Sometimes you stumble onto a photograph that says more than a thousand words. This is one of those images.
Haiti is on the left and the Dominican Republic is on the right. We can debate the reasons for this contrast (and the reasons for the contrast are important), but there is no debating the difference itself.
We have so much to be grateful for here in Barbados – but when talking about the environment are we more on the path to the right side of the photo, or the left? Which path are we choosing for our grandchildren?
Photograph by James Blair courtesy of The Guardian.
Barbados Free Press 
At one time the Haitian country side had well forested mountain sides, just like those of the DR, and boasted very fertile soil before the mountain slopes became denuded of trees and then the country’s fertile topsoil washed away thanks to the subsequent erosion problems. This was mostly due to the largely poverty stricken peasantry cutting down the trees for firewood or to make charcoal for use mainly in cooking.
What are we Bajans going to cut down for our firewood when the tourist industry worldwide, not just in Barbados or the Caribbean, collapses simply because it costs too much to get from point A to point B by air at 500mph no matter how much efficiency we can squeeze out of the next generation of jet engines? Was the grounding of the Concorde just the first and so far most visible feature indicating the start of a long term downward spiral for air travel?
Running on Empty: Big Airlines in Big Trouble
I have a joke with a friend of mine that airline pilots are nothing but glorified bus drivers. As cynical as this may be, for the majority of us with regular jobs who fly economy air travel is increasingly becoming like its land-based cousin: cramped, overcrowded and at times downright unpleasant.
Most people living in our modern industrial society take air travel for granted. We think very little about hopping on a plane and travelling around the world for little more than a couple of weeks wages. As jet fuel prices bounce along with the price of crude however many airlines are increasingly struggling to break even. Fuel prices now account for 35 percent of operating costs compared to 15 percent a decade ago. Air travel has always been a fickle business, earning an average net profit of one to two percent, compared with an average of over five percent for U.S. industry as a whole. Research from the 1980s found that some carriers would have zero profitability if they had lost just one out of ten business passengers.
So how does the future look for the airline industry? If recent trends are anything to go by, not good. Not good at all.
SNIP
The outgoing (Air New Zealand) chief executive Rob Fyfe says the price of jet fuel has doubled over the last three years and due to the weak global economy it has been difficult to pass on the higher costs to passengers.The inflation adjusted average price of jet fuel was US$3.04 per gallon for the six months to December 31st. Going off jet fuel prices alone it is unlikely the airline will see much of a turn around in profitability for 2012. In the first six months of 2012 the average price barely moved, up US$0.04 to $US3.08.
The full year earnings are not released until the end of August but the few media releases coming out of Air New Zealand the last few months are beginning to sound increasingly desperate. On 19th July 2012 Fyfe and Palmer called for an “urgent review” of New Zealand tourism (emphasis added /GM). Palmer told Parliament’s finance and expenditure committee that despite operational improvements (newspeak for job cuts), Air New Zealand’s financial performance was not healthy and decreased expenditure was yet to be reflected in its currently “disappointing” share price.
SNIP
These IATA forecasts illustrate the fragility of the airline industry. Profitability is an elusive prospect for the industry with the IATA commenting that “the best collective margin of the last decade of 2.9% (2007 and 2010) does not cover the cost of capital”. Cargo traffic around the globe declined 1.9 percent in May 2012 compared to May last year. Cargo traffic generated US$66 billion in 2010 but has declined every month since May 2011. “Business and consumer confidence are falling,” Tyler said. “And we are seeing the first signs of that in slowing demand and softer load factors. This does not bode well for industry profitability.”
Dirty Air
If airlines are struggling this much with the current economic conditions it is almost certain that a globally unified approach to carbon taxing would cripple the industry. A report from 2008 found that airlines were emitting 20 percent more carbon dioxide than previously estimated. This could grow to 1.5 billion tons a year by 2025, far more that the worst cast IPCC predictions. As a comparison the entire European Union currently emits 3.1 billion tons of CO2 annually. This emission prediction does assume that oil prices will stay relatively low and that economic growth gets back on track, two assumptions that are looking increasingly unlikely.
Travel While You Can
Environmental concerns aside if you want to travel anywhere in the next five years now is the time to do it. The global economy is extremely fragile at the moment. Petroleum deliveries are at their lowest point since September 2008, with the weakest July demand since 2005 and yet Brent crude prices are still sitting above $US116 per barrel. This is not to mention the impending US “fiscal cliff” where $600bn in tax increases and spending cuts come into effect on January 1, 2013. Unless the US Congress comes to some kind of agreement on raising the debt ceiling again by the end of this year GDP growth could be reduced by four percent, plunging the US into recession. Europe cannot escape its current quaqmire without huge upheaval and there is now talk that France will be the next to crumble leaving Germany on its own. China’s growth has slowed to a three year low of 7.6 per cent with little sign of recovery in the next few months.
http://www.southernlimitsnz.com/2012/08/running-on-empty-big-airlines-in-big.html
Thanks Green Monkey,
What an excellent piece!
Too bad that we blew all that money on cricket parties and new embassies instead of diversifying our economy and preparing for the bad days ahead.
Even now there is much that could be done if people would only wake up.
Marcus
I flew over Haiti and the Dominican republic in the 90’s and could not believe the stark contrast. This picture is real.
It’s not as if the DR is a model of modern democracy yet the contrast shows what happens when a plundering elite destroys its own country. Don’t forget how Haiti was forced to pay the French millions year after year to compensate them for the “loss” of their slaves. Condoned by the West. The French have a lot to answer for here.
@Green Monkey
I’ve been realizing the same thing 5 years now… Oil is on the way out… Bajans need to embrace renewable energy and it’s cousin, energy efficiency, in the same way we have taken to mobile phones! it’s better to invest in a renewable solar photovoltaic system for your home , than to change your car every 5-10 years… the energy savings\tax free income will eventually pay for good portion of the next car. If that car could be electrically powered, so much the better! I would honestly say that it would be foolish for any current or future government to subsidize electricity… Locally , the most I would do is subsidize diesel for manufacturing and commercial applications, and just for a limited time too. The writing has been on the wall for a good few years now… in big neon letters too… Oil has no future in the main stream of energy sources… In the region of air travel , because we need it so badly , I would consider subsidizing the fuel for any airline flying tourists here… Maybe we had better stop producing as much sugar and do biofuels for airplanes instead…
@ Green Monkey
Also… to be honest, food to eat may be even more important than firewood to cook it with… i hope the flying fish don’t go too far…
My brothers and my sisters, please look and see – please listen and hear: There is order to everything under heaven. There is even order in disorder.
Do you know who the people whom we call “Haitians” are? They are the Israelite Tribe of Levi, the priestly class. And, as such, were never meant to
have as their own the land and were never entitled to inherit land as were their brothers; consequently, the land is not at one with them and is not an extension of them as it is with the Dominican – the Israelite Tribe of Simeon. However, as priests, the Levites are entitled to receive the tithe and the sacrifice from every tribe- a portion of the best that their brethren produce and extract from the land by their labor. (The Almighty has always caused his people, Israel, to suffer when they disobey and then he takes them back and allows them to prosper once they repent.) Haiti had a blight in the blessing department for many years; the blight was a sickness that was reflected even in the land that they occupy. Then, a year or so ago, the Lord quaked the earth. Many Hatians died and many were injured – the same as when Israel left Egypt and only two families of the original people who left ever lived to see the “Promised Land”. But the earthquake was not a curse,
but a blessing because, while trees do not grow atop the earth in Haiti, rich veins of gold, uranium and oil surfaced from below in the aftermath of the earthquake as a sign that the Lord has heard the cry of repentance of the people and has “healed the land” and is allowing the Levites to received the tithe and the sacrifice as countries in the northern and western hemispheres mine and refine the gold, oil and uranium for them, and the Haitians finally get paid.
Peace and Blessings
Malcolm from Harlem