This episode features a conversation between Phil Dillard, Founder of Thruline Networks, and Philip Owen, Founding Member of GeaSphere. In this episode, Philip talks about the impactful stories that heavily influenced his career in eco-activism and the importance of organic farming and regenerative agriculture for the sustainability of the future. He also discusses the significant differences in environmental impact between afforestation and deforestation when it comes to the negative impact of timber plantations. Lastly, he provides fascinating insights into the undervalued ecological importance that grasslands hold within his own community and in environments around the globe.
This episode features a conversation between Phil Dillard, Founder of Thruline Networks, and Philip Owen, Founding Member of GeaSphere.
Philip is an environmental activist and pecan farmer based in South Africa. As the Founding Member of GeaSphere, he represents a nonprofit environmental organization that has been campaigning against afforestation, deforestation and the overall forest industry for more than two decades.
In this episode, Philip talks about the impactful stories that heavily influenced his career in eco-activism and the importance of organic farming and regenerative agriculture for the sustainability of the future. He also discusses the significant differences in environmental impact between afforestation and deforestation when it comes to the negative impact of timber plantations. Lastly, he provides fascinating insights into the undervalued ecological importance that grasslands hold within his own community and in environments around the globe.
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Guest Quote
“We need to diversify and where possible we should use the appropriate indigenous number species to be cultivated. If you want to say that you're in the forest industry then you must plant a real forest, not only one kind of tree. And a real forest also includes animals. I really think that it's vital that we re-include animals into all of these systems because there's a link between the animals and plants and sustainability, you know, the circle of life. We know that very well. And we've managed to break that system.” - Philip Owen
Episode Timestamps
(01:49) Introducing Philip
(06:12) Philip’s entry into eco-activism
(09:01) Starting GeaSphere
(19:20) Importance of grassland ecosystems
(28:51) Impacts of climate change in South Africa
(37:31) Competing actors and roles involved
(40:42) Quick hits
Links
Phil Dillard: Hello and welcome to Thruline to the Fourth Sector, where we're exploring fourth sector capitalism and impact investing as an invitation to innovation and changing the world. I'm your host, Phil Dillard, Founder of Thruline Networks. This episode features a conversation with Philip Owen, Founding Member of GeaSphere.
Philip is an environmental activist and pecan farmer based in South Africa. As a Founding Member of GeaSphere, he represents a non-profit environmental organization that has been campaigning against afforestation, deforestation, and the overall forest industry for more than two decades. In this episode, Philip talks about the impactful stories that heavily influenced his career in eco activism and the importance of organic farming and regenerative agriculture.
He also discusses the significant differences in environmental impact between afforestation and deforestation, as well as providing fascinating insights into the undervalued ecological importance that grasslands provide. To learn more about Philip's work, visit www.netzkraft.net. That's triple w dot n e t z k r a f t dot net.
And search GeaSphere, g e a s p h e r e. And to learn more about our work at Thruline Networks, visit thrulinenetworks.com. You can find links for both companies in the show notes. Now sit back and enjoy this conversation with Philip Owen, Founding Member of GeaSphere.
Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of Thruline to the Fourth Sector. I'm here today with Philip Owen, the Founding Member of GeaSphere, a non-for-profit environmental organization based in South Africa. Good morning, Philip. How are you doing today?
[00:02:00] Philip Owen: Good morning, Phil. No, I'm doing well thanks and nice to be on your podcast.
[00:02:03] Phil Dillard: Great to have you. It's rare that I get another ‘Phils of the world unite’ moment, but I always appreciate them. It's a beautiful, beautiful day here in San Francisco. How are things in South Africa?
[00:02:15] Philip Owen: It's a nice day. It's been cloudy, starting to go to the winter time now here where I am. So it's getting a little bit chilly in the evenings and yeah, it's gonna be a cold winter. This one, because we've had a a lot of rain, we've had more than a thousand millimeters, where normally we have around 700. That's the average.
[00:02:35] Phil Dillard: We could definitely use that, uh, that up here because we've had a very, very dry winter and we've had a very, a very little snow. We're looking at drought because of the lack of snow pack and maybe even limitations on freshwater in hydro power for the business San Francisco Bay area because it's been so, so dry and God forbid we'll see the next fire season because, you know, part of the reason we're here today was before [00:03:00] we met.
I was actually walking through the Redwood forest with a friend from Germany and I was just so excited to show it to her. And then I walked through and some of the trails were inaccessible and it was the obvious impact of the recent forest fire. It, it looked like it had traumatized the forest. We've had so much conversation about forest and great forest protection and things we can do, and you know, your comments about what's going on in South Africa are really important.
To us, and we wanted to kind of bring you on and get to know you a little bit. So we'll start in the first section, uh, just learning to learn a little bit more about you and, and your journey. So when people ask you, you know, about what you do, how do you describe what
[00:03:43] Philip Owen: you do? Well, you know, mainly I, I represent a environmental organization called gase, which for more than two decades have been campaigning against.
A forestation or deforestation or the forest industry. [00:04:00] Yeah, that's taken up quite a large spot of my, of my life. But what pays the bulls is a small ecotourism business that our family owns in an area where, you know, it's an ecotourism area, including of course, monoculture plantations. But um, yeah, it's a small little theme.
And then we have sort of a small nu which of avocado, some, uh, coffee going and then mainly pick nuts. Pecans 40 years ago was recommended as a viable crop for this area, so people were planting peaks. But I mean, since then they've seen that actually it's too moist and the nuts are prone to a kind a SC disease. We hanging in there. Most of the farmers have taken out thes and we [00:05:00] are trying to manage the organically and heal them back to some form of health.
We haven't been using any chemicals on them for more than 30 years. And there's some trees which consistently give good nuts. But yeah, that's what we do. Manage a small property, uh, sort of a eco-friendly way and try to promote ecological awareness in the region through this organization. Yes.
[00:05:24] Phil Dillard: Outstanding. I can't wait to get more into that discussion because it's something that I've heard actually now on, well, at least two continents. I talked about some of other folks who are doing work in Africa, in Asia, around organic farming with nu trees, actually in Australia too. Organic farming, regenerative agriculture.
In a smart way versus monoculture timber and monoculture agriculture. And we'll get into that a little bit. I definitely wanna make sure we talk a little bit about you before we started talking more about, about the work. But, um, so you said it's a family owned park and, and orchard. So I'm guessing that that started [00:06:00] from the beginning.
But when did you start getting into the eco activism and campaigning against the forest in.
[00:06:05] Philip Owen: Well, there was a particular piece of grassland, which I often was as a younger man, and then once I was away for a couple years in on returning, I found that, uh, much of that grassland was planted up to pine trees.
First they were tiny tree seedlings, but on subsequent visits you could see that obviously the trees were growing and as the trees were growing, the grass plant vegetation was thinning. Ultimately not enough light can penetrate through the three canopy to sustain the underground. And there is this one particular kind of plant, it's called a matawan, um, normally creeps along the soil and completely out of character.
This plant was trying to lift itself, the soil, trying to reach for the light, which was diminishing. You know, it really had a big impact on me because I could feel that these plants. Or fighting a [00:07:00] losing battle. You know, there's no ways that they can survive in those conditions. You know, then it just didn't make sense to me.
How can we transform these massive climax primary grassland regions? I mean, mostly, yeah, it used to be grasslands, um, with pockets of indigenous forests in the deep gullies. And of course, along the ripon zones, along the river, mostly where it's moist and fire cannot get to it. But these local grasslands are, well, first of all, they're very, very Ed.
You might know that grasslands globally is the world's most threatened vegetation type. The prairie is in South North America, the bumper in South America. The steps in Russia and the Southern African grassland complex of almost, well, more than 80% have been irrevocably destroyed. And the reason for that is that grasslands makes excellent agricultural soils.
So most of it's been plowed up worldwide, and the local [00:08:00] grasslands is home to an estimated 4,000 different kinds of indigenous plants. Most of them not crosses, but wild flowers with the roots and bulbs underground. It's just crazy for me to think that we can, that we could have allowed. To transform these primary grassland, bio diverse life grassland to massive monocultures and the is just off the chart, our South Africa.
There's around 650,000 he acres of these alien timber plantations. And remember, that's exclusively alien trees, so pines and euca. And in South Africa it's much bigger. It's about one and half million HEC acres in total manage, and then a 1.5 million acre of invasive plantations. But yeah, that's where I started.
You know, thinking about the fact that this is not. And then [00:09:00] I heard a guy called Wally. He, we used to be the chairperson of the Timber Watch Coalition, South Africa. I heard him speaking on the radio and, uh, he was just saying all these things that I felt, you know, about the impacts of these plantations, not only on the grasslands, but on water, on, on, on soil, you know, sustainability on people's lives and livelihoods.
Heard him speak on the radio, made a big impression on me. I then contacted him through the radio station, phone them to find out his number, and the two of us became good friends. He was the kinda so older than me and, uh, a real, real hardcore campaigner in this forest sector. So he said to me that that was back in 1999, and he suggested that we have a meeting in the local town, which we then did.
It went under the hitting African water crisis because at that time we were in a water scar [00:10:00] and, uh, that got quite lot of people together and we spoke different plantations on animals, on people, and, um, I was mandated from the floor to keep on circulating the information about them. Basically that's how the organization got.
Ultimately in 2003, we got a small grant from Grant Fund,
which.
That was really quite a big well attended meeting with some international stakeholders There mean, Swanland is a country that 80 kilometers and of SWA monoculture timber plantations in some of the most edible swans and that. It's, it's not for small scale and it's for big industry. You know, [00:11:00] two, five, we got a bit Swedish conservation and that allowed us actually to employ coordinators in and coordinators in.
We were heavily involved in strengthening Soul society in South Africa and the water sector. DSE is one of the organizations that was there. One of the founding organizations in the South African Water Caucus, which is a broad coalition of organizations involved somehow in the water sector in South Africa.
That was just before three when the world sustain development. So we've very much involved in society campaigning this for years. We've
and 50 participating organizations globally, part of the World [00:12:00] Rainforest movement. I was fortunate to have met Ricardo career. He used to be the Cordinator for the World Forest Movement based in Uua. He used to say that Aest is much worse than deforest. Because with deforestation, a company would come in, they would harvest, log the trees, they would take out the best timber, but they would leave some stuff.
They would leave some of the smaller trees. They would leave some of the smaller bushes and they would leave again. You know? And within 5,000 years that forest system would regenerate and you. There were people there, but were afforestation. These companies come in, they do exactly the same thing, destroy the indigenous diversity, their timber plantations, and stay making it really, really difficult, in some cases, completely impossible to rehabilitate towards the indigenous vegetation facts.
And of course, now we can see the impacts. We can see, you know, biological. Diversity, [00:13:00] we can see flesh flooding, we can erosion, we can degradation of systems.
Our catchment areas, you know? And then another incident that happened, which also sort of motivated me to become involved, involved in the environmental sector. There's a reservoir, water reservoir, maybe liters, and it used to fish and came this reservoir and was a, it's called African daughter. Also called the bird dives, catches fish, and this bird was just Reservoir.
Reservoir. The. It's a beautiful bird. It's neck has got like an air [00:14:00] shape. When it's swimming in the water, it looks like a snake. That's Bob, the beautiful, beautiful bird. Quite vegan. I heard later could, they can be quite vicious. But when I looked at this bird closely, I could see that around its bundles and bundles and bundles of fishing wire dried up.
Fishing wire, you know, and I thought that. I can scare, but I thought that I'm gonna around this and then jump up, give the bird. Cause there was a big tree three on the other side of the dam and I thought that no doubt it'd get entangled in the tree and that maybe then I would be able to catch him.
Remove the wire, you know, the, and more
ent.
Now, you know, I [00:15:00] was a little bit disappointed cause I would've liked see it and make sure that all of that stuff is removed and it just me, how we've stuffed up the local environment. You know that yeah, in semi wilderness areas there's still in abundance of wilderness, there's still a lot of wildlife that can be, you know, that it could have degraded to such an extent with birds, which depend.
Local river system cannot fish there without becoming entangled in. And then there's one last incident, which, which, which
on this years 10, 12 years out the. A bush pick in this environment. Now, bush pigs, they normally knockturnal, you don't see them walking around the day and they avoid people like the plague. But this bush came outta the bush and it walked straight up to a couple of workers at the local chicken farm. Um, on the inspection [00:16:00] they could see that this bush.
There was a wire cable snare that Poach had placed in the, that snare. This SNA managed, its,
its to eat or drink water or communicate to other members of its bond. And to me it was just interesting that that. You know, decided to go to the people not expecting help, I'm sure, but expecting to be put outta its Missouri quickly. You know, rather than spending days or weeks in the, in the bush dying from hunger and first to be put outta, its quickly.
That's what happened. But that inspired also a of us to start locally[00:17:00]
lifetime of than. Of these wire cables were removed, not only from our valley, but there were also some landowner in the adjoining, which to organization land area. But now things have changed a lot. I mean, there's more, there's more people taking, you know, internal care of poaching. But unfortunately, the way people see these animals, they see.
As they to be exploited, you know? And of course if you are and you struggling find enough food for your, then those animals, you know, in south, you know, some say in unemployment. So of course that's part of the problem. We need to create more jobs. So that's where Forest Store landscape restoration comes in.
Cause jobs can be created [00:18:00] in that. Oh, so that's how I became inspired. We mean a couple of things that put me on this path.
[00:18:06] Phil Dillard: Thank you so much for sharing all that. There's so much to dig into. You know, a lot of times people talk about local and indigenous populations and you get an image of some tribe that lives in the jungle or something.
But I mean, I think you paint a great picture of the grasslands of South Africa and one that says, Look, this isn't even talking about the climate change's components. It's just talking about mismanagement of the grasslands that lead to all these negative and undesired outcomes. For the people who live there, for the other stakeholders who are in this property, while certain interests are making profits and clearly you're not anti-business, but are anti harmful practices that really damage the ecosystem.
Let's talk a little about the grassland themselves. Cause we talk a lot about forests and rainforest and people talk. Uh, I think generally that gets a lot of conversation, but I don't think grasslands do. And you talked about their importance to water, to soil. [00:19:00] To animals and people. And when we talk about rainforest, we talk a lot about the under the canopy, the hidden value of the rainforest, because some people slash and burn the rainforest to put in palm plantations or corn plantations or grain for cattle, things like that.
And you describe the degradation of the grassland for timber. Can you talk a little bit about what we know that grasslands do in a positive way for the local ecosystem?
[00:19:25] Philip Owen: Yes, of course. Well, first let me say that the grasslands have evolved and or formed over the past 200 million years. Actually, different vegetation types superposed over each other once it's been fragmented.
Once it's been destroyed, it is. Almost impossible to get back. I mentioned before that the local grasslands, which is called the Northeastern Mountain sour, is home to an estimated 4,000 different kinds of indigenous plant species, of which only about 10 or 11% of grasses. So the [00:20:00] bulk of the floral biodiversity in the grassland are not crosses, but plants like Forbes, you know, If you think about 4,000 different kinds of plants, plants create habitat for other components of the ecosystem, you know, so in terms of insects, small birds, birds, mammals, the reptiles, Crossland is just in creatively biodiverse.
It's got carbon sequestration functions. Of course, it's very good at sequestering carbon, and there's insects, for instance, like termites, which literally carbon underground. So grassland have also got services like water retention. It's like a sponge. It holds the water back when it rains and allows it slowly the time to seep into the underground equi.
So if you destroy the grassland, you destroy that service. We can see now more soil erosion. That's more flash flooding. Crossland is the least responsible for this hydro that's induced into [00:21:00] the soils. Pine trees is bad, but eucalyptus is the worst. They induce a sort of a hydro in the soil where there's a thin waxy, which covers the soil, grains, inhibiting water penetration, and this of course, all.
Is made worse by fire. So a fire in timber plantation is devastating to the soils, literally because its so hot, you know? Um, interesting about grasslands. It's a fire driven vegetation type, so it needs fire. Some call fire the life blood of the grassland. If you remove the. You destroy the grassland? No, that's how important fire is to the grassland.
Of course, timber plantations don't want fire in timber plantations, so grasslands are joining. Timber plantations are very regularly being burned and they're being burnt at the wrong time of the year. According to most scientists in the know because natural. The [00:22:00] grassland would burn very late in the winter season, early spring when there's high likelihood of, of, of lightning induced fires with the early spring rains.
Then the grassland is very, very, very dry. And it burns fast and furious and it kills any three seeds, which might have seeded into the grassland. If you burn too early, like we do now, we burn, uh, even around this time, you know, people are already April, May, June, people burn. That's just when the grassland is dry enough to be able to be burnt.
And of course then it's easier cause it's a safer burn when the grassland is not that dry, but it doesn't burn with the same intensity, so it doesn't kill any three seedlings, which might have seeded into the grassland and they actually take hold, you know, become stronger. And of course this is problematic because it leads to this phenomena called bush encroach.
Where even indigenous trees are slowly but [00:23:00] grassland,
moreover,
underground. If you should Google underground forests, you'll definitely get references to these interesting trees. In our region they call breakers or breakers, my native language, which obviously refers to the fact that a farmer would still be plowing the, and the next plow would be hooked by a massive tree trunk on the ground.
So these trees, the roots, the trunks, the stems, everything is underground. Only leaves protruding above soil level. Of course, this is adapted to fire. There's other plants called pre flowers. Really fascinating. They don't need rain. All they need is fire. So as soon as the fire burnt through the grassland, you go there two, three days later.
Multitude of flowering plants, [00:24:00] small little flower. That's the opportunity. They've got stored reserve of watering their underground bulbs. As soon as the grassland have burnt, they shoot flowers because then the pollinating insects can see that and pollinate it once the grasses grow bad. They disappear the sea of grass.
You know, it's an absolutely fascinating and completely undervalued vegetation.
Let's
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And now back to the interview.
It's interesting that I was just gonna ask the question about the value of it, right? Because when we talk about rainforest, we talk about the hidden value of the rainforest, whether it's ecotourism or whether it's things you can learn from the plants and the flowers for, for drugs, or for other things, or if it's the impact that it has on other parts of the ecosystem.
Like what are soil animals, carbon sequestration, things like that. I'm curious if you're seeing opportu. For that hidden value of the grasslands [00:26:00] and where you see those
[00:26:01] Philip Owen: opportunities. I see it for sure, and I, I see it also in combination. Utilization of indigenous knowledge organization develop very links of health practitioners, practitioners, of course.
Are dependent upon the, you know, the plants and the animals of the bush to prepare their medicines. So, of course, you know, many of the medicinal plants are in fact found in the grassland. And now that the grasslands are, have been, you know, changed to such a large degree, the areas where these kinds of plants, these medicinal plants are still available.
They becoming few and far between. So that's why we've joined ranks of these indigenous health practitioners. And why we often collaborate on joint activities to raise awareness about the fact that, you know, the nature is important, not only for the medicinal plants, of course, but for all the ecosystem [00:27:00] services that it provides.
And in our region, I can really say that our river are in jeopardy. And of course, water is life. You know, eucalyptus roots have been measured 60 meters into the soil. 60 meters. The average indigenous trees, they've got boot depth of about seven meters. So 60 meters. That's how deep eucalyptus could go and mine
[00:27:24] Phil Dillard: groundwater.
So you're saying that eucalyptus are basically stealing water from the local trees, but also from the ecosystem? From the folks who would drink the water? Would use the water for the plants, animals, and humans who would use the water for survival.
[00:27:38] Philip Owen: That's why Eucalyptus also called the selfish tree because it uses more water than what actually rains upon it.
In the wintertime here, you see that most of the indigenous trees drop their leaves, can see their skeletons. Indicating that they are not utilizing water because they know that water is scar in the winter and that the other components of the ecosystem also [00:28:00] needs to survive. But these pines and eucalyptus and water, of course, they alien to the region.
They ever green with deep rooting systems, so they continuously tap into the water. It said that eucalyptus can use about 600 millimeters of annual. So if you live in an area and there's just eucalyptus plantations, you get 600 millimeters of rainfall. All of that will go to the eucalyptus. None of it will go to the systems spine.
Use about four millimeters of rainfall on, and these statistics are really, really well documented in back in 1915. Farmers were already complaining about the impact of Aest on water in South Africa. There was a Commonwealth Forestry Conference that was South Minister of Forestry and Agriculture. He initiated a peer catchment, which actually took place in various parts of our country, and it was ongoing for almost [00:29:00] 80 years, where they did peer catchment studies and you know, first measured hydrology of these catchments and then planted one of them up to timber and see how they respond, you know?
So that research have been ongoing for many, many years, for almost 80 years, as I said, and there's a very valuable data set that's been. In fact, if you go to our YouTube channel, you can get a video on that. It's called Timber Plantations and Water Use. It's a interview with, with a scientist who, from that, involved with those catchment studies.
But yeah, impact on water is absolutely a, and of course that leads to conflict. Water, water.
[00:29:42] Phil Dillard: Wow, that's a very heavy, heavy story. So, before we go on to talk a little bit about solution, I'm curious how you, you said that a lot of this is just about management, but the impacts of climate change people are seeing anywhere.
Can you talk about the, the recent impacts of climate change that you got, you might be seeing in [00:30:00] South Africa?
[00:30:01] Philip Owen: Well, you know, it's definitely getting warmer. I was at, at a recent workshop where, where it was, there was a presentation that estimates that we will have experienced a 60% drop in stream flow.
As in as few as 15 years, and this is not primarily to less rain because the rain actually seems as we're getting more rain lately, but to warmer conditions, so of course much more evaporation from the system. That's why one of the things that we say is that these dams must be broken down, you know, Decom.
Because dams is not, you know, normally when it's really, you need the dams.
S
ss out of a, we'd said that the average dam in South Africa [00:31:00] sos up at about 2% each year. So that gives the average lifespan of the near 50 years. You know, So once you really think, is it worth it to make such big changes to the, shouldn't we rather store the stored underground, you know, underground catchment so that we actually, that water underground, you know?
But there are most of the effects that I see locally. As I mentioned, you know, the way there has been a relatively constantly acknowledged that these change changing conditions, but generally it's been relatively constant. But there's been massive biological bio biodiversity impoverishment. There's massive soil erosion, there's now increased flesh flooding, which we never had in the past, and all of.
As is related to the fact that, uh, our catchments have been changed to industrial monoculture, timber plantations. There's also new studies [00:32:00] which reveals that when you plant the timber plantation, you are actually contributing to carbon emissions for the first couple of decades, it's only once the system stabilizes that it becomes a carbon.
And that it can become good at sequestering carbon. And it's not the trees primarily responsible for sequestering, its the living ecosystem. And the more diverse that living ecosystem, the more that sequester, you know, You know, often people say, Yeah, but the forest cover worldwide is. And it's true that, you know, there might be more trees being planted, but a timber plantation doesn't constitute a forest.
You know, the forest is more than just trees that's single age, single sized in straight roads. You know, I understand that in the USA there's only 4% of the original forest. So the bulk of the forests that you know in [00:33:00] America are planted forest and also impoverished from a biological point of view. In Sweden, for example, they've got 1% of the original forest between one and of the original.
Forests are still standing. The bulk, the, the majority of the forests there also planted forest, also mostly monocultural. There is a big difference though in the, It's colder, so the trees take a much longer time to. So it's longer rotation cycles, and within those longer timeframes, there's more opportunity for diversity to become established.
So in northern forests or timber patients, you would find some berries and some and some masses because they become established over that long timeframe. In South Africa and in most of the global south, these trees are planted because they grow so quickly. Euca trees can rotate from [00:34:00] 15 years. So it's short plantation cycles and pine trees, they take slightly longer, 15 to maybe 30 years.
So even, yeah, the pine plantation seems to be slightly more diverse because some trees might have died, more light coming through the canopy, some grass or that growing, you know. But the short cycles are devastating. It really makes it the eye impact activity. So I just wanted to make it clear. It's not only a problem in the south or in South Africa, it's a particular trees.
It's
timber, timber products. That's being the, the, the pulp and the. Celluloses now more, more, uh, they're planting more, producing more cell. And that's mostly for the export, [00:35:00] you know, so it's the local ecosystems that's being degraded, two full, full really over consumption of these products in northern countries.
So definitely we should start to consume less, you know, And talking, if I, if I may talk about another, the, the solutions. To me, the solutions lies in diversity. We need to diversify and possible, we should use appropriate indigenous species to know if you only one kind tree and a real funds also includes animals.
I really think that. It's vital that we re include animals into all of these systems because there's a link between the animals and plants and sustainability, you know, the circle of life. We know that very well, and we've managed to, to break that system. In the agriculture sector, of course we [00:36:00] use, you know, chemical fertilizers to breach that gap.
But of course that, you know, in the long term, that's not a good. We have to go back to organic ways. We have to make good compost, and for good composts, you need a good source of organic, uh, nitrogen. I really think that animals should, uh, find their place again in agriculture, not necessarily just to consume for the valuable manure.
That they can provide to the system, which here we, we have got a couple of cattle, we can see increased beetles, you know, we can see the environment benefits from animals, and it's, uh, really, you know, regret. That we have killed most of the, of the big animals from our, from our systems. We have to redo that.
There's just one example close by to where I am, there's plantations where they are still using some horses and mules. For some selective extraction. That's one of only [00:37:00] such teams in South Africa.
Tory environmentalists support. Because it's more labor intensive. Each animal needs a handler. It's less compaction that the animals bring compared to the heavy machinery. It's a little bit more diversity into the system. And of course it's less use of fossil fuels. So yeah, that's a small example where using animals, horses, and in this case, is positive in this sector.
And I hope we, we see more of that into the.
[00:37:36] Phil Dillard: You paint a really good picture of the, the challenge and then start to look at some of those solutions because you know, a lot of people start to look towards technology. They look towards process, they look towards manufacturing efficiency. But people who I'm seeing who are finding, who are looking out at the problem a little farther out, they're talking about how we need to be engaged with.
They're talking about how we need to be [00:38:00] thinking more about the future and seeing the trends and where they take us and how there actually can be the engagement with nature and the engagement with the lessons from local, local traditions. And what I've heard, you know, when you, when it first comes to people in the global north, I think people are kind of skeptical.
I think people say, Eh, you know, what do those, what of those folks have to teach us? But you pick a very clear picture of how. Impacts, Oh, those impacts will flow. And how they then show in kind of traumatic. Evidence to the, to local ecosystem. So can we talk a little bit about the actors? What's the role?
How do we balance the desire for for profit business with governments and nonprofit and local stakeholders? Because everybody's a handed this, everybody's trying to live and survive and extract some sort of value from the ecosystem. But if it's out, I'm hearing you say, if it's out of balance, [00:39:00] it creates.
Far more harm than people even anticipate. How do you engage? How do you think about we should balance those, those competing well seemingly competing interests. So we
[00:39:11] Philip Owen: are talking about the actors and I was just talking about Sappi, Southern African Paper and Pulp Industry, which is actually a multinational corporation with the officers that over the planet, one of the biggest pop malls.
It's a pop mall called number one, which is not far from where I am. In Africa, they used to produce primarily for paper, but now due to a global slump in the demand for paper, there's a rise in the demand for S. So the industry been converting some of the processes to produce S. So that's good from a financial point of view, you know, for the industry.
But to produce cellulars, they require hu. To produce a pop for paper. Normally they would plant and cultivate pine trees. So we've already discussed [00:40:00] differences. Betweens now are convert plantation a. We've been pointing out to them that, you know, we don't have the water. Even the government's been saying, Yeah, you know, we stress in terms of, of water availability.
So there used to be this sort of rule that one can convert pine plantations to eucalyptus plantations, but then you have to reduce the size of area that you plant by 35% to compensate for more water being used by the ECUs. So they've just been converting one on. And when ultimately the government said, No, you cannot do that.
They took government to court and they managed to convince the judge that converting from Pine to S will have an insignificant impact on. And I also believe that, you know, they use research studies which only looks at develop. It doesn't look at the entire scenario. It doesn't the use of ground [00:41:00] all. So, you know, to as if the industry of these impacts yet.
To chase finances and financial gains, they are willing to manage the environment. Even harsher timber industry gets away with, they call the forest industry and everybody around the world say, What can be wrong with plant trees? Trees is part of the,
[00:41:26] Phil Dillard: that's what people say in terms of g. Right. I mean, that's the evidence of it. Instead of really saying we have to change the industry and, and bite the bullet, take some of the costs and take some short term profit change to change the business model. People push and brand and stick with something that damages the earth and, and they're, they're not doing the right things.
Right. 10 years from now, what does success look like
[00:41:50] Philip Owen: to. 10 years from now, it would be nice to see some move away from monocultural timber plantations towards a diversified [00:42:00] system where indigenous trees are being appropriate. Indigenous, not exclusively, but indigenous trees must start featuring and start replacing these exotics because of course, the indigenous trees are locally adapted.
We should utilize all the levels. Of these timber plantations so that we can get more utility out of these, these so-called forests, we should include animals into these systems. So if we can have diversified or removed towards diversified real forestry systems into the future, that would be a major plus point.
[00:42:37] Phil Dillard: Right now, outside of your company, what project, program, campaign, or creation is really inspiring?
[00:42:44] Philip Owen: Well, I am. I am inspired by, by my fellow local activists. I'm thinking about people like methods. From there, from the Southern African Green Revolutionary Council, campaigning again, [00:43:00] coal fire, power stations, and mining of coal due to the massive impacts that it have on the communities.
The same globals fighting for our. Through Pumalanga Water Caucus, people like Mariet Leafing, who's been working in with the Federation for a sustainable environment for many, many decades, um, on the impacts of coal mining in, in, you know, in the main coal mining, gold mining areas of our country. So it's really these, uh, activists around me, which inspired and also helped to motivate me.
What are
[00:43:33] Phil Dillard: the most important things individuals can do to lead to a better future for the grass? Well,
[00:43:39] Philip Owen: I think one of the most important things that individuals can do is to become more aware of, of our environment and our impacts. And then something as simple as making compost. Anybody can make compost.
Every household can produce a compost and regenerate the soils. So I [00:44:00] think that's a good start.
[00:44:01] Phil Dillard: And then finally, last question. What's the most important thing governments and NGOs can do to lead to a better.
[00:44:08] Philip Owen: Well, I think that there should be solidarity amongst NGOs and governments in terms of understanding.
You know, at the moment I think there's still a lot of misconceptions around what is the right answers in terms of these huge environmental challenges we, we face, for example, afforestation being promoted globally as a means of carbon. You know, climate change, mitigation. So if like we've discussed, if a real forest can be establi, Hundred percent.
If real rewilding can occur, if real dive biodiversity enhancement, enhancement can take place, perfect. But at the moment we, we, you know, just planting trees. So we need to cultivate a, a understanding for what the real impacts of, we need to [00:45:00] quantify all the costs. I think that's a, a good place to start is to say, quantify all the costs when it comes to the reforestation projects and also when it comes to renewable energy projects.
You know, it's true that sunshine is renewable, but solar panels and charge controllers and inverters are most, and batteries of course, are most definitely not. Similarly, wind is renewable and cheap. But these massive wind turbines are not, you know, it's got a cost associated to it. So I think whatever we do, we need to, to.
Sure that we, that we, you know, calculate all the costs so that we can make wise decisions about land use. And of course include communities where these developments, any kind of solar farm or wind farm, any kind of project, we need to include the local communities so that they can own, you know, that that project,
[00:45:56] Phil Dillard: uh, Philip, it's really, really.
Talking with [00:46:00] you, I'm, we're gonna have to do more of this again, and you've expanded my mind and understanding of the importance of the grasslands and these different ecosystems that will, that will definitely matter. I'll share with you more detail about some of the projects that we, that are where this will be an issue.
[00:46:16] Philip Owen: I just wanna say thank you for this opportunity to share, because of course, one of the most important things that we can do is use our voice. If we've got a voice, we have to use it.
[00:46:32] Phil Dillard: Thank you for listening to this episode of Thruline to the Fourth Sector. I'm your host, Phil Dillard. If you enjoyed the show, please leave a rating and tell a friend. To learn more about the fourth sector economy, visit thrulinenetworks.com. That's T H R U L I N E networks.com. Thanks again, and we hope to have you with us in the next episode.