature. If all goes well, I think I've found my personal holy grail. Not that I actually attained it, at least I know what it vaguely looks like. Damn it was the right decision to write about conceptual framework for my GRS paper after all.

References
Davis DK (2006) "Neoliberalism, environmentalism, and agricultural restructuring in Morocco" The Geographical Journal, 172 (2) pp. 88-105

Lockie, S and Goodman, M (2006) “Neoliberalism and the problem of space: competing rationalities of governance in fair trade and mainstream agri-environmental networks” in T Marsden and J Murdoch (eds) Between the Local and the Global: Confronting Complexity in the Contemporary Agri-Food Sector (Research in Rural Sociology and Development)

Update @ 28 Apr 08
Bought a book today from the routledge sale on neoliberal environments.
Heyen N, McCarthy J, Robbins P and Prudham S eds. (2007) "Neoliberal Environments: False Promises and Unnatural Consequences" Routledge

What is a hinterland?

Originally I was going to do a independent study module paper talking about Singapore and its transnational agricultural hinterland: preconditions of a city state or an encroaching ecological footprint.

However, a senior pop by today and got me thinking that transnational doesn't just mean Malaysia and that's what I was working towards. Likewise, agricultural doesn't mean vegetables. How do I lead into talking about Malaysia and Singapore's historical trade?

So in the end, I decided that a change of title is needed.

What I've ended up doing for 2 hours today is to compile a list of definitions of Hinterlands, the different type of usage in different conceptual relationships such as hinterlands in metropolis-hinterland relations or transport geography, foreland-hinterland. There is also heartland-hinterland relationship. I've also looked at rural-hinterland versus urban-hinterland, urban fringe and metropolis. There is international/global/transnational hinterland versus local/immediate hinterland. But do I really need to read central place theory to really know what I am talking about? When do I get to the main dish? Enough with the appetizers already!

Updates @ 11.21pm
Alternative titles may include:

"City-States and Transnational Agricultural Hinterlands: a case study of Singapore-Malaysia Fresh Vegetable Trade"

"Locating the fresh vegetable supply trade within the global food crisis: a Singapore perspective"

New concepts I learnt today

Ecological Modernization
Reflexive Modernity
Habermas's theory of communicative action

Elling, B. (2008) "Rationality and the environment : decision making in environmental politics and assessment" London ; Sterling, VA : Earthscan

Critique of Environmental Reporting

Earlier this semester, for my Environmental Management and Assessment class, we were tasked to do a critique of 2 environmental reports by any 2 corporations of different scale, management style, etc.

I chose Unilever and Bens & Jerrys mainly because Bens & Jerrys was bought over by Unilever a few years ago. Supposedly, B&J was able to maintain independent corporate governance but still, in recent years, things have been reeling out of control. All the reasons which I use to love about B&J - their environmental and social ethics, not just their ice cream flavours - seems to have been lost!

This critique of the environmental reports is available on google documents.

Yesterday, I received an A for this report. Made my day.

EIA of Sentosa IR Development

For my Environmental Management and Assessment class, we were tasked to do an EIA of the Sentosa IR development prior to its construction. Yes, we pretend nothing has happened yet and write most idealistically.


Pretend this big hole is not here

Honestly the report we did was rushed and done so badly. I wanted to write 2,500 houses built at Sentosa Cove but instead wrote 2,5000 and nobody caught it while editing! Grrr, there are more mistakes like that. But having already submitted that, I think we should move forward.

Today at 6pm will be the presentation of our report. The powerpoint file is 16MB so I am not able to upload it on Google Documents. Instead I've fully utilized my server space with Lham and uploaded the entire powerpoint presentation.

If anybody is interested, this is my group's idea of how an EIA should be done on a project like the Sentosa IR. You can download the file here [PPT:16MB] if you feel like reading what we've come up with. I would not say it is the best that can be done but then it's been done within 2 weeks. Furthermore, in terms of scope and impacts studied, it's definitely more directed than the EIA actually commissioned by Resorts World which focus mainly on impact of the IR on the cruise center at Harborfront.

Furthermore, since a lot of the report is "play pretend" as we did not have the resources or time to actually do a real baseline study, everything you see in the report is based on surveys done by WildSingapore (marine) and Joe Lai (terrestrial). Sadly, I must admit that I had to overlook a lot of inaccuracies like the fact that the terrestrial plant list is actually of Siloso forest and not of the mount imbiah forest but I passed it off as the Mount Imbiah forest species list! It's mainly to give an idea on the type of data needed.


Joe Lai showing us on the map where the affected forest is

This is also not a full EIA report. It's just a summary based on the format given by the Asian Development Bank where they give the specific type of sections needed and how many pages per section. The reason why the ADB EIA reporting style is chosen is mainly part of the assignment requirements.

I am mainly in charge of the Description of Environment and Public Consultation section. Naturally, my area of expertise. I found a very interesting Geography honors thesis done in 1993 that talks about the physical changes to 3 offshore islands in Singapore - namely Kusu, St Johns and Sentosa. That report was exceedingly useful. Although personally I think the public consultation could have been done better if we had better communication and integration amongst my group of 7. Complicated but I shan't go into it. I'm just glad it's over.

Related Links
Photos of the construction at Sentosa.
Powerpoint file of my EIA report presentation. [16MB]

Updates
The presentation in class yesterday went really well. All 3 judges (lecturers on the marking panel) were very happy with our suggestion and presentation. We were able to provide historical examinations of the site and suggest not a no-go zone but to integrate the forest in with the development. Ultimately this site is really the best site on Sentosa to go ahead but to reclaim was a really bad idea. Thus the best mitigation would be to aspire for a truly green design at the site. To aspire towards the green mark award would be an excellent move for Genting if they wish to mitigate their own impacts on the environment. Still, really happy to know that our EIA report did well for the presentation.

Individual Essay for DE5106

I am wondering which of the following questions should I choose:

1. Placing a monetary value on the environment is beneficial. Discuss.

2. Environmental problems cannot be solved without firstly addressing poverty. Discuss

3. How can we measure Sustainable Development? Is it beneficial to do so?

4. Describe the process through which a company must go to gain ISO14001 certification, and discuss the benefits and limitations of ISO14001 certification.

5. Describe the mechanisms for climate change control under the Kyoto Protocol. What are the implications for Annex 1 and Annex II countries. Are these mechanisms sufficient to manage climate change?

6. Describe the approaches that can be used to conduct Environmental Impact Assessments. What makes a good EIA?

7. Is environmental reporting just “greenwash”?

What do you guys suggest? Knowing me and my expertise, I am considering #1, #2 or #7. Comments?

More keywords

urban food systems
sustainable urban food systems
urban food security

landscape ecology [journal]
agricultural ecology
agro-ecosystems
agroecology [article]
"ecology of food systems"
virtual water

Abstract

Submitted for the department website:

Ecological Shadow of Singapore's Vegetable Imports

The concept of ecological shadow or "shadow ecology" refers to the environmental impact of one country's economy on resource and environmental management in another country or area (Dauvergne, 1997). This involves examining both the consumption and production from inputs, through distribution to consumption and disposal, as integrated production and consumption systems. In addition, processes such as the mechanism of price, the creation of wants and consumption along with corporate and governmental practices, investments, developmental aid, and regulations, as well as production processes in the producing country and its various policies, politics, corporations mechanism and regulations are under scrutiny.

Although all countries cast ecological shadows, highly industrialized states with few natural resources tend to draw more environmental resources and in turn have large ecological shadows. Singapore being a small island state with a population of 4 million and little natural resources presents itself as a prime case study in the region. Singapore is a rare example of a country with high food dependency, importing 95% of total vegetable consumption in Singapore. 48% of Singapore’s total vegetable imports come from Malaysia, making it an excellent study site for examining the ecological impact of Singapore’s consumption on its environment. A baseline environmental impact assessment as well as historical change will be examined to determine the possible interrelations and impacts between source and destination countries.

With the onslaught of climate change added with greater environmental awareness of food safety, environmental protection and the push for organic farming, this study hopes to study in depth the dynamics within food systems. By understanding the processes and impacts of entire food systems, points of leverage for improving sustainability can be identified, along with possible policies and management implications.

Research Interests:
Sustainable Agri-food consumption-production systems, nature conservation, urban ecology

Keywords and Themes

sustainable geography
sustainable food consumption
sustainable consumption
'Techno-Ethics' of Sustainable Living
agricultural/e geography
sustainable agriculture geography
sustainable development geography
sustainable production-consumption systems (SPACES)
food systems
Sustainable consumption and production (SCP) (UNESA Div for Sust Devt)
Consumers and globalization
Sustainable agriculture in face of free trade
sustainable agriculture/production/consumption in north-south context
sustainable supply
Environmental management systems (EMS),
private codes of conduct,
holistic approaches to sustainable production
Sustainable consumption research exchange (SCORE)
cities and conservation
Human Ecology (SHE)
Social Ecology
Cultural Ecology
Political Ecology

"Cultural and Political Ecology" Group in AAG
- Agriculture and Agricultural Development
- Capitalization of Life and Nature
- Ecosystem Change
- Ecosystem Services
- Ecoterrorism
- Ecotourism
- Environmental Activism
- Environmental Degradation
- Environmental Discourse
- Environmental Management
- Environmental Racism
- Functional Materialism
- Hazards Research
- Historical Ecology
- Indigenous land mapping
- Land Use, Land Cover, Land Change
- Land Tenure and Common Property
- Migration
- Nature Conservation and Social Justice
- Nature and Ethnic Politics
- Nature Privatization and the State
- Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs)
- Neoliberalism
- Political Economics
- Protected Area Policy and Management
- Pastoral Communities
- Subjectivity in Best Use Practice
- Sustainability and Vulnerability
- Sustainability Metrics
- Third-world Development
- Urban Ecology
- Urban Pollution and Remediation
- Water Management
- Wildlife Conservation

Themes
Multiple stresses as affecting vulnerability of food systems
Political and social value of food
climate forecasting for food security research
Responses of alternative food movements to climate change
Adaptation options and building adaptive capacity for food systems
Water and food security in the future
Trade and market reform for food system adaptation
Cross-scale interactions of food systems and Global Env Change
Governance of food systems
Scenarios for regional GEC/food security research
Biofuels and food security
Resilience of food systems
Tradeoffs between ecosystem services, food security and economic growth
food systems in a changing world
Food industry strategies for GEC adaptation and mitigation
Institutional and policy challenges for natural resource management for food security
Analysis of the international environmental assessments and food security
conflicts relating to food security and environmental change
Elaborations

Environmental Legislation in SG

An excellent list from NEA website on Environmental Legislations in Singapore

Singapore Statutes Online also helpful. Very detailed law-language.

Environmental Issues in Singapore

For my DE5122 assignment presentation on environmental issues in Singapore:

Here are some numbers:

Exxon Mobile plant's total crude oil processing capacity is 309,000 barrels a day, according to the company's Web site.

Exxon Mobil, the world's largest listed oil and gas company by market capitalization, also operates another Singapore refinery with a 296,000-barrel-a-day capacity.

Source: International Business Times

Large point source of CO2 emission are listed as "large point sources, such as power plants, oil refineries and industrial processes".

"The refining process releases numerous different chemicals into the atmosphere; consequently, there are substantial air pollution emissions[7] and a notable odor normally accompanies the presence of a refinery. Aside from air pollution impacts there are also wastewater concerns,[2] upset risks of fire and explosion, and both occupational noise and environmental noise health effects." - Wikipedia


Lights from Bukom Shell Oil Refinery at night


Tuas Powerplant



"Gas pipelines linking the air separation plant (lower case) directly to the customer through the pipeline network ensure continuous and consistent supply of large quantities of gases. SOXAL has a network of more than 80 kilometres of oxygen, nitrogen and hydrogen piping covering major parts of Jurong, Tuas and Jurong Island." - Soxal - a major gas supplier for all refineries in Singapore. SOXAL (Singapore Oxygen Air Liquide Pte Ltd) is owned by Air Liquide, France, the world's leaders in the manufacture and application of gases.


Shell’s Pulau Bukom Refinery – currently Shell’s largest refinery in the world

List of Oil Refineries in Singapore:
* ExxonMobil Jurong Island Refinery (ExxonMobil), 605,000 barrels per day
* SRC Jurong Island Refinery (Singapore Refining Corporation), 285,000 bpd
* Shell Pulau Bukom Refinery (Royal Dutch Shell), 458,000 bpd

Video Jug explains Oil Refinery
30 miles radius of Oil Refinery has high chance of cancer
Fugitive Emission - air pollution from refinery that's not under control - smoke stack are regulated but miles of pipes that move gas and partially processed products have vents that allow the gas to escape and emission which pollute air and soil
S02 - sulphur dioxide one of the key pollutants responsible for acid rain
Also responsible for fugitive Volatile Organic Compounds (VOC) synonymous with NMVOC (Non­ methane VOC)

calculating carbon emission of oil refinery in 1997/98
crude oil emissions coefficient per unit of energy 5.8 million Btu per barrel
emissions coefficient for crude oil is 20.24 million metric tons carbon per quadrillion Btu

Assuming 5.8 million btu per barrel,
Singapore's oil refinery process 1348000 barrels per day
producing 78,184,000,000,000 btu per day (0.078184 quadrillion btu)
or 28.53716 quadrillion btu a year
total carbon emission is 577.6 million metric tons carbon per year just from oil refineries alone
Converted to carbon dioxide emission, this is equivalent to 2086.8 million metric tons of carbon dioxide

Eureka!

I've finally pin down a topic for my thesis!

Well more or less really. Maybe I'm quite the optimist because I foresee many more changes and need to narrow down my scope. I'm not sure how extensive a Masters thesis can be but here goes:

Topic:
Feasibility of Sustainable Urban Food Systems in Singapore - a Policy Perspective

Research question:
1) What is the impact of Singapore's high per capita food consumption and lack of agricultural production on the region's environment?
2) Is a sustainable urban food systems in Singapore feasible?
3) What are the potential threats to our food security? Climate change, resource politics, etc.

Objectives:- To highlight Singapore's high food dependency and rare 99.9% national food import.
- To examine the attitudes and awareness of Singaporeans and wholesale/retailers towards their food systems (ie source, production, importation, nutrition, food safety, etc.)
- To study the impact of our food consumption on the environment, particularly in Singapore's unique circumstances (soil, deforestation,water, pollution, chemical, food miles etc)
- To study the current production, supply and demand of local farms versus the dependency of imported food
- To analyse and evaluate the environmental advantanges and disadvantages of imported versus supporting locally grown produce
- To identify the extent to which community support local agriculture can play a part in addition to globalized food systems.

Aims:- To provide a policy perspective for Singapore in tackling these issues
- To provide a reference for the increasingly urbanized and globalized developing countries with potentially crippling dependency on a shrinking rural population worldwide.
- To examine or provide other nation states with a case study of high food dependency as means of comparison.

I've chosen food production because:
1) Singapore is extremely vulnerable in terms of food dependency, resource politics and climate change.
2) Being a high per capita consumer, our impact on the environment is also high without seeing direct impacts which is another driving force in my choice of topic.
3) At the same time the presence of the "singapore rural countryside" enables the exploration of the feasibility of community-supported agriculture in Singapore.
4) I am keen on doing social and urban ecology but from more of a "green" issue than a "brown issue".

What this study is not going to be about:
1) seafood / fishing - keeping this to purely terrestrial agriculture only. Coastal issues would be too diverse.

Jared Diamond

Professor in Geography at UCLA.
email: JDIAMOND@GEOG.UCLA.EDU
Interesting Publications:
Diamond (1999). Dirty eating for healthy living. Nature 400: 120-121.
Diamond (1987). The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race. Discover. 64-66

Here's a reminder to myself, always.

From Collapse (Diamond, 2005:9)
"... both extreme sides in this controversy - the racists and the believers in a past eden - are committing the error of viewing past indigenous people as fundamentally different from (whether inferior to or superior to) modern First World peoples. Managing environmental resources sustainably has always been difficult"

A possible factor to consider and remember - Diamond's Five-point framework of contributing factors to understanding environmental collapse.

From Collapse (Diamond, 2005:11)
"...Four of those sets of factors - environmental damage, climate change, hostile neighbors, and friendly trade partners - may or may not prove significant for a particular society. The fifth set of factors - the society's responses to its environmental problems - always prove significant."

A summary of 12 environmental threats in the world:

From Collapse (Diamond, 2005:6-7)
"Traditional Issues"
1. deforestation and habitat destruction
2. soil problems (erosion, salinization, fertility loss)
3. water management problems
4. overhunting
5. overfishing
6. effects of introduced species on native species
7. human population growth
8. increased per capita impact of people
"Modern Issues"
9. human-caused climate change
10. buildup of toxic chemicals in the environment
11. energy shortages
12. full human utilization of the Earth's photosynthetic capacity

I don't quite understand the last point yet but I suppose there will be further elaboration in the book. Point 4 and 5 are similar in essence. I wonder what are the large scale impact of point 6 except for species extinction like the dodo and other Mauritius birds or the Kakapo Parrot of New Zealand? Of course I musn't forget the cane toad at Australia or Guam's brown tree snake crisis.


The spread of Cane Toads in Australia from 1940 to 1980 in 5-year intervals