Green economy needs to make money, too

Well, hasn’t this been a trip!

The stock market is in a nosedive due. The economy appears to be in risk of further battering, despite our superior banking and fiscal situation.

It isn’t 1929 or 1931; in fact, nowhere near, not by a long, long shot. But, it’s the worst many of us have seen in our adult lives.

Partly because of the federal election campaign, the turmoil has also brought attention to our much-needed manufacturing sector, declining for some time due to cheaper labour elsewhere.

There could also be another reason for the flight.

We have to ask if the reason why many manufacturing jobs have been untimely ripped from our communities is the new push on several fronts for green this and that, and right now.

What businessman is going to invest in heavy industry, only to have it environmentally taxed into oblivion by a government of this or that stripe? Why not move it to where the cheap labour and the lax environmental laws are?

I recall covering a meeting a few years back concerned with job losses. There were union representatives and leftist politicians there. They, like everybody else, were worried about what the manufacturing losses and the fact everybody loses when manufacturing – including agriculture – takes a hit. I wondered, however, how many of those people understood the effects of the then new Kyoto Accord’s risk of pushing industry out to India, China and Mexico would have on our job situations.

Now, I’ve lived in environmentally risky conditions, and I’ve been broke -- and I’ll tell you, being broke is far worse!

I’ve inhaled pulp mill smoke and swam in its effluent. I’ve breathed in coal smoke and dust from the power plant across the river, and the smoke and dust from the steel and car works. I’ve gagged on rotten cow and hog poop, being spread on nearby fields.

I guarantee you, if things get any worse, we’d all be glad to put up with some risk - but only for a short time. We’d soon see the beauty of a poultry processing plant or railcar plant in the neighbourhood – properly operated, of course.

Don’t get me wrong, I want a green economy. We’ll develop it because, regardless of the bottom falling out of petrol prices of late, oil is not going to get cheaper for long.

The business community has to be made aware of the benefits of manufacturing here – and doing it green. Security, good labour and close markets are positive ones; then we have to look at “helpful” trade regulations and tariffs. Unions have to ensure their brothers and sisters in the countries taking our jobs are organized to receive similar benefits as those North Americans get – or got. Environmentalists have to take a long look at what’s taking place in those countries, too.

In the end, however, we have to conserve. We have to go green and develop green technology to use and sell to the rest of the world.

But let’s keep what we have so we can survive long enough to develop and enjoy this new economy.