WINDHOEK -One important difference between Namibia and the United States of America (USA) should surprise and shock every concerned global citizen. Specifically, Namibians seem to recognise and appreciate the negative impacts of global climate change, but many Americans do not. Why are so many Namibians right (and so many Americans wrong) on this critical issue?
Scott A. Thompson, an American attorney and writer, with a degree in Economics, who lives and works in North-Central Namibia, says he has the answer. Speaking to Farmers Forum from the Oshana Region, he says the United States is a world leader in science, including the environmental sciences. Indeed, the United States is responsible for some of the leading work attempting to understand, explain and prevent environmental degradation. “Yet, a recent statistic revealed that more than 70 million Americans do not believe that climate change is happening. In stark contrast, both the University of Namibia (Unam) Professor Emeritus and the Namibian subsistence farmer will inform you that climate change is already happening to devastating effect. “What differences between the two nations cause Namibians and many Americans to hold such different views on the climate change issue? Reasonable explanations might include economics, psychology, religion or politics. To me, however, the answer is easy – it’s agriculture,” he notes.
According to him, only two percent of Americans are farmers. Instead, most live in cities and towns, which are covered in tarred roads, parking lots and shopping malls. They do not grow crops or raise animals for food. Instead, nearly all of the food that the average American consumes comes from large, private corporations responsible for feeding the nation an assortment of highly-processed foods. These companies are most often located in sparsely-inhabited, rural areas thousands of kilometers (or even continents) away from the cities and towns where the food they produce is eaten.
The average American supermarket contains more than 47,000 different products. The many different varieties of beef sold there, for example, may have been raised as cattle, slaughtered and processed in another country on a different continent, such as Namibia.
However, the average American supermarket shopper is unlikely to know (or even consider) where the beef comes from. He or she is equally unlikely to know or think about all of the steps in the process required to turn a living animal into tonight’s main course. This is because most Americans are completely removed from food production and the realities of the natural environment in which it occurs.
“Namibia is very different. Here, agriculture is the largest form of employment. “Indeed, approximately 70 percent of all Namibians practice subsistence agriculture, growing and raising most of the food that they eat using dry-land crop production methods. Even Namibians who live in cities and towns often remain intimately connected to the land and agriculture through their villages and traditional homesteads.
“Namibians, in general, pay more attention to the climate than Americans do. The reason is that Namibians are more closely connected to the natural environment through agriculture and food production. Many Americans, for example, consider rainfall a minor inconvenience, which makes an umbrella necessary. There is not much reason to care about local rain showers when your food is grown, harvested and processed thousands of kilometers away using high-tech machinery, industrial irrigation, the latest genetically-modified seeds, and potent chemical inputs.
“Conversely, rain is critical in Namibia, and speaking with a village elder will quickly reveal that the timing, reliability and distribution of rainfall have changed significantly. The impact on farmers is lower yields and fewer animals, as well as decreased food security and increased poverty and hunger. This environmental sensitivity and awareness – developed through dependence on local agriculture – makes climate change’s effects more obvious to the Namibian famer than the American supermarket shopper,” he says.
Thompson says this explains why most Namibians believe climate change is happening while more than 70 million Americans do not. “It may also answer the question why Namibia has it right (and so many Americans have it wrong) when it comes to this critical issue,” he concludes.