Honest Abe and climate change

Well, I told you that I’d have some more quotations from Abraham Lincoln for you, and I don’t intend to disappoint. This one is from the same speech to a Springfield, Illinois temperance society. “Few can be induced to labor exclusively for posterity, and none will do it enthusiastically. Posterity has done nothing for us; and theorize on it as we may, practically we shall do very little for it, unless we are made to think we are at the same time doing something for ourselves.”

One of the observations you will often see in discussions about climate change is the disproportionate burden borne by developing countries, that often the countries least responsible for contributing to increased levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere are most affected by the unpredictable weather patterns those increases create.

In the United States, many of the things we can do to reduce our carbon footprint (driving less, eating responsibly-produced food, etc.) are not immediately beneficial to us and so must fall under the category of “labor exclusively for posterity.” Even things that might benefit us directly (lower electric bills if you have a solar set-up) still have steep up-front costs (the thousands and thousands of dollars you need to spend to get a solar set-up). So, as Pres. Lincoln notes, few have been induced.

But in Lesotho, two factors combine to make any labor done to adapt to climate change (and note that the option in regions with already minimal footprints is simply to adapt) not labor for posterity but labor for self.

One: the effects have already been noticed. Whether or not these specific weather patterns can be causally linked to rising carbon dioxide levels, most people here note that something abnormal is going on. I arrived on the heels of a six-month drought, and Shakhane (my counterpart/the Grade 5 teacher) told me that planting had been delayed two months from its normal time. Adapting to the changing climate is not something you should do for your children, it is something you must do for yourself.

Two: the strategies for adapting to climate change (at least that I’ve seen) have the additional benefit of making one’s daily life easier. I use a propane-powered stove, but many people in Matholeng burn wood. My propane tank, full, weighs 11.3 kg, or just under 25 lbs. I grunt and sweat and complain every time I have to lug a new one from the road up the mountain to my house. But one tank—which must provide fuel to cook all my food, boil all my drinking water, and heat the water for my bucket baths—lasts about 40 days. I don’t have to carry that propane tank very often.

I am not sure how long it takes to burn through 25 lbs of wood, but I imagine it’s a great deal shorter than 40 days. My host father, ntate Matlere Thamae, works at the local NGO as its Climate Change Resource Officer. One of his newest initiatives is to sell wood-burning stoves to people in the surrounding villages. These stoves come in three different sizes and, he has told me, are about 80% more efficient than putting your wood fire out in the open. This would be a very small step to mitigate the effects of climate change, but more importantly, the purchaser would now have to carry 80% less wood. Their labor benefits posterity, but they are, in a very real, palpable way, “at the same time doing something for [them]selves.”

 

Ntate Matlere with some of the new stoves.

80 per cent. We're talking about per cent here.

And reducing the use of wood would have a tremendous ripple effect. Trees are naturally very important because of their ability to eat carbon dioxide and poop oxygen (you may be wondering how I got so smart at science, and let me tell you that I have quite the background; I once took a class called “Chemistry for Citizens”). More oxygen and less carbon dioxide is a good thing for us humans. But let’s take it local.

In Lesotho, one of the greatest environmental concerns is the pervasive soil erosion. The entire country is a high mountain plateau, and most of our rain finds its way into the Senqu River and then out into South Africa. Large ditches called dongas scar the countryside where the water streams down from the mountains. There are very few trees to keep the soil in place, so much of the fertile topsoil gets carried away. Plenty of people and organizations have tried to remedy this by planting trees, but it is difficult to convince those who live in nearby villages to let those trees be. When confronted with the immediate need of fuel to cook food with, the slightly longer-term need of fertile topsoil gets swept aside. If 80% more trees are left where they stand, more soil will be left in place.

Which brings us to food security. Shakhane recently attended a government workshop for 5^th-grade teachers and high school agriculture teachers about a new method of farming called “Conservation agriculture.” This is another approach that, while it will certainly be beneficial to posterity, it is also immediately, tangibly beneficial to people living in Lesotho today (even shorter term than just the better crop yields they might see). I am thinking specifically of the 1^st Principle of Conservation Agriculture: minimum soil disturbance. This helps to protect the soil from erosion and conserves soil moisture, but what it practically means is that you no longer have to hoe the fields to break up the soil before planting. (I have heard that) hoeing is very difficult work, and the other teachers readily approved of the new approach.

This is a very high-quality pamphlet.

Spend less time disturbing the soil and more time with your kids. Win win.

One of the main points of Peace Corps service is to build capacity, which entails the transfer of any skills the volunteer might have to members of the local population, so that the locals may use those skills long after the volunteer has left. So I would have been remiss in my duty if I had not suggested an approach to dealing with climate change that has been useful in America. “Have you tried,” I asked, “denying it?”

“Denying what?”

“Climate change. You know, you could just say that it’s not happening.”

“But it is happening.”

“Yes, but… what if it weren’t?”

“But it is.”

“Look, I believe that you believe that. But, and bear with me here: what if it weren’t?”

(looking around at others) “Does anyone know what he’s talking about?”