globalprosperity

November 2010

CONSUMERS ALLIANCE FOR

www.consumerprosperity.com

GREENPEACEAN UNETHICAL AND VERY UN-CIVIL SOCIETY

Greenpeace proclaims a superior moral purpose for its goals. It uses this to justify methods and tactics that are legally questionable, morally bankrupt and show a disrespect for property and the rights of individuals. Greenpeace uses its self-proclaimed, high moral purpose to pressure businesses, organizations and governments to pursue courses of action which harm the underprivileged in rich and poor countries. Greenpeace tactics more often than not reduce economic growth. Its core strategies rest on the presumption that economic growth per se harms the environment. In developing countries, these tactics, if applied, would reduce standards of living and hinder, if not reverse, strategies to reduce poverty. When businesses, organizations and government bodies donate to or ally with Greenpeace, they not only give credence to its unethical and anti-humane strategies, but also endorse and legitimize them. For example, earlier this year Greenpeace lobbied the U.K. Government to block a World Bank loan to South Africa to finance a range of energy measures, including a new coal-fired power plant and renewable power sources. Greenpeace argued that the risk to the worlds climate from the [coal] plants emissions outweighs the benefits of the secure electricity it would supply.1 This is despite the fact that in some provinces in South Africa as many as one-third of all households has no electricity supply. In 2008, electricity prices rose almost 30 percent.2

Greenpeace has attempted to undermine the fight against malaria in Africa through its political objection to the use of pesticides.
South Africas Government lashed out at the group following the lobbying action. South African Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan stated, It is regrettable that [a] very small group of NGOs are putting their environmental concerns above the economic needs of South Africa and our need to grow the economy so that all the people benefit.3 Greenpeace has attempted to undermine the fight against malaria in Africa through its political objection to the use of pesticides. It has also lobbied European companies and governments to boycott or ban the import of African forest products. Greenpeaces blind purpose is to advance its narrow view of how to protect the environment. It pays little regard to the economic consequences of its damaging strategies. It contends that consumerism, economic growth and excessive populations are core threats to the environment and that efforts to promote these must be curtailed.

It pays little regard to the economic consequences of its damaging strategies. It contends that consumerism, economic growth and excessive populations are core threats to the environment and that efforts to promote these must be curtailed.

1 2 3

Ben Webster, Britain may block World Bank loan for coal plant in South Africa, The Times Online (UK), April 6, 2010. Polya Lesova, South Africa raises electricity prices by 27.5%: In response to crippling power shortages, regulator allows price hikes, Wall Street Journal MarketWatch, June 18, 2008. Ben Webster, Britain may block World Bank loan for coal plant in South Africa, The Times Online (UK), April 6, 2010.

GREENPEACES UNETHICAL APPROACH

Several years ago Greenpeace subscribed to a non-governmental organization (NGO) code of ethics. However, this has not inhibited it from using unethical methods to raise funds and run its campaigns. Greenpeace signed on to the NGO Accountability Charter on June 6, 2008, which calls for the group to take all possible steps to ensure that there are no links with organizations, or persons involved in illegal or unethical practices. Within four weeks, Greenpeace had violated St. Kitts territorial waters, illegally offloaded passengers and defied law enforcement officials by refusing to accompany them to police headquarters.4 highlighted inconsistencies between the ships stated intention and the visa applications of the Greenpeace activists onboard. Government officials noted that the activists stated they were heading to one of the most politically sensitive and war-torn parts of Indonesia, which was clearly at odds with their environmental mandate. News reports referred to the Greenpeace vessel as a warship.9

Creating disturbance and destroying private property

Greenpeace boasts that it uses direct action to advance its goals. Direct action, a protest method of the hard left, involves breaking the law and causing disturbance in order to generate publicity. This is often misleadingly described as peaceful civil disobedience. 1989: Greenpeace lost its Canadian charitable status amid concerns that it was not a true charity and was not providing a discernible benefit to the public.7 1995: Greenpeaces second Canadian guise lost its charitable status after an audit revealed that the charity had failed to devote all its resources to charitable activities.8 Greenpeace regularly engages in the destruction of scientificallycontrolled trials of experimental crops that could potentially provide higher food yields and lower malnutrition levels in developing countries.10

Misrepresentation A charitable or political organization?

Greenpeace portrays itself as a campaign organization and has avowed its pursuit of political goals. Yet it represents itself as a charitable organization to attract tax free donations from supporters. Greenpeace has had its charitable status revoked on a number of occasions:5 2010: Greenpeace New Zealand lost its charitable status after being deemed a political organization whose members have acted illegally, thereby making it uncharitable.6

Trespassing
Greenpeaces most commonly-committed crime is trespassing.11 A recurring tactic of theirs is to climb public monuments or enter private property without approval to hang posters and slogans. The following are some examples:

An environmental or political mandate?

In 2010, the Indonesian Government refused to allow the Rainbow Warrior, Greenpeaces flagship, to dock at the main port in Jakarta, the nations capital. The Indonesian Government

4 5 6 7 8 9

Nick Nichols, Make Greenpeace live up to its own book of rules, Townhall.com, June 28, 2006. Roger Bate, Its Official: Greenpeace serves no Purpose, IPA Review, December, 1999. New Zealand Charities Commission, Registration decision: Greenpeace of New Zealand Incorporated, April 14, 2010. Deroy Murdock, The IRS may board the Rainbow Warrior, National Review Online, October 07, 2003. Ibid. Agence France Presse, Greenpeace says Rainbow Warrior Denied Entry to Indonesia, The Jakarta Globe, October 14, 2010.

10 Michael McCarthy, Lord Melchett and company back in the dock to deny GM crop damage, The Independent (UK), September 5, 2000. 11 Greenpeace four charged over ANZ stunt, Brisbane Times, October 21, 2010.

Twice in five years, Greenpeace has abseiled the Christ the Redeemer statute atop the Corcovado Mountain overlooking Rio de Janeiro to hang banners and advertise Greenpeace campaigns from the statues outstretched arms.12 In 2006, Greenpeace activists illegally climbed to the roof of the British Cabinet office to hang posters claiming illegal timber from Papua New Guinea was being used on the site.13 In 2010, Greenpeace activists boarded coal ships awaiting loading in Australia.14

Greenpeace has just boasted that this campaign helped pressure the European Union to adopt measures aimed at reducing imports of illegally logged timber.

around the world of widespread illegal logging; the public record has shown this to not be the case.

Concoction of events Distortion of facts

Greenpeace has a long record of distorting facts and making wrong or misleading claims. It campaigned against Royal Dutch Shells plans to sink the Brent Spar offshore oil storage facility in the North Sea, claiming vast quantities of oil would be dumped into the ocean. Once plans were abandoned, Greenpeace admitted its assessment of the amount of oil still stored in the Bren Spars tanks was greatly overestimated.16 Greenpeace also claims high rates of deforestation in South America, Southeast Asia and the Pacific, which greatly exceed proper estimates. It regularly accuses forestry companies Greenpeace has concocted events to make false allegations against foreign companies. In countries as far apart as the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Papua New Guinea (PNG), Greenpeace has falsely accused foreign companies of abusing human rights, using armed force against employees and disregarding local laws. The company in DRC was Germanowned and that in PNG was Malaysian.

Piracy
In 2008, Greenpeace engaged in piracy in the Gulf of Papua by seizing a ship and wrongly claiming it belonged to a particular company before stating that the timber on board was illegal.15 (Both claims were demonstrated to be incorrect within 24 hours, yet Greenpeace continued to repeat them publicly.)

Slander and pressure

Greenpeace engages in public slander and defamation. It has accused leading European business figures of being forest criminals, and published photographs of them because their businesses were importing products that Greenpeace claimed contained illegal timber.17 Business law prohibits this type of corporate pressure in many countries.

12 Ana Cecelia Brignol, Greenpeace Activists unfulred a banner from the Christ statue in Rio de Janeiro, Greenpeace.org, March 16, 2009 and; Marcio Pena, Greenpeace activists hung a banner across the arms of the Christ statue on Corcovado in Rio de Janeiro to protest against the world leaders failure to secure the future of the planet, Greenpeace.org, September 5, 2002. 13 Victory! How ten years of activism helped protect the worlds forests, Greenpeace.org, July 7, 2010. 14 Angela Macdonald Smith, Greenpeace Paints Slogans on Queensland Coal Ships, Bloomberg News, July 27, 2008. 15 Danielle Stewart, Protecting Forests to Save the Climate, Greenpeace Australia Pacific, September 7, 2008. 16 World: Europe Brent Spar gets chop, BBC News, November 25, 1998. 17 Partners in Crime: The UK timber trade, Chinese sweatshops and Malaysian robber barons in Papua New Guineas rainforests, Greenpeace.org, October 19, 2005.

GREENPEACEAN UN-CIVIL SOCIETY

Greenpeace endangers human health
Greenpeace was highly influential in mobilising widespread opposition to the use of dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane (DDT) in fighting malaria in developing countries, despite evidence that the presence of toxicity, in Greenpeaces own words, was inconclusive.19 This was widely criticised by anti-malaria and health organizations.20 Approximately 90 percent of the worlds malaria cases are in sub-Saharan Africa.21

...Greenpeace, other NGOs, and Western donors have disregarded the agreement by biasing funding pledges towards environmental goals.
Greenpeace and other environmental NGOs recently pushed Western aid donors to agree in principle to $160 billion in annual climate change funding to developing countries. The symbolism of the financial commitment to this environmental cause is important. It is significantly more than the $100 billion25 donated to annual global aid in recent years. While developing countries continue to argue that the Rio consensus states neither development nor the environment should be subordinate to the other, Greenpeace, other NGOs, and Western donors have disregarded the agreement by biasing funding pledges towards environmental goals.

Greenpeace opposes global consensus on sustainable development

The question of environment versus growth was debated at the Rio Earth Summit in 1992. Developing countries were adamant that environmental strategies had to support economic growth, not retard it. There was consensus on this, and it was enshrined in the global Agenda 21 program. It was the United Nations first global declaration on development and the environment.22 The declaration also specifically enjoined members of the United Nations to respect international rules that enabled members to trade freely.23 Greenpeace and other Western, environmental NGOs behaved as if the declaration did not exist from the very moment of its adoption. At the ten-year review of the Rio Summit, the Johannesburg World Conference on Sustainable Development, Greenpeace and other NGOs campaigned for the primacy of environmental protection over economic development.24

Greenpeace considers itself one of the leaders of the global civil society movement, along with Oxfam, the Worldwide Fund for Nature (WWF), Consumers International and the Northern Alliance for Sustainability (ANPED). Several years ago they established the ECO/Equity coalition to advance common goals at the 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development conference in Johannesburg.18 The coalition claims to support economic growth in developing countries, but only on the terms laid down by these Westernbased, largely anti-growth, NGOs. Their premise is simple: improving the environment should take precedence over economic growth.

Greenpeace policies hamper food production

Greenpeace in principle opposes industrial agriculture. By this it means any large scale monoculture. This is the basis of most global farm production. Greenpeaces objection is that monoculture is the antithesis of biodiversity.

18 Activity Report 1 June 2003

31 December 2003, The Northern Alliance for Sustainability (ANPED), December 2003.

19 New book urges reversal of DDT ban to fight malaria, Reuters, April 12, 2010. 20 Richard Tren, Letter to Dr Gerd Leipold Greenpeace International, Africa Fighting Malaria, August 18, 2006. 21 Robert W. Snow, Judy A. Omumbo, Disease and Mortality in Sub Saharan Africa, National Center for Biotechnology Information, National Library of Medicine at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), 2006. 22 Agenda 21, United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UN DESA), Division for Sustainable Development, updated 2009. 23 Report of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development, United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UN DESA), Division for Sustainable Development, August 12, 1992. 24 The Lessons of History: Stalled on the Road from Rio to Johannsburg: A 2002 Foreword to Beyond UNCED originally published in 1992, Greenpeace.org, January 2002. 25 2010 Annual Letter from Bill Gates: Rich Countries Aid Generosity, The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, 2010.

Greenpeace policies would result in increased food prices and the conversion of more land for agricultural production than is necessary.
It is conceded today that global food production must increase to meet growing demand in developing countries. Greenpeaces philosophy is to cease conversion of land to large-scale agricultural production. Greenpeace is also strongly opposed to the use of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) for food production, despite other environmental groups pointing out that the only way to increase output from agricultural production is by employing them. By opposing GMO technology, Greenpeace policies would result in increased food prices and the conversion of more land for agricultural production than is necessary.

Greenpeace distorts the meaning of sustainable forestry

At the Rio Summit, global forest principles were adopted, which echoed the key theme of the conference. The right of developing countries to use forestry for development was recognized and affirmed. Sustainable forest management became the universal goal; a core principle held that protection of the environment and economic growth went hand in hand.26 Greenpeace never accepted that principle and has worked tirelessly to halt forestry in the tropical, developing countries of South America, Africa, Asia and the Pacific. It is of no account to Greenpeace that many of these economies have committed to reserve more land for conservation than is reserved in most industrialized economies; or that virtually all have reserved more than the 10 percent of their land for conservation, a target set by the members of the U.N. Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD). Stopping global forestry is a key Greenpeace goal. The U.N. Forest and Agricultural Organization (FAO) and other global forestry research agencies accept as fact that most deforestation is not caused by large, well-organized forest companies, but is instead caused by poor people clearing forest land for fuel wood, low-value and near-subsistence agriculture and habitat.27 Greenpeace has called for the halting of palm oil development in Nigeria based on deforestation claims it has made against the industry in Southeast Asia. Yet palm oil plantations in

Greenpeace supports erroneous claims that more than 1.5 billion people depend on the preservation of natural forests.
Nigeria are in the south of the country, and the majority of Nigerias deforestation is located primarily in the north of the country, due to a need for fuel wood and food.28 If conversion of forest land to more productive purposes stops (commercial forestry yields between $1,000 and $2,000 a hectare, whereas semi-subsistence agriculture yields less than $100 per hectare), economic growth will stall and the poor population which is the driver of deforestation will increase.29

Greenpeace promotes semi-subsistence lifestyles and poverty

Greenpeace supports erroneous claims that more than 1.5 billion people depend on the preservation of natural forests.30 It argues that forests should be preserved to continue to support these semi-subsistence lifestyles. Greenpeace also promotes communal forestry. It mounted a project with donor money in PNG to demonstrate the concept. The project failed, demonstrating that communal forestry is economically-unviable and does little to advance literacy, reduce child mortality and reduce poverty.31

26 Agenda 21 for Change: Complete text of Forest Principles: Non Legally Binding Authoritative Statement of Principles for a Global Consensus on the Management, Conservation and Sustainable Development of all Types of Forests, International Institute for Sustainable Development. 27 Rhett Butler, Deforestation Stats: Desforestation: Causes of tropical desforestation 2000 2005, Mongabay.com. 28 Kayode Aboyeji, Climate Change: Northern Nigeria tackles deforestation, others, The Nigerian Compass, June 1, 2010. 29 Ian R. Noble, Rodolfo Dirzo, Forests as Human Dominated Ecosystems, Science 277, July 25, 1997. 30 Biodiversity and Forests at a glance, World Bank, 2002. 31 Issues and opportunities for the forest sector in Papua New Guinea: [PNG] Forest Studies 3, Overseas Development Institute, Forest Policy and Environment Programme, January 2007.

This misplaced Greenpeace strategy supports the retention of semi-subsistence economies and denies people the opportunity to secure their own economic benefits...
This misplaced Greenpeace strategy supports the retention of semi-subsistence economies and denies people the opportunity to secure their own economic benefits, including education of their children, by preventing normal participation in the formal economy.

Greenpeace and WWF presented a draft treaty intended to create an international mechanism to reduce greenhouse gases to world leaders at the U.N. Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen in December 2009.32 The Copenhagen Summit notoriously failed, and the Greenpeace/WWF model never surfaced.33 Greenpeaces philosophy holds that lower-income tropical forested countries should cease all forestry and be compensated by rich countries to do so. Their argument is that this action would help stop global warming because these developing countries generate so much carbon dioxide from forestry, stopping it would tangibly reduce emissions. (The extent of emissions from forestry and related land management has been considerably exaggerated by Greenpeace and others.)34

At least Greenpeace has recognized that reducing emissions from developing countries would come at the cost of economic growth. So what is Greenpeaces solution? To create a massive global green welfare fund to pay workers and families previously employed by forestry companies.35 Such a fund would further impoverish these developing countries. Not only would industries that tangibly contribute to national economic growth and create jobs cease, but workers would also be put onto a global green dole.

32 Climate: NGOs Unveil a Benchmark Global Climate Treaty, Narrative Text, The World Wildlife Fund (WWF), 2009. 33 Louise Gray, Global warming summit heads for failure amid snub by world leaders, Telegraph (UK), October 10, 2010. 34 Paying the Climate Bill, Media briefing on the European Commissions communication on climate finance, Greenpeace and Oxfam International, September 10, 2009, 2. 35 Climate: NGOs Unveil a Benchmark Global Climate Treaty, Narrative Text, The World Wildlife Fund (WWF), 2009.

GREENPEACES ANTI-FREE TRADE CAMPAIGNS

The principle Greenpeace affirms would undermine the right of countries to produce and export goods by utilizing the comparative advantage of their economies.
In the lead up to the conference to launch the Doha Round of global negotiations to reduce trade barriers in 2001, Greenpeace issued a report attacking the World Trade Organization (WTO), accusing it of acting as an impediment to the protection of the environment.36 Greenpeace objected to one of the fundamental principles that underpins the WTO: the rules which make it illegal for governments to play politics with trade by leveraging provision of access to markets for agreements on other matters, such as protection of the environment. Greenpeace and other environmental groups have consistently sought the right to use the threat of trade bans if commitments to environmental agreements were not honored.37 Greenpeace updated its 2001 report in 2005, and made broad scale attacks against the WTO, claiming erroneously that WTO rules prevented measures to halt deforestation. It reiterated its call, supported by other green groups like WWF, that WTO rules should be altered to allow imports to be restricted if, in the production of those goods, environmental standards demanded by importing governments were not met. This is a naked threat of trade coercion. The principle Greenpeace affirms would undermine the right of countries to produce and export goods by utilizing the comparative advantage of their economies. If trade was restricted because environmental standards were not met, this principle could be extended to anything restricting trade for failure to meet standards on labor laws, freedom of speech, sexual discrimination and anything else.

36 World Trade Factsheet, Greenpeace.org, 2010. 37 Provisions for trade bans are found in the Convention to Restrict International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), the Biosafety Protocol to the Convention on Biodiversity and the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants.

THE ETHICAL CHALLENGE FOR GREENPEACES BUSINESS PARTNERS

Greenpeaces moral high ground becomes ethical low ground for business partners
Sustainability managers in many of the large companies who have yielded to Greenpeace pressure by aligning with their strategies will console themselves by thinking they are on the moral high ground of saving the environment. They are not. Their actions may well retard protection of the environment. It has long been recognized that poor countries cannot protect the environment unless they have the prosperity and resources to pay for it. It is no accident, then, that the environment is least protected in poor countries. When companies like home improvement retailer B&Q, supermarket chain ASDA and Wal-Mart think recent refusals to buy timber and furniture products from developing countries like the Democratic Republic of Congo save the rainforest and endangered species, they are mistaken. By endorsing this Greenpeace strategy they are supporting measures which are likely to increase the loss of rainforests. Poverty is the principle cause of deforestation. The timber harvesters whose products Greenpeace enjoins them to boycott generate the jobs which reduce poverty. When their businesses are hindered, so are efforts to reduce poverty. When Western-based corporations ally with Greenpeace and boycott products from developing countries, they are restricting growth and retarding the principle thing that will support improved protection of the environment increased prosperity. These companies are actually joining Greenpeace in a povertyenhancing strategy. They are giving respectability, moreover, to a set of disreputable and unethical practices that they would not tolerate in their own company, let alone from a major business partner. Business should be putting pressure on Greenpeace to act ethically, not falling into the Greenpeace trap of sanctioning its unethical practices.

When Western-based corporations ally with Greenpeace and boycott products from developing countries, they are restricting growth and retarding the principle thing that will support improved protection of the environment increased prosperity.

The Consumer Alliance for Global Prosperity (CAGP) is an action-oriented advocacy group that promotes free trade, economic growth and pro-consumer policies across the world. We are passionate in the defense of individual rights and the interests of consumers. CAGP is a project of the Institute for Liberty, a non-profit advocacy organization dedicated to preserving individual rights, protecting entrepreneurship worldwide, and promoting prosperity both in America and abroad. www.consumerprosperity.com

Pulp Wars is a project of the consumer advocacy group Consumers Alliance for Global Prosperity in response to the pulp and paper trade war promulgated by organizations such as Greenpeace and WWF, in collusion with domestic labor unions and pulp and paper producers. CAGP was created by the Institute for Liberty and the Frontiers of Freedom Institute, non-profit think tanks dedicated to preserving individual rights, protecting entrepreneurship worldwide, and promoting prosperity both in America and abroad. The participants in Pulp Wars share an abiding faith in liberty and human ingenuity to resolve our problems and a belief that economic competition through free markets provides the greatest protection for consumers while promoting opportunity for all. www.pulpwars.com