Feral thinking on camels

Putting camels to use - back then.

Opinion by Dave Richards

Is he joking?

Federal Opposition agriculture spokesman John Cobb’s  suggestion that killing every one of our camels would be a major step to reducing Australia’s greenhouses was worth an airing.

Not because it makes sense, but because it evokes so powerfully the mire of second-rate thinking that global confusion about global warming has led us into.

Just recently, Tim Flannery,  who wrote a book about global warming, The Weather Makers, admitted on ABC’s Lateline that climate modellers had got it wrong and couldn’t explain the fact that global temperatures hadn’t increased for 10 years.

“Well, the thing is we deal with an incomplete understanding of the way the earth’s system works, we know enough to say as the IPCC said that greenhouse gases cause warming. They are 90 per cent sure, 90 per cent plus sure that it’s caused by humans, we can go that far. In the last few years, were there hasn’t been a continuation of that warming trend, we don’t understand all of the factors that create earth’s climate, so there are some things we don’t understand, that’s what the scientists were email (sic) about, you know, we don’t understand the way the whole system works, and we have to find out,” said Flannery.

His grudging admission illuminates the reality that, amazingly enough, not even scientists know exactly what the future will bring. It doesn’t mean that climate change isn’t happening – simply that we are human, fallible, and can’t actually determine all the factors in climate, how they will come into play, and enhance each other or even cancel each other out. Climate science is, after all, a baby among sciences.

In that context, mass eradication of camels would not only likely to be very difficult. The idea has the same mixed air of panic and pandering to vested interests as taking over farmland to grow crops for biodiesel.

Both solutions are bad economics, and both put people last. And there is one people problem  - hunger –  that is a bigger problem than climate. There is no ten per cent of doubt about it; people are hungry now. And camels are a food source that with care and imagination could be exploited to feed millions of people, both in the global market place and in famine situations – a solution that Trevor Shiell and others have thoughtfully developed.

The Government investment required to dry the meat in mobile abattoirs is a fraction of what taxpayers would give to reduce Australia’s greenhouse emissions and make a miniscule contribution to reducing the carbon glut. This is especially the case after recent rains. Camels will not only multiply, but fatten up quickly.

Skeptics point out that we are yet to develop a camel industry and can’t wait for one to come about while ferals are wrecking the countryside. They are right. But by harvesting as much camel meat as possible while culling, the Government can make a moral and practical committment to a planetary problem – just as it says it will in the matter of carbon emissions. It can then follow up  on its welcome announcement that it will investigate the viability of a camel industry.

Mr Cobb’s ideas are a great example of how politics and sectional interests spoil clear thinking about climate change. The Opposition has clearly favoured a hands-off approach when it comes to lowering the emissions of secondary industry. Camels, apparently, are different, presumably because getting rid of them – if such a thing were possible – would satisfy sections of the pastoral lobby. To be consistent, Mr Cobb needs to take up the vegan line and discourage any form of livestock-keeping altogether.

But, of course, if we keep following that line of thinking, the best solution to global warming would be to cull a few billion humans. Volunteers only, of course.

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