Ecological economics

Earth Island Journal, Summer, 2009 by Robert Burk

Elaine Miller Bond's article "Net Benefits" (Spring) illustrates what is wrong with efforts to correct many environmental problems in this case, overfishing. Capitalism encourages behavior motivated by greed. It should be no surprise when overfishing or pollution occurs. Providing fishermen with individual quotas is a good first step, but it does no more than put capitalism on hold.

A better system would be to model our economy on ecology. For example, what if the world's fishing fleet were a corporation? This "Oceans Corporation" would be established by national governments. The fishermen would be the shareholders, and a board would appoint administrators to oversee all of the ocean harvests. Profits would be divided among the shareholders, whose initial shares would be distributed according to their percentage of the catch. Overfishing would result in a decline in profits, creating an incentive for the corporation to use the fishing fleet in the most efficient way possible.

Sustainability has to be made profitable to the point where non-sustainable behavior adversely impacts the corporate shareholders' economic interests.

Robert Burk

Lisle, Ontario