**Tourism AFF**

Link Turn- Tourism

Tourism is good for the environment
Strong, writer for TavelMole, 13
[Maurice, 7/12/13, TrevelMole, Tourism Is Good For Economic, Social, And Environmental
Progress, http://www.travelmole.com/news_feature.php?news_id=2002015, NCM]

Tourism, providing jobs and supporting the livelihoods of millions, particularly of women and
young people, is central to advancing the three pillars of sustainability, agreed participants
meeting at a Rio+20 tourism event. Participants at the side event 'Tourism for a Sustainable
Future', held at Rio+20, agreed that tourism can make a significant contribution to the three
pillars of sustainable development - economic, social and environmental. "Tourism is
interlinked with the seven key themes being discussed here at Rio+20 - jobs, energy, cities,
food, water, oceans and disasters - and can be a factor of development for developing and
developed countries alike," said Gasto Vieira, Minister of Tourism of Brazil, opening the event.
"We are here today at Rio, twenty years after the first Earth Summit, to renew our
commitments, define shared goals and agree on a roadmap for a better future," said UNWTO
Secretary-General, Taleb Rifai, highlighting that "amid growing economic concerns it is now,
more than ever, that we need to call for the right policies, the adequate investment and the
proper business practices that can advance us towards fairer, more people-centered, inclusive
growth." Tourism"s capacity to create jobs is central to this debate," said Supachai
Panitchpakdi, Secretary-General of the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD),
underlining tourism"s multiplier effects. "We cannot forget that for every job created in
tourism, many more jobs are created in other sectors." The role of the UN system in advancing
tourism"s contribution to economic growth and development was debated, namely the work of
the UN Steering Committee on Tourism for Development (SCTD), an initiative led by UNWTO
and bringing together eight further UN agencies and programmes (ILO, ITC, UNCTAD, UNDP,
UNEP, UNESCO, UNIDO, WTO) to ensure an integrated and more effective international
cooperation - "Delivering as One "- for tourism, and to accelerate progress towards the
Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). Participants emphasized the role of sustainable tourism
in creating decent jobs, stimulating trade and linkages and eliminating poverty. There was a
clear call to improve the link between local communities and tourism attractions in order make
tourism a more effective tool in the fight against poverty and to advance awareness raising
among tourists of their obligation to respect and protect the environment considering that it
is tourism"s prime interest and responsibility to protect natural resources. Closing the event,
Maurice Strong, Secretary-General of the 1992 Earth Summit said "your sector has a real
interest in protecting the environment and a huge potential for the green economy as its
assets are the ones we need to preserve and enhance." The event also had the participation of
the Minister of Tourism of Ecuador, Freddy Ehlers; the Minister of Tourism of Madagascar, Jean
Max Rakotomamonjy; the Vice-Minister for Tourism Planning of Mexico, Jorge Mezher;
Ambassador Dho Young-Shim, Member of the UN MDG Advocacy Group and Chair of the ST-EP
Foundation (Sustainable Tourism - Eliminating Poverty); the President of the ST-EP Foundation
and former UNWTO Secretary-General, Francesco Frangialli; and Shahrazad Roohi,
Environmental Advisor for the Abu Dhabi Tourism and Cultural Authority.
Link Turn- Science Co-op
Lifting the embargo is essential to scientific cooperation- thats key to solve
Cuban biodiversity- the embargo is also squeezing Cuba dry of money which
hinders their own environmental protection efforts
Collymore, IPS Correspondent, 97
[Yvette, 3/7/97, Inter Press Service, Inter Press Service- News Agency, Environment-Cuba: US
Embargo Cramping Environmental Prospects,
http://ipsnews2.wpengine.com/1997/03/environment-cuba-us-embargo-cramping-
environmental-prospects/, NCM]
From woodpeckers to sea turtles, some animal species facing extinction in the United States
have taken up permanent residence in Cuba, the original winter home for many a fish and fowl
in North America. But as the U.S. economic embargo against Havana hacks away at Cubas
prospects, the Caribbean island is struggling to keep up key work in protecting its natural
resources , including species that are disappearing in other parts of the Americas. In one
word, Cuba needs help, say policy analysts and environmentalists. They argue that its time for
Washington and Havana to drop their political dog fight and attend to shared environmental
concerns. And cooperation could be truly mutual in view of Cubas significant advances in
science, they add. There is more scientific research in Cuba relative to the environment than
in many countries, including Mexico and Chile, says Jorge Dominguez of the Washington-
based Inter-American Dialogue. This research the budget for which is swiftly eroding is
uncovering plant and animal species previously unknown to the scientific community.
According to the World Resources Institute (WRI) here, 40 percent of the species currently
being found on the island is new to science. Cuba has 40 times as many bird species per
hectare as is found in North America and 30 times as many reptile and amphibian species,
says WRI. The island is a quarter the size of California, which is one of the most species-rich
areas in the United States; yet Cuba has more species and plants than California, says Walt
Reid of WRI, noting the islands 6,700 plant types. Its a bit like the Galapagos of the
Caribbean. Researchers say Cuba has the worlds smallest lizard the gecko or
sphaerodactylus schwarzi which measures less than 25 mm from its nose to the tip of its tail.
And a recent discovery places Cuba in a category with Brazil as having the smallest frog at one
centimetre long. Of the islands 350 species of birds, 60 percent are known to be North
American migrants. One bird which recently became extinct in the United States the Ivory
Billed woodpecker was last seen in Cuba. At the same time, as many as six sea turtles on
the endangered list in the United States could be threatened by fishing pressures in Cuba,
says WRI. They include the Green turtle, the Hawksbill, Kemps Ridley, Leatherback, Loggerhead,
and Pacific Ridley turtles. Cubas economic woes are bad news for the birds and plant life .
Like any developing country, poor people are driven into areas of biodiversity, says Reid.
Cuba has made a bigger effort in establishing protected areas than most countries in the
world, but without some help, these protected areas will fall. Cuba and the United States,
separated by 145 kms and the Florida Straits, are being advised to pool their efforts to prevent
the pollution of coastal waters, to promote protection of migratory birds and fish, and to
collaborate in hurricane forecasts. Four out of 10 hurricanes that hit the United States in the
20th century have hit Cuba first, says Dominguez of the Inter- American Dialogue.
The Dialogue, which includes political, business, and academic leaders from Canada, the United
States, and Latin America, launched an initiative in 1994 to assess the impact of U.S. policy on
cooperation between Cuba and the United States on the environment and to look for areas for
cooperation. Firstly, the two countries should remove all barriers to scientific cooperation,
says the Dialogue. Scientific ties between the neighbouring countries declined dramatically
since the United States instituted its embargo against Cuba in 1962. And while the embargo
does permit many forms of scientific collaboration, including travel to Cuba for scientific
research, and since 1988 the purchase and transfer of informational material, the political
climate is seen as a hindrance to any real initiatives. The atmosphere of official hostility has
had a dramatic, chilling effect on such collaboration, says a new report by the Dialogue. The
U.S. policy of isolating Cuba has created the erroneous but lasting impression that scientific
collaboration is impossible or illegal, says the report, titled The Environment in U.S.-Cuban
Relations: Recommendations for Cooperation. By their rhetoric and their frequent changes in
policy and administrative procedures, both governments have made scientific work difficult, it
says. The Dialogue is calling on the Cuban Ministry of Science, Technology, and the Environment
as well as professional scientific associations in Cuba to identify the obstacles to increased work
with their U.S. counterparts. The group also calls on the National Academy of Sciences, the
American Association for the Advancement of Science and other professional associations in the
United States to feature Cuban scientific work in their publications and to highlight
opportunities to conduct research in Cuba. We believe that this level of effort and
involvement on the part of scientific institutions and associations is essential to achieving a
meaningful level of collaboration between U.S. and Cuban scientists, says the Dialogue. The
office of Cuban Affairs at the U.S. State Department says even though scientific cooperation
declined significantly from 1962, at no time did technical cooperation come to a complete halt.
Cuba and the United States are parties to a number of regional and international treaties
aimed at protecting the oceans, marine life, the atmosphere, and wildlife, and they call for
technical cooperation at the official level. According to the Office of Ocean Affairs at the U.S.
State Department, Havana and Washington are also negotiating a joint protocol on land-based
sources of marine pollution. This is one area in which we have common goals, says Robert
Blumberg of the Office of Ocean Affairs, citing a shared interest in protecting coral reefs. Were
trying to negotiate minimum effluent limitations for sewage. The two countries have also
cooperated in work at the International Maritime Organisation (IMO). The two countries were
key players in the designation of the Caribbean as a special area under the 1983 Marpol
agreement the Protocol On Prevention of Pollution from Ships. We found on Texas beaches
garbage that was discharged way down in the Caribbean, says Blumberg. We were able to
achieve quite a positive result.
Lifting the embargo solves environmental concernscooperation and funding
Ricks, writer for FP, 9
[Thomas, 10/23/9, Foreign Policy, National Security, Marine Colonel: Drop The Cuban
Embargo,
http://ricks.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2009/10/23/marine_colonel_drop_the_cuba_embargo,
NCM]

The Obama administration's decision to extend the U.S. economic trade embargo on Cuba for an
additional year is detrimental to our national and regional security and further emboldens our
economic, military, and infrastructure rivals. What is most perplexing is the fact that earlier this
summer the Obama administration decided to relax some of the regulations regarding
personal travel and personal money transfers from Cuban-Americans to their relatives in Cuba,
as well as telecommunication exchanges between private U.S. and state-run Cuban companies:
all are steps in the right direction for U.S. interests - but are not enough. While these relaxed
restrictions are certainly a step forward in normalizing relations, these steps do not outweigh
the heavy diplomatic, information, and economic influence of Brazil, Venezuela, Nicaragua,
China, Russia, India, and Iran, all of whom support the Cuban government and all of whom seek
to be peer competitors with the United States. In short, the U.S. unilateral embargo will
continue to retard regional security and stability, and further serve to erode our influence in
the Americas at a time when U.S. credibility is globally scrutinized. The arguably outdated and
undeniably ineffective embargo will continue to halt progress at every turn; more specifically,
the diplomatic influence and credibility of the U.S., the social and political progress of Cuba,
and the security and stability progress of the region. The U.S. embargo will continue to
impede potential and future cultural and scientific trade investments, shared agricultural
advancements, and pertinent meteorological and environmental exchanges regarding the
shared Florida Straits ecology. Furthermore, the U.S. unilateral embargo will continue to
encourage Cuba to partner with Russia, China, and Brazil for off-shore oil and natural gas
exploration within the shared U.S. and Cuban economic exclusion zone. The U.S. embargo will
continue to endear many of the poor Caribbean and Central American nations to the Chavez
Venezuelan PetroCaribe initiative, and the embargo will ensure that no official U.S. - Cuban
dialogue and/or planned cooperative action occurs with regards to such crucial issues as
regional and transnational criminal organizations, illegal immigration and extortion issues, and
the growing Islamic influence on Latin American from Iranian, Syrian, and Lebanese diasporas.
We must face the facts: the U.S. efforts to isolate and force a regime change in Cuba for nearly
half a century have failed. These 50 years have successfully driven Cuba to aggressively seek
support elsewhere, as is evident in their forming and fostering diplomatic ties, seeking
infrastructure support, establishing military liaisons, and accepting economic support from
every government in the Americas - to include Canada - with the exception of the United
States. Most of Cuba's economic and diplomatic partners have "Leftist" governments with close
ties to state and non-state Islamic fundamentalists, porous national borders and often rampant
organized crime cartels coupled with violent gang warfare fueled by drug trafficking, human
trafficking, and extortion. After all, Cuba has the backing of Hugo Chavez' endorsed ALBA and
doctors for oil initiative, Evo Morales' endorsed MAS, China's $600M economic and trade
stimulus grant, and Brazil's $300M infrastructure and modernization credit to list a few. To be
sure, the United States should be very concerned with the company that Cubans keep. A less
adversarial tone with Cuba will reestablish much needed dialogue in the region and help
address shared national border security vulnerabilities, transnational and regional crime
consortiums, and environmental and ecological initiatives. The necessity for the Obama
administration to lift the U.S. economic embargo is painfully obvious. It would enhance the
region's security, promote economic prosperity, establish shared environmental regulations,
and help re-establish our credibility and leadership vis--vis some of our most prominent global
allies and competitors. Lastly, let's ask ourselves, "Has our 50 year embargo brought Cuba any
closer to democracy, or have we denied the Cubans an opportunity to see the best that our free
and democratic society offers?"
Impact Defense
No species snowball Ecosystems are resilient
Sedjo, economist and senior fellow and director of Resources for the Future, 2k
[Roger A., Resources for the Future, Conserving Natures Biodiversity: insights from biology,
ethics & economics, eds. Van Kooten, Bulte and Sinclair, p 114]
As a critical input into the existence of humans and of life on earth, biodiversity obviously has a
very high value (at least to humans). But, as with other resource questions, including public
goods, biodiversity is not an either/or question, but rather a question of how much. Thus, we
may argue as to how much biodiversity is desirable or is required for human life (threshold) and
how much is desirable (insurance) and at what price, just as societies argue over the appropriate
amount and cost of national defense. As discussed by Simpson, the value of water is small even
though it is essential to human life, while diamonds are inessential but valuable to humans. The
reason has to do with relative abundance and scarcity, with market value pertaining to the
marginal unit. This water-diamond paradox can be applied to biodiversity. Although biological
diversity is essential, a single species has only limited value, since the global system will
continue to function without that species. Similarly, the value of a piece of biodiversity (e.g.,
10 ha of tropical forest) is small to negligible since its contribution to the functioning of the
global biodiversity is negligible. The global ecosystem can function with somewhat more or
somewhat less biodiversity, since there have been larger amounts in times past and some
losses in recent times. Therefore, in the absence of evidence to indicate that small habitat
losses threaten the functioning of the global life support system, the value of these marginal
habitats is negligible. The value question is that of how valuable to the life support function
are species at the margin. While this, in principle, is an empirical question, in practice it is
probably unknowable. However, thus far, biodiversity losses appear to have had little or no
effect on the functioning of the earths life support system, presumably due to the resiliency
of the system, which perhaps is due to the redundancy found in the system. Through most of its
existence, earth has had far less biological diversity. Thus, as in the water-diamond paradox,
the value of the marginal unit of biodiversity appears to be very small.
Empirics proveno impact to species loss
Dodds, President of North Pacific Research, 2000
[Donald, 2000, North Pacific Research, The Myth of Biodiversity
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:X8s-
Gaf_5r0J:northpacificresearch.com/downloads/The_myth_of_biodiversity.doc+&cd=1&hl=en&c
t=clnk&gl=us, accessed 7-12-13, GSK]

Biodiversity is a corner stone of the environmental movement. But there is no proof that
biodiversity is important to the environment. Something without basis in scientific fact is called
a Myth. Lets examine biodiversity through out the history of the earth. The earth has been a
around for about 4 billion years. Life did not develop until about 500 million years later. Thus
for the first 500 million years bio diversity was zero. The planet somehow survived this lack of
biodiversity. For the next 3 billion years, the only life on the planet was microbial and not
diverse. Thus, the first unexplainable fact is that the earth existed for 3.5 billion years, 87.5% of
its existence, without biodiversity.
Somewhere around 500 million years ago life began to diversify and multiple celled species
appeared. Because these species were partially composed of sold material they left better
geologic records, and the number of species and genera could be cataloged and counted. The
number of genera on the planet is a indication of the biodiversity of the planet. Figure 1 is a plot
of the number of genera on the planet over the last 550 million years. The little black line
outside of the left edge of the graph is 10 million years. Notice the left end of this graph.
Biodiversity has never been higher than it is today.
Notice next that at least ten times biodiversity fell rapidly; none of these extreme reductions
in biodiversity were caused by humans. Around 250 million years ago the number of genera
was reduce 85 percent from about 1200 to around 200, by any definition a significant
reduction in biodiversity. Now notice that after this extinction a steep and rapid rise of
biodiversity. In fact, if you look closely at the curve, you will find that every mass-extinction
was followed by a massive increase in biodiversity. Why was that? Do you suppose it had
anything to do with the number environmental niches available for exploitation? If you do, you
are right. Extinctions are necessary for creation.
Each time a mass extinction occurs the world is filled with new and better-adapted species.
That is the way evolution works, its called survival of the fittest. Those species that could not
adapted to the changing world conditions simply disappeared and better species evolved.
How efficient is that? Those that could adapt to change continued to thrive. For example, the
cockroach and the shark have been around well over 300 million years. There is a pair to draw
to, two successful species that any creator would be proud to produce. To date these creatures
have successful survived six extinctions, without the aid of humans or the EPA.
Now notice that only once in the last 500 million years did life ever exceed 1500 genera, and
that was in the middle of the Cretaceous Period around 100 million years ago, when the
dinosaurs exploded on the planet. Obviously, biodiversity has a bad side. The direct result of
this explosion in biodiversity was the extinction of the dinosaurs that followed 45 million years
later at the KT boundary. It is interesting to note, that at the end of the extinction the number
of genera had returned to the 1500 level almost exactly. Presently biodiversity is at an all
time high and has again far exceeded the 1500 genera level. Are we over due for another
extinction?