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Clean and green?
Authors: Piers MaclarenPublication: New Zealand Journal of Forestry, Volume N.Z.J.For. 2006, Issue N.Z.J.For. 51(4) 2007, pp 48, Jan 2007
Publisher: New Zealand Institute of Forestry
Abstract: [First paragraphs...]
During a conference-break in Germany, a local grabbed me: “I thought New Zealand was advanced in environmental thinking, but I have a friend on a farm there. He heard the farmer discussing with his wife the best place to dig a hole to bury their old fridge!” I replied that the farmer was probably some sort of environmentalist: many New Zealand cockies would have just tossed it down a handy bank or gully, without thinking to mention the fact....
A steady stream of Germans makes the pilgrimage to New Zealand, seeking their environmental Nirvana. Many return bitter and disillusioned. I’m glad they don’t stay, at least not in sizable numbers. The fanatical gleam in the eyes of these modern “Greenshirts” scares me, and brings recollections of the horrors caused by their predecessors: the Redshirts and the Brownshirts. Nonetheless, we need their skills, and at least some of their environmental awareness.