admin, Author at PERC | Page 184 of 210

Slippery Slopes

More than 200 million impoverished people worldwide make their homes on hillsides. These hillsides are the source of some 20 percent of the world’s freshwater, and yet agricultural activities have resulted in vast deforestation and topsoil erosion. Since 1993, the International Centre for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT) based in Cali, Colombia, has been working with farmersContinue reading “Slippery Slopes”

Waste Not Want Not

Two companies that appear to have little in common have joined forces to build processing plants that will convert biomass to energy and create organic fertilizer at the same time. The plants will burn the waste to produce steam that can power electric generators. The leftover residue can be sold as fertilizer. The partners areContinue reading “Waste Not Want Not”

Agriculture and the Environment

A look at the major environmental constraints that limit U.S. food production without necessarily improving environmental quality.

Is No Use Good Use?

Americans are on the fast track to land preservation as more and more federal land is set aside at an increasingly rapid pace. Now is the time to pause and ask if locking up great expanses of land provides the good stewardship that we want for our public lands.

Pesticides and Property Rights

Two PERC researchers, reviewing the history of the banned pesticide DDT, have concluded that violation of private property rights lies at the heart of the conflict over DDT.

Economic Growth and the State of Humanity

Economic Growth and the State of Humanity, by Indur M. Goklany, emulates and builds upon the contributions that Julian Simon made in reporting on the progress of humankind.

Sweet Success

The EcoEnterprises Fund has invested $500,000 in a private company that works with small scale cocoa producers in Latin America. ‘By investing in businesses doing the right thing, we can help people make a living, and help protect the world’s great places,’ says Tammy Newmark, president of the fund. The $10 million fund provides ventureContinue reading “Sweet Success”

Clear-cut

Every few years the phone rings and a person in distress says, “Wallace, something awful is going to happen.” The caller’s neighbor or someone close by has decided to cut timber. The distress in the caller’s voice verges on panic, as if the house had started to burn. The end is near. And it’sContinue reading “Clear-cut”