Ecological Disaster

Almost certainly, the most important news from Europe this week is the result of a long-term study of insect life in the German countryside. This has shown that over the last 30 years - an incredibly short period in evolutionary terms - up to 84% of the TOTAL of insect life, over almost all species, has declined when the incidence of creatures is counted at the peak of the summer [when the populations of most insects should be at the highest level].

The importance of insects in the crop cycle for most plant types has been recognised by humans for millennia, and it has been re-emphasised as the population of bees has declined over recent decades with a whole series of diseases and alien species destroying the populations of hives and also the survival and reproduction of solitary bees. That this catastrophe has befallen almost all European insects in a very short period is truly alarming. Insects and plants have evolved symbiotically over millions of years; and mammals are utterly dependent on that symbiosis for their foods.

The culprits are well recognised, especially a small range of herbicides and insecticides that are used in massive quantities - particularly in Europe - with the desired effect of protecting crops in the short term. The lobbies for these substances to be banned will grow larger and louder from now on, with many farmers joining in as the risk to pollination of their crops hits their pockets.When the necessary measures have belatedly been taken, nature will almost certainly act as it usually has, and provide the climatic and other conditions in which populations can rebuild themselves quickly. But it may not work that way: the ecological disaster may already have gone so far that the spaces left by the vanished insects could be taken up by alien species that do not support the main farmed crops, and present health hazards to human beings.

There have been many, crystal clear warnings from various ecological pressure groups, not least the ludicrously-named 'organic' movement [who ever saw an inorganic cabbage?], and they have been ignored. The German data are incontrovertible, and are largely replicated across the continent: so something most be done, and will be done, and things may just turn out all right.

A parallel crisis has been reported from the mass use of antibiotics in cattle and other mammalian species of farmed animals and in zoos: the powerful chemicals become dispersed in the waterways and thus return to the life-cycle of which humans are a part: accelerating the rate at which viruses and bacteria evolve to counteract the effects of the drugs on their own ecology. The British medical establishment has warned that when the rate of evolution of bacterial and virological resistance to antibiotics outpaces the development of new and replacement antibiotics, it will become unsafe to perform almost any form of surgery. I include viruses alongside bacteria here because it has become common to give antibiotics to people experiencing virological attacks because in many cases patients find it has a placebo effect: thus they demand antibiotics and doctors often succumb to such demands in order to avoid complaints from patients. This matter has been presented to the media for several years, and the impact of the message has somewhat been muted by the development of more advanced antibiotics; but there is no assurance that the pharmacologists will continue to outpace the evolution of bacteria, and it is irrational for people to assume that science will always triumph.

There is nothing new in the reported decline of insect species: the decline in several bird species has been associated with the decline of their prey for several decades. But nothing adequate has been done about it, and now the 'eleventh hour' has passed and Europe is in the twelfth hour. This is a far more massive challenge than Islam, Jihad, populism, Putin or Trump: and it cannot be avoided.

Beware of Africa

It is terribly easy for a resident in Europe or the Americas to ignore Africa. Nevertheless the European Union is subject to a massive invasion of African economic migrants, many of whom claim to be refugees; but fewer and fewer are even allowed landfall on the continent. An unknown number of hundreds of thousands have gone to ground in Europe, many of whom have no prospect of becoming fully registered members of the workforce and of the social security systems. The main political focus on this issue is on keeping any more of them out, as 'populist' politicians gain votes from people who are scared [rationally or otherwise] by the prospect of culturally alien people of different skin colour 'swamping' medical services, schools and the jobs market.

Some voices are raised to point out threat the flow of would-be migrants would be massively less if more attention were given to economic and political development of African countries; but weary EU politicians who take any interest in such matters count the billions of dollars of 'aid' that have been abused by dictators on their personal lives and on military equipment to mount or to defend against political adventurism. The continent is seen as inherently corrupt; with many western corporations hesitant to trade there because of draconian anti-corruption laws that operate in their home states.

China has been very active in construction, especially of railways and port installations that enable the sources of materials and crops in which they have invested to get back to China easily. China has become a major manipulator of the African morass for its economic advantage; which has relatively disadvantaged the west where firms are hamstrung as mentioned above.

Almost every African country is an artificial construct, with boundaries set by the European imperialists in the nineteenth century which have simply been handed on the post-colonial regime that now prevails. These boundaries ignore ethnic diversity, and give cause to conflict on those grounds. It is estimated that half of the world's population growth in the next two decades will be in Africa, centred in just five countries; which are as diverse as Egypt, Nigeria and South Africa.

There are renewed signs that the ethnic tensions which have to some degree been restrained over the post-colonial half century will break out with renewed force. The key example here is in Kenya, where a few months ago a court whose participants - all native Africans - wore English eighteenth century white wigs and black gowns as handed down by the former colonial government to announce the decision to quash the result of a presidential election. Now the losing candidate in that election, who knows that he will also lose any re-run of the election, has stood down from the contest. So long as there is an acknowledged candidate from the Kikuyu population, as there is in Mr Kenyatta, no minority ethnic group has a chance of being elected, however free and fair the election process is. Mr Odinga uses many arguments, but the weight of numbers will always be against him.

So does Odinga try secession: do a Catalonia? It has been tries many times, all over Africa, dating back to the secessionist campaigns in Katanga and 'Biafra' several decades ago. There will be much more of this kind of thing, which will increase the lawlessness and political chaos that have paralysed most of central Africa for several decades. No outsiders have any right to tell Africans how to conduct their lives. The problems will multiply; and their effects will rebound on the rest of humanity: not only as an endless procession of boatloads of miserable, desperate humans who are even more unwanted in Europe than they were where they come from.