Israel, Palestinian Reforestration, and You

The Jewish National Fund is always going to be controversial. Their stated goal is to acquire and hold land for Jewish development in Palestine. Their first land purchase in Ottoman Palestine in 1903 predates by more than four decades the successful establishment of Jewish Israel after the Second World War. The JNF has been instrumental in the continuing political and economic operation of the Jewish state.

Free shipping, and $5 to the JNF. Mr. Linden is their American Spokesman.

Politics and history notwithstanding, I’m quite interested in the JNF’s active tree-planting operations. Many of the reforestation projects have come under some fire due to the incorporation of some non-native species. Additional claims of logistical military strategic plantings of these areas have been levied. Taking the politics completely out of this analysis is next to impossible, but I don’t much care WHY the JNF is planting trees where they are. I want to look at the ecological and economic effects of the program over time.

Bedouin overgrazing has been an issue in these arid lands for some time. Additional population additions to the area over time have compounded the strain on the resources of an already stressed area. Many of the JNF’s tree-planting programs have turned around once barren wastelands into sustainable forest locations. Cypress is heavily planted in Israel by the JNF.

The reforestation of pines carries an economic benefit for the JNF and the people of Israel over time. Turning non-productive lands into productive ones is always a sound economic model. Say what you want about the politic or intention of the issue at hand, the landowner is the landowner. I’ve seen many landowners do much worse with productive lands…

It has been estimated that the JNF, all holdings calculated, owns up to 13% of land in Palestine. So the West Bank issues still on the table for discussion are nothing new here. Sometimes forgotten or unknown are the years of capitalization and holdings growth that took place in the decades leading up to WWII. Much of the paperwork was already in place for that transaction.

Hal gets down and dirty with reforestation.

The JNF has been active in reservoir building, parkland establishment, and something in the neighborhood of 240 million trees have been planted, and over a quarter-million acres of land have been developed. They build roads. They build infrastructure. This is an essential piece to understand the current- and long-standing conflicts over the interests at work in any peace negotiations to even be conceivable. The overthrow of Israeli law could lead to massive disputes over property rights. And a hell of a lot more fighting.

Recent political turmoil for the JNF focused on the leasing operations to non-Jewish leaseholders, such as the Bedouins mentioned above. In Israel, like in the US, internal domestic debates over policy and practice eat up a lot of legislative time. Thus much continued discussion for another time.

A Post-Bubble Hangover

Once in a while, a person has to wonder about the learning processes of Americans. A massive bailout of our banking system was necessitated almost three years ago by the inability of our biggest (and smallest) banks to properly regulate their own activities. Lending practices over the decade leading up to our housing meltdown could do nothing but lead to a market bubble. Home “ownership” rates were at an all-time high, and the corresponding failures of those being foreclosed upon now is a simple market correction of the banks’ collective inability to make accurate risk analyses.

An obese housing market slims down by wearing smaller pants.

The Weekend Journal had a good write-up by Nick Timiraos and Maurice Tamman about big banks’ response to being saved by the American taxpayer. After letting lending standards slide so far toward loose money, the banks, it seems, are overcorrecting a bit now. The tightening of the current money supply helps to indemnify lenders against future error, but the multiplier effect of funds available to lend and stimulate economic growth are now tied up in possibly overcautious rates of credit denial.

Today’s lending market is more heavily reliant on borrowers with ample cash, which creates kind of a vicious cycle here. Those who don’t need to borrow money have ample means and historically low interest rates with which to attain credit, while those people and areas that need credit the worst are now unable to acquire it.

If the banks were “too big to fail” three or four years ago, they are every bit as big or bigger today. Furthermore, their books are still polluted with toxic assets—a number of properties stagnated in limbo between foreclosure and renewed marketability. The banks can’t release all the foreclosures they should back to the market at one setting, or the entire pricing structure would become devalued. Every bank would be stuck with piles of worthless paper.

So now it appears our banks, and perhaps our housing market, are “too big to succeed.” Fun stuff, knee-jerk pendulum politics...

Goodbye, Holocene?

The cover story of last week’s Economist suggests we may have seen the last of the Holocene. (The most recent geological epoch) It’s a little concerning to be among those actively participating in this transition. The article suggests that 90% of all plant activity in the world is reliant in some way upon people. The advances to worldwide food production have pretty much forced the issue upon our earth. It’s just not possible to expect the world to remain a similar place supporting ten times its population of three centuries ago.

Can the Robocene be far behind?

That responsible forestry has become a more acceptable practice worldwide is encouraging. Since we are already pretty much in the middle of an “Anthropocene Era,” we should do our best to not cause some sort of mass extinction, I suppose. Population swells will have to be managed with the available resources.

Meanwhile, people are certainly living longer. So the strains on the system increase incrementally with each generation, even if there were an effective zero population growth. This has been established already in much of Western Europe, but not so elsewhere in the world. China is already questioning its one-child policy as it is experiencing its most remarkable economic growth period in its modern history.

Again, we’ll see if we make responsible decisions home and abroad. International mandates have certainly become more common, and rogue nations are experiencing just a little bit of difficulty worldwide…in case anyone hadn’t noticed quite yet. Now we can root for a simple little epoch change instead of the end/beginning of a new era.