A friend again drew my attention to how worrying the situation of an enormous number of animal species has become: they’re being exterminated: due to pollution, the destruction of their habitat, the hunting that decimates them...
Animals huge and minute... from fleas to monkeys to whales... all are on death row. Man, he insisted, has turned out to be the greatest killer on our planet. If man does not learn how to control himself, he shall have destroyed all those who do not belong to his homo sapiens species before he has even realised just what is happening.
If our species is the only one to remain active in the world, then it is obvious that the next extermination that’s bound to happen will be our own.
To be sure, I’ve been listening to such tirades for I don’t know how many decades. Rachel Carson was among the forerunners of the practice, with her book in 1961 “The Silent Spring”, about the impact of pesticides on the countryside. Since that date, the threat to our fauna and flora has increased tremendously – that’s what my rather persistent friend does not want to take his mind off.
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MORATORIUM
A huge effort was deployed to widen, lengthen and modernize the primary roads of Malta and Gozo, according to a well-planned and well implemented exercise. Actually, the corona virus pandemic did obstruct the organizational impetus but marginally. On many fronts, there was an excellent implementation of deadlines.
The ongoing works also generated criticism from a number of sectors, some of which was justified. The decision to carry out “everything all at once” instead of implementing change according to a step by step plan over a number of years, contributed to how – in order to maintain the momentum – the need to consult and compromise was sidelined.
When the current very extensive programme of works on primary roads is over, we need to have a moratorium on public works in this sector. Perhaps, more thought could be given to a phased and well financed programme to upgrade secondary roads.
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RULES ON TRAVEL
At the time of this writing, the public health rules being applied to travel between countries are in a carousel. That holds too for rules that define how travellers in one country must behave before departing for another one.
Nothing is more alien to the commitment that led to the establishment of the Schengen zone. Till the corona virus pandemic came our way, it was considered by European citizens as among the top achievements of European unity... even while putting brackets around the days when Islamic fundamentalism struck at the foundations of European security.
However the pandemic is repeating the work of terrorism, to even greater effect, for it attacks the many, not the few. And to cross frontiers, it does not need passports, whether false or the real thing.
No unified, convincing response has yet been developed to outflank its forward movement. Unsurprisingly, European tourism has suffered a big beating. Beyond this, the rules about travel have remained confused for the Schengen zone still has no reply to the corona virus pandemic seen as a threat to European security.