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>New modelling evidence suggests we can halt and even reverse habitat loss and deforestation if we take urgent conservation action and change the way we produce

>New modelling evidence suggests we can halt and even reverse habitat loss and deforestation if we take urgent conservation action and change the way we produce and consume food. I'm pessimistic with this claim. From my experience, if a productive process like agriculture becomes more efficient, we scale up output. The resources being used up, in this case land, won't be reduced. For an analogy, consider how adding more lanes to a busy highway ultimately means more people drive and congestion is just as bad. What we need is more government protection of habitats. But it's hard for a government to directly and explicitly oppose economic opportunities.

monktastic1 6y ago
Sounds like Jevon's Paradox: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox "In economics, the Jevons paradox occurs when technological progress or government policy increases the efficiency with which a resource is used (reducing the amount necessary for any one use), but the rate of consumption of that resource rises due to increasing demand."
- xg15 6y ago
  Thanks for the pointer and definition. "Increasing demand" seems pretty funny when we have whole industries dedicated to artificially generating demand (e.g. marketing and advertising) and when the ultimate quality metric for a country is it's GDP - so both business as well as government will do whatever it can to keep demand from going down. Sometimes I feel we're sitting in the bus from Speed (that will explode if it goes under 50 Mph) and just realized we're headed towards a roadblock. So now we're paradoxically trying to come to a full stop and not go below 50mph at the same time and wonder why it's not working.
nickff 6y ago
As a matter of fact, the more industrialized nations have increased productivity and production, while decreasing the amount of land devoted to agriculture (returning a great deal of it to 'nature').

monktastic1 6y ago

Sounds like Jevon's Paradox: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox "In economics, the Jevons paradox occurs when technological progress or government policy increases the efficiency with which a resource is used (reducing the amount necessary for any one use), but the rate of consumption of that resource rises due to increasing demand."

xg15 6y ago
Thanks for the pointer and definition. "Increasing demand" seems pretty funny when we have whole industries dedicated to artificially generating demand (e.g. marketing and advertising) and when the ultimate quality metric for a country is it's GDP - so both business as well as government will do whatever it can to keep demand from going down. Sometimes I feel we're sitting in the bus from Speed (that will explode if it goes under 50 Mph) and just realized we're headed towards a roadblock. So now we're paradoxically trying to come to a full stop and not go below 50mph at the same time and wonder why it's not working.

nickff 6y ago

As a matter of fact, the more industrialized nations have increased productivity and production, while decreasing the amount of land devoted to agriculture (returning a great deal of it to 'nature').