The One-Straw Revolution - Multiworld India

course, industrial discharge of mercury and other contaminating wastesalso contribute to the pollution, but for the most part water pollution inJapan comes from agricultural chemicals.So it is the farmer who must shoulder major responsibility for the redtide. The farmer who applies polluting chemicals to his field, thecorporations who manufacture these chemicals; the village officials whobelieve in the convenience of chemicals and offer technical guidanceaccordingly-if each of these people does not ponder the problem deeplythere will be no solving the question of water pollution.As it is now, only those who are most directly affected becomeactive in trying to cope with pollution problems, as in the case of thelocal fishermen's struggle against the big oil companies after the oil spillnear Mizushima. Or else some professor proposes to cope with theproblem by opening a channel through the belly of Shikoku Island to letthe relatively clean water of the Pacific Ocean flow into the Inland Sea.This sort of thing is researched and attempted time after time, but a truesolution can never come about in this way.The fact of the matter is that whatever we do, the situation getsworse. The more elaborate the countermeasures, the more complicatedthe problems become.Suppose a pipe were laid across Shikoku and water were pumped upfrom the Pacific and poured into the Inland Sea. Let us say that this maypossibly clean up the Inland Sea. But where is the electric power going tocome from to run the factory which will manufacture the steel pipe, andhow about the power required to pump the water up? A nuclear powerplant would become necessary. To construct such a system, concrete andall the various materials must be assembled, and a uranium processingcenter83