We can’t expect Gozo to remain a ‘virgin’, while we continue raping her sister-island

For some time now, I have been discerning a vague parallel between the local ‘overdevelopment’ issue – especially, where Gozo is concerned – and the general global discussion about Climate Change.

Not just in the most self-evident way that those two issues could realistically be compared: i.e., that both are cases where ‘The Environment’ - on a micro and macro scale, respectively - is ‘under threat from human activity’ (and let’s face it: not much is being done to actually deal with the threat, on either level...)

There is that too, naturally; but the parallel I have in mind is slightly different. It’s more about how both those issues are actively being ‘exploited’, to create entirely unnecessary divisions between different categories of ‘haves’ and ‘have-nots’; with the result that... well, like I said just a second ago: not much is being done, in either case, to address the problem at hand.

But tell you what: let’s jump right into the analogy itself, shall we? (One last thing, however: for reasons of brevity, everything you are about to read is obviously going to be a MASSIVE over-simplification. You have been warned...)

Ready? Here goes:

For the past couple of centuries, those parts of the world we now refer to as ‘developed’ – Europe, the United States, Canada, Australia, etc. – have been undergoing an intense process of ‘industrialisation’.

And we all know what that means, in practice. They have been burning fossil fuels, to power up their ever-burgeoning industrial needs; all the while deforesting the landscape, to accommodate more pasture-land; more factories; more industry, more railways; more highways, more... anyway: you get the general idea.

But then – from around the mid-1980s onward – a slow realisation starts to dawn on the developed world.

Actually, two. The first is that: “You know what? Maybe it wasn’t such a good idea, after all, to cut down all those virgin forests; or to burn all those fossil-fuels...” Because (in the interest of keeping this part as brief as possible) we now have solid, scientific evidence, that:

a) the greenhouse gases that we’ve been pumping into the atmosphere, ever since the early 19th century, have had the unforeseen consequence of transforming the entire planet into equivalent of a ‘pressure cooker’, and;

b) around the only thing we know of, that might actually absorb some of those gases, are... well, what do you know? Forests! You know: those ‘greeny, leafy, tree-y’ things, that the Western World has spent the better part of the entire Industrial Revolution, ‘chopping down’ at every conceivable opportunity...

In any case: it wasn’t exactly the most ‘reassuring’ reality the world could have woken up to, 30 years ago; and let’s just say that... clearly, large parts of the world still haven’t actually ‘woken up to it’, at all.

For one thing, because a sizeable percentage of the global population still evidently prefers clinging to even the most outrageous conspiracy theories, rather than accept the scientific reality of Climate Change...

And for another, because – unconscionably – we’ve actually managed to pump out MORE greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, over the past 30 years (yes, even after scientists had first raised the alarm) than throughout 300+ years, since the earliest invention of the Steam Engine.

But this brings me to the second realisation, that dawned on (other parts of) the world, at roughly the same time.

Ever since around the 1980s – varying from country to country, naturally – all those countries that had previously been considered ‘developing’ [Note: a few decades earlier it was ‘Third World’; but never mind), were finally coming round to the idea that: “Hey! Isn’t it high time that we, too, start enjoying all the luxuries associated with industrialisation?” (And let’s face it: who can possibly blame them? After all, the Western world has been treating those countries as nothing but glorified ‘markets’, for their own consumer goods/products, for time out of memory...)

So I suppose you can work out the rest for yourselves. Countries like India and (especially) China, transformed themselves into ‘massive industrial power-houses’, almost overnight...

... and we now have countries dotted all over the so-called ‘Developing World’ – in Sub-Saharan Africa, South-and-Central America, Asia, etc. – all falling over themselves, in the mad scramble to emulate precisely the same sort of ‘economic miracle’, themselves....

Ah: but what, pray tell, was the developed world’s reaction?

“Sorry, folks, but... NO CAN DO! We’ve just issued the Kyoto Protocols, you see... and what they mean, in practice, is that: countries which are only just starting their own industrialisation process, must now limit their national CO2 emissions to within certain... shall we say, ‘restrictions’.

“It’s all for the good of the planet, of course: but you now have to cap your emissions at the precise level that will – by pure coincidence, naturally – also keep your country more or less exactly as ‘industrialised’, or otherwise, as it happens to be right now.

“In other words: I’m afraid you’ll all just have to lump it, for the time being; and simply carry on living in abject poverty, like you’ve always done before. (But hey, not to worry! We’ll send tonnes of UN aid, promise! And Bono, too! In fact: you can even keep him, if you like... you know, as a token of our eternal ‘Good Will’...)”

Right: that’s about as far as I’ll go with the ‘Climate Change’ part, for now; because, well, you should already be seeing more or less where ‘the island of Gozo’ (and the overdevelopment thereof) actually ‘fits’, into all this.

I could, of course, carry on in the same vein – i.e., by pointing out how, over the past 30-or-so years, Malta has experienced a never-ending ‘construction and development boom’; and how the resulting economic expansion – not unlike the Industrial Revolution before it – similarly brought about massive financial benefits, to all the industries/entrepreneurs involved... as well as devastating, irreparable damage to Malta’s environment, as a whole.

I could also add that Gozo, over the same period, has remained largely ‘unscathed’ by the same construction-frenzy (or at least, it HAD, until only very recently)....

... and I’d be able to stop there, wouldn’t I? Because if you were to simply re-read this article from the beginning, and replace ‘Climate Change’ with ‘Construction’; and the ‘Developed/Developing Worlds’, with ‘Malta and Gozo’, respectively...

... you’d be looking at precisely the same sort of scenario, all over again. It’s yet another case where one ‘part of the world’ (Malta, in this case) simply turns to another (Gozo), and says: “Sorry, sister! But YOU are not allowed to do, what WE have been doing, to to our hearts’ content, for 30 years or more!” [and are still doing today, please note: more of which in a sec].

But let me try a different tack instead. This week, it was reported that Christian Zammit resigned from his position as Xaghra mayor: citing, among other things, a continuous ‘whispering campaign’ against him, orchestrated from within his own Labour Party (from which he also resigned).

The following sentence leaps to the eye: “Gozitans were being told he [Zammit] would stop development permits, eradicate apartment blocks and fifth-floor penthouses, slap strong fines for infringements, and ‘pinch their pockets’...”

Now: one way of interpreting that would be: “Christian Zammit was eventually ‘hounded out of office’, because he was trying to spare his home-town of Xaghra – and presumably, the rest of Gozo – from sharing the same fate as her long-suffering sister-island, Malta...”

That is to say: he wanted to avoid a situation whereby Gozo was similarly ‘raped’ by endless ‘development permits, apartment blocks, fifth-floor penthouses’, and so on... to the point where its inhabitants suffer the same negative consequences – on their health, their safety, their quality of life, etc. – that we in Malta are suffering, on a daily basis, right now.

But while that is, indeed, how I myself interpret the situation... it remains (let’s be honest) an intensely ‘Malta-centric’ perspective.

Another way to interpret that ‘whispering campaign’ is... well, from the perspective of the Gozitans to whom it was actually addressed; and to some of whose ears, must have sounded a lot like:

“Yes, of course the Maltese would tell you to ‘stop over-developing your own island’! After all, they’ve already made their own ‘small fortunes’, by simply cashing in on the re-development their own private properties... so now, they want stop YOU from doing the same thing, in order to preserve YOUR island as an ‘idyllic holiday-spot’ (or a ‘preserpju’, to use the local jargon)... FOR THEMSELVES!”

And much as it pains me to have to say this: it’s not an argument that can very easily be countered, in practical terms. For while that perspective might be somewhat ‘flawed’, on a logical basis... you can hardly describe it as ‘factually incorrect’, can you?

No, indeed. It is perfectly true that most Maltese environmentalists (myself included) attach a special environmental significance to Gozo, precisely because it remains relatively ‘unspoilt’... just as it is equally true, that it would be in the Gozitans’ own interest to actually keep their island that way, for as long as humanly possible...

And so – just to avoid ending on such a dismal note – allow me to propose a third possible ‘interpretation’, instead (one which also applies to the issue of Climate Change, by the way... but that’s just an aside).

Yes, Gozitans are quite right to feel aggrieved, that they themselves are being pressured to ‘forego’ the same opportunities, that their counterparts in Malta have been availing of for years...

... not least, because – even as we, here in Malta, entreat the Gozitans to ‘respect their own environment’ (for its own sake, by the way; not just for ‘theirs’ or ‘ours’) – well, it’s not exactly as though we’re ‘practising what we preach’ here on our own island, is it?

So unless we ourselves start putting our ‘money where our mouth us’, here in Malta... and actually EMULATE (instead of merely ‘applauding’) the efforts of mayors like Xaghra’s Christian Zammit; Gzira’s Conrad Borg Manche; and Qala’s Paul Buttigieg, in trying to halt this never-ending cycle of ‘environmental violence’...

... well, we can’t hardly expect the Gozitans – or anyone else on the entire planet, for that matter – to behave any differently, on what is, after all, their own ‘home-turf’... can we, now?