Let Nature Be Natural? Safety Requires More Capital in Nature!

The dictionary definition of “nature” is “all beings and conditions that exist on their own in the world or come into being spontaneously in the universe, without the addition of human power.” In reality, a “state left exactly as it is, without human intervention” is dangerous, dirty, and inconvenient.

This summer, there were more than a few cities around the world that were flooded because of excessive rainfall. Temperatures in several European countries reached 40 degrees, and in China they exceeded a staggering 50 degrees. In Korea as well, temperatures approached 40 degrees, causing many deaths from heat-related illness.

In July of this year, the Earth became so hot that UN Secretary-General António Guterres officially declared, “The era of global warming has ended. The era of global boiling has arrived.”

People say that humans have emitted too much carbon dioxide and brought about climate disaster, but nature was always like this. Nature is what makes rain pour down in one place as if buckets of water were being dumped from the sky, and also what causes not a single drop to fall until plants dry out completely. We must remember that if nature is simply left alone, roads can disappear in torrential rain and deserts can form through drought.

How can we get along with nature, which behaves as it pleases? The answer lies in capital. Only when capital is added to nature do human beings become safer and more comfortable. A park is precisely what results when capital is added to nature. A park is a place where a comfortable, pleasant, and convenient environment has been deliberately arranged.

People go to Yeouido Park, climb its hills, look at its pond, and walk through its woods, thinking they are enjoying nature. But nature and a park are clearly different. In other words, Yeouido Park is, literally, not nature but a park.

If we look closely, much of the land we use was created through a process of transforming nature into park-like, managed space. Blood, sweat, and capital went into converting barren land into farmland. In the course of reclamation, many people labored to remove rocks and level the ground. Enormous effort and capital were invested before rice farming became possible on the Seosan reclaimed land. Agricultural products were produced there only after the sea had been filled in and after a long wait for the salt to be washed out of the soil.

The slogan “Let nature be natural!” sounds plausible, but it is no different from saying, “Let nature be neglected.” Just as land is reclaimed for agriculture, mountains too should be turned into parks through projects that require time, money, and effort. Only then can we enjoy safe and convenient lives.

Many express concern about turning mountains into parks, but there is no problem if safety measures are firmly put in place. Recently, heavy rain caused landslides in many places. Some slopes collapsed because of reckless development, but some mountains gave way because there were too many trees. When trees are packed too densely on steep slopes, the danger increases. Some trees must be removed to create open spaces within the forest so that landslides can be prevented.

These days, forest damage from wildfires is severe, but wildfires can be prevented by creating spaces between wooded areas and installing firebreak walls. Construction to install such barriers has made significant progress, but in some places, projects cannot proceed because people insist that the mountains must not be touched.

Under a thorough plan, if dense trees are thinned out, spaces are opened up throughout the forest, and firebreak walls are installed at intervals, mountains can be managed scientifically to prevent both wildfires and landslides. This kind of management is what it means to turn mountains into parks.

Whenever bicycle paths are built, cable cars installed, or tunnels dug, there is tremendous opposition. Installing a cable car does not destroy nature. We should approach the issue from the perspective of how nature can be enjoyed. It is time to move beyond the nature-worshipping idea that nothing artificial should be added, and instead make nature into parks so that it can be enjoyed safely and comfortably.

Blind opposition only leads to worse outcomes by leaving nature unmanaged. Nature is not sacred; it is an object of management. If necessary, cable cars should be installed and hotels should be built on mountaintops. Villages were built on flat land because doing so was easier than building in the mountains, not because mountains are sacred. Regulations should also be loosened so that housing can be built in the mountains. Just as rivers and underground space are utilized, mountains too should be developed as resources.

If nature is neglected, even greater disasters will approach. To live together with nature, investing capital to turn it into parks is precisely what elevates our lives to a higher level. All unnecessary regulations should be removed, and while maximizing safety, we should make use of our mountains as parks. Then we will be able to use our national territory far more extensively and live more comfortably.

Sung-no Choi, President, Center for Free Enterprise (CFE)

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Original title: 자연을 자연답게? 자연에 자본 더해야 안전!

Author: Sung-no Choi

Date: 2023-08-21

Source: https://www.cfe.org/bbs/bbsDetail.php?cid=column&pn=3&idx=25953