By Zanny Begg and Sam Wainwright
MELBOURNE — The third Students, Science and Sustainability conference was held July 13-15 at the University of Melbourne.
Judy Lambert, former adviser to environment minister Ros Kelly, opened the conference by telling the audience of 200 students that the environmental movement needs to learn to "sit on the fence". A combination of grassroots activism and professionalism is required to press governments into action. According to Lambert, the government has the power to save our environment; all it needs is a little gentle persuasion from respectable environmentalists.
The first day of the conference was largely filled by speakers with dubious environmental credentials. Coopers and Lybrand, the Tasman Institute and an environmental consultant with a professional background in the forest and chemical industries were all keynote speakers.
Trish Caswell, executive director of the Australian Conservation Foundation, opened her address by denying that the ACF was an arm of the government. One of Caswell's more worrying suggestions was a user pays system to limit water usage — a proposal which would hurt the poor more then the big companies which are wasting our water.
The highlight of the first day was unquestionably the youth speakers, Aboriginal activist Russell Smith and Lina Cabero from the Asian Students Association.
Smith explored the implications of the Mabo decision and the importance of land rights to the environmental movement. Cabero talked about the revitalisation of youth activism through environmental issues and sought links between the workers' and peasants' struggles in the Asian region and the environmental movement.
On the second day, Nijar, from the Third World Network, gave a compelling talk on the international
economic system. He described how the food producing capacity of the third world is being undermined by multinational companies. Genetic engineering is producing crop varieties that have a high yield but are dependent on pesticides and susceptible to crop failure. These engineered crop seeds are being patented, allowing companies to control and profit from another step in the food production process.
Carolyn Sherman from Aid Watch stunned the conference with her exposé of where the Australian aid dollar goes. Approximately one quarter goes to PNG; some of this money has been used in police training, not in development assistance projects. Aid dollars often end up in business projects like coal production in India, according to Sherman.
The third day was set aside for discussing environmental action. This was the most disappointing part of the conference.
The discussion on networking was opened by the National Union of Students. Alex Hanlon from NUS National Environment Committee (NEC) told the conference that NUS was open to activist input on environmental issues. When describing what the NEC had actually done on environmental issues in the year it has existed, however, she could only mention one poster with a vague reference to a campaign.
Other groups to address the conference included NOSCA (National Overseas Students Collective in Australia), Asian Students Association, Environmental Youth Alliance and Green Youth Action, the youth group of the ACF.
Discussion about what those at SSS could do to get involved in action was unfortunately cut rather short. NUS supporters pushed through a proposal that NUS be used as a networking tool for the campus environmental movement. This was questioned by some activists, given the relationship between NUS and the Labor government — the body responsible for much ecological destruction.
EYA's address to the conference stated that saving the environment will require involving people in campaigns that mobilise around issues of environmental
significance. The World Environment Day actions, which involved more than 3000 young people around Australia, were a good example of this approach. In the past NUS has used a different strategy, calling on people to stay at home and phone, fax or write about their grievances.
Next year's SSS conference will be held at Macquarie University in Sydney. Hopefully, it will exhibit a stronger commitment to building an independent environmental movement.