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Florida's Salvation. Maybe...

By Ailish M. Nic Phaidin
Brevard Technical Journal

Occasionally we all read something that appeals to some inner voice in ourselves and we ponder it. Well, such a 'something' crossed my reading recently and I pondered it, as well as getting a morning giggle from its contents.

We may indeed be geographically removed from New Zealand, but the advent of instant communications has reached across the miles and we find ourselves allowed to peek into the intimate lives of cattle, sheep, goats and chickens on the farms of that far-off land, not quite recognized as a 'down-under' nation - yet.

Sometimes governments endeavor to fulfill their destinies by bettering the lot of their people, by bettering the lot of despots and tyrants, by bettering the lot of democratically elected politicians, but rarely by embarrassing an entire population of people, cattle, sheep, goats and chickens.

Here's the rub: the government of New Zealand has succeeded where just about everyone else has failed in the embarrassment stakes. The late great Thomas Alva Edison (1847-1931) once said in a newspaper interview, "Genius is one per-cent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration". The New Zealand government has now attained the lofty position of being sagacious (almost aka: bordering on genius) as well as suffering from the paralysis that follows being severely burned by the genesis of a redundant tax policy suggestion which back-fired.

Very recently the New Zealand government squared off against its colossal farming community by proposing a "Flatulence Tax" on cattle, sheep, goats and chickens in an effort to meet its obligations under the Kyoto Protocol. Some of us may remember the Kyoto Protocol of December 1997 emanated from the Earth Summit of June 1992 in Rio de Janeiro, to which several nations are still endeavoring to respect and reach their required obligations and targets in relation to greenhouse gas emissions.

Carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide are the main culprits under the Kyoto Protocol. The New Zealand government has ascertained, by means fair or foul, that about 55% of its emissions of greenhouse gas is expelled into the atmosphere by their four (and two) legged friends - mostly the four-legged - by flatulence. Obviously, it has been no mean feat to arrive at this determination. In a nation where there are 47 million sheep and 10 million beef and dairy cattle, the problem is compounded by the fact that New Zealand's contribution to global greenhouse gas emission is between 0.2% and 0.4% of that produced worldwide.

The proposed Flatulence Tax which ranged from $3 - $48 would mean that each farm household in New Zealand would pay in the region of US$150 per year. The roar of the hot air that back-fired from the farming lobbies reached fever pitch until the hapless Agricultural Minister, Jim Sutton, finally ruled out the offending tax proposal.

The frenzy is over for the time being, with the government technology officials diligently carrying out research on breeding techniques and animal diets. The cattle, sheep, and goats continue to chomp on the fertile grass of the New Zealand landscape, while the chickens have come home to roost on the high moral ground of global extravagance.

The unfortunate and down- trodden Jim Sutton is continuing to receive medicinal treatment for the burns suffered by the entire government when the methane and nitrous oxide.

Surely if Florida decided to introduce such a tax we could resolve our budget problems? Then we could escort new eco-tourists throughout our state with an eye to rebuilding an industry that is suffering the pangs of a serious down-turn. That would most certainly leave us with our 1% genius and our 99% perspiration, and enough hot air from the agricultural lobby to ensure that the international news media would once again focus on us.

I could not imagine the profits from such frivolity, or the lasting effects. To avoid the Flatulence Tax syndrome, and the deficit we will surely suffer in the forthcoming financial year, we may need to take some bright new steps towards balance through the medium of ingenuity. However, a quiet word with a Public Relations counselor may very well avoid a fireball of flack.