Conservation issues of yesterday, today, and tomorrow
Excerpt
As an older member of the Soil and Water Conservation Society, I am intrigued, challenged, and sometimes overwhelmed by the nature and diversity of issues that the society is addressing today. Moving from one session to another at the 2007 annual conference, I was both impressed and baffled by the subject matter of the scientific and technical presentations. I heard about bioenergy with its corollaries of biofuels and biodiesel. I listened to discussions of carbon and several of its ramifications such as sequestration and credit trading. The wildlife people were there to talk about biodiversity conservation and management. As I reflected on what I had seen and heard at the conference, my mind wandered back about 20 years when I was president of the society. Most of the issues being discussed today were not on our agenda then. I can only conclude that we are in a new era of soil and water conservation.
While I applaud the Soil and Water Conservation Society for being on the cutting edge of current conservation issues, I hope we will not forget the time-liness—and urgency—of some subjects that have been with us for awhile. One that particularly concerns me and …
Footnotes
Maurice G. Cook, received the Hugh Hammond Bennett Award in 2006. He is professor emeritus at North Carolina State University.
- Copyright 2007 by the Soil and Water Conservation Society
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