POST SCRIPTS

Hernando de Soto yesterday I came across this paragraph having to do with environmental concerns. I found it interesting because many of the hard core greens in this country have made it their mission to convince us that American Corporations are the big bad polluters of the Amazon. According to de Soto, "One of the great worries of anyone concerned about the environment is that at the very sources of the Amazon one finds an enormous amount of pollution due to the dumping of thousands of tons of sulfuric acid, kero- sene, and other such chemicals. Well, these chemicals are there simply because that's where peasants manufacture coca paste.

The major reason they make coca paste is that these entrepreneurs have no security with respect to their property, because it is informal property and therefore not "legal." They have no incentive to plant, for ex- ample, oil palms, which in five years will give them an economic benefit six times greater than planting coca. To produce palm oil, you have to be able to wait five years, while coca grows like weeds, without any need for care and time. And if you don't have clear property rights, you can't get the credit necessary to grow crops that require more investment capital than coca..."

Not only should we, 1. "Teach them to fish" and 2. Make sure they own their own boat, but we should do it...for the environment! Hmmm, another great reason to promote the free market and property rights!

Woof, Woof!