Rosemary Sutcliff

Manuel Otero

Retells the story of the Trojan War, from the quarrel for the golden apple, and the flight of Helen with Paris, to the destruction of Troy.

la historia de la "Ilíada" de Homero

Naves negras ante Troya

When analyzing the topic of natural resouce conservatin and the environment, two basic premises must be considered. The first is that the economic system and natural resources are closely intertwined; if one is ignored, the other is placed in jeopardy. Second, the links between the economic system and natural resouces are not only local in nature, as was previously thought, so the impact of actions affecting natural resources reverberates throughout the planet. The problem of natural resource conservation and the environmental is not a new one. What is new is the magnitude of the pressure on natural resources and the environment and how our perception of the problem has expanded beyond the frontiers of the biological sciences to include other elements affecting the security of the planet. Out of this web of relationships, multilateral fora are giving special attention to the link between international agricultural trade and management of the environment, with the agricultural sector placed as the nexus between the two, due to its direct relationship with each. Awareness of the universality of ecological phenomena and the relationship between the economy and the environment highlights the pervasiveness of the problem, as well as the need for the community of nations to accept the problem as a challenge and to share responsability in solving it. In short, environmental deterioration is the result of the protectionist policies of developed countries, which have led to the intensification of agricultural production through the indiscriminate use of chemical inputs and marginal lands. Developing countries also share in the responsability, since the extremely unequal distribution of income, lack of access to land, and extreme poverty in those countries make it necessary to overexploit fragile ecosystems. In view of this situation, there is no doubt that the agricultural sector, given its wealth of natural resources and its importance in the overall economy, should serve as the driving force behind a new economic and social development strategy. At the same time, however, its inseparabiliy from environmental and natural resource management issues demands the design of strategies to boost production capabilities through careful planning, and to improve the quality of life for future generations. According to this new vision of agriculture as the motor of growth, modernizatin can no longer be limited in scope, bypassing important sectors of society. Modernization efforts must place priority on incorporating small-scale farmers into commercial agriculture through mechanisms for reaching agreement, decentralization, strengthening trade associations and human resource training. This is essential to the concept of comprehensive modernization, and necessary for stemming rural poverty and the exodus to urban centers, and for bringing resource mining to an end. The natural comparative advantages of Latin America and the Caribbean must be transformed into dynamic competitive advantages to enable the agricultural sector to meet present challenges. In essence, this means that agriculture must develop a new competitiveness, based on technological innovations and human resources capable of steering the region toward sustainable development. This new type of development will undoubtedly require profound changes in the organization of society. To date, markets have been unsuccessful in allocating resources and generating "sustainable" behavior because the problem does not lie in the market mechanism per se, but in how the players are organized and how effective are the rules established to promote environmentally sound behavior. This is where institutional innovations are needed. It is not a question of abandoning or ignoring fundamental principles such as private property and individual initiative, but rather of formulating laws that deliberately steer markets in a direction that fosters sustainable economic behavior. We are now witnessing a growing trend of joint cooperation to reach a consensus on these major lines of work for the next century: international trade, sustainability, and the environment. Developed and developing countries have still not reached and agreement as to what the priorities are, who is responsible for what, and how the transition to new schemes of organization and social behavior will be financed. Resolution of these differences is the key component of the process launched in Rio during the United Nations Conference on Environment and development (ECO92). The first step has already been taken: where we go from here is up to us.

Manuel Otero

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