Land privatization and water depletion set the stage for the Lahaina fire 150 years ago. Now, land companies may benefit even more
www.theguardian.com
Hawaiian history was a one time hobby of mine. This article is a bit misleading, deliberately so to make propaganda points:
1. Pineapple plantation owners didn't flock to Hawaii in the early 1800s. Most of the white planters actually came from missionary families and sea captains who settled on the island. The entire thing of those missionary families is they came to "save" the Hawaiians but wound up bringing mass disease wiping out most of them and then profiting in business. The planters actually stole Pineapples from elsewhere, and used them to grow where sugar cane could not.
2. Both pineapple and sugar cane plantations haven't been profitable in Hawaii since the 1970s. They've been replaced by much lower producers elsewhere. Government has had over 40 years to clean up the plantation mess since it hasn't been a factor for decades.
3. The west side of Maui has always been in the shadow of the mountains and has always been desert like. Yes, breadfruit used to grow in the Lahaina area but that was more due to the swampy areas along the coast. There's some truth to the stuff they write about stream diversion and wells, but the other big factor is those swamps were cleaned up to prevent outbreaks of diseases. Otherwise, the beaches would just be marsh lands.
4. The big culprit in water diversion, which the article mentions but blames the plantations for, is the hotels, condo developments, swimming pools and golf courses. Presumably, they did this so that they could make their message about white plantation owners are bad, without making their readers feel guilty about taking those Hawaiian vacations. If you are vacationing on the dry side of the island, you are totally part of the problem. They are like those climate changers who preach windmills and recycling and then go about flying everywhere. One way to change the ecology on the west side is to get rid of all the resorts and developments, but that's not going to happen because not only would the developers be out their money, but the people out their jobs, and Maui would be reduced to an underdeveloped almost third world like country (see Molokai for reference) with a vastly lower population.
5. The East side of the island has plenty of water. The problem is the government has never wanted to invest in that, in part because most of such investment goes to Oahu (where the voters reside). If agriculture were actually profitable on the west side, you totally would have seen an investment in the infrastructure needed to shuffle water from one side to the other of the island (which would be expensive because of the rugged geography of the wet sides and the fact that the water runs downhill on the volcanos)....but it's not cost effective since Hawaiian agriculture is undercut by other countries, so they never did it. The hotels are basically free riding on the water (and the politicians, largely in D hands, won't say boo because of money).
6. What ever happened to honest journalism. Does every piece need to be a propaganda piece for either the right or the left? No wonder legacy media is dying. If this is the best they can do, maybe they deserve it.
www.overdriveonline.com
www.newsweek.com
