Nº 23 – Stay grounded

Monday, the 27th Abril 2020

What does the term “systemic relevance” really mean? Who can guarantee that the State’s provision of short-term, life-sustaining financial support to airlines will really keep planes in the air or that their financial collapse will not happen in the near future? Besides jet fuel, TAP, Lufthansa, Air France, KLM, Alitalia and many other airlines – if and when they fly – will burn large amounts of government credit from May 2020 onwards, which will not make any sense either for the climate or for the economy. Investing money in black holes always goes hand in hand with high energy losses: the money dissolves into CO2 and vanishes, when it could have done a lot of good elsewhere – for example, in preventing forest fires.

And this raises the following questions, which all private investors ask when they experience a loss: is the burning of so much jet fuel intrinsically sustainable? Does Europe need so many individual airlines? Does each country need its own airline? Wouldn’t it make more sense to merge the ailing, bankrupt airlines together and reduce the size of their fleet?

There’s no denying that those who make the right decisions in times of systemic crisis will survive into the future. Let’s take a systemically relevant look through the magnifying glass at the small community in Monchique in southern Portugal to give this story a positive twist. In Monchique, water is a very valuable asset, and the construction of cisterns for four victims of the 2018 forest fire is beginning today. No, neither António Costa, nor Boris Johnson, nor even Angela Merkel have invested a single euro in this project, with the money being raised through crowdfunding at www.ppl.pt/monchique-com-futuro. On the contrary. The budget of 22,390€ has been amassed exclusively through donations by 165 private individuals, who, in autumn 2019, gave anything from 2€ to 2,000€ in support of a climate idea developed by the Monchique-Alerta, Serra livre de incêndios association and now becoming a reality.

Despite the initial restrictions imposed by this State of Emergency, those in charge of the local association continued to work on their project behind the scenes. They put the construction work out to public tender and subsequently received seven estimates from various constructors. After an in-depth discussion, the board of directors of Monchique Alerta unanimously settled on a local construction company, which was awarded the contract to build the first two cisterns. The building work begins today, Monday 27 April. The association expects to hand over the first cistern to a couple from Monchique at the end of May, and the second cistern should also be ready before the hot dry summer season begins. The association, which finances its work exclusively through private donations and is involved in forest fire prevention, would be pleased if yet more responsible and enlightened citizens actively engaged in climate protection.

This includes the concept of reforestation, with the planting of a mixture of various native species of oak, chestnut, alder and ash, among other trees, and the elimination of invasive and fire-promoting species such as eucalyptus and acacia. Monchique-Alerta reminds us that only a sustainable, biodiverse stock of trees will promote a balance between the groundwater and the soil. Any good economic policy should always be focused on achieving a balance in nature, where the basic elements of life – water, earth and air – interact with each other in a harmonious relationship. A reduction in monocultures always leads to improved groundwater levels and thus a higher quality of life.