ROYAL GEOGRAPHIC SOCIETY

HOSTS NONSENSE

Image left is Sir Gordon Conway, who compered and spoke at the RGS at Kensington Gore on Wednesday, 22 October. The subject of the evening was rainforest management, but what was needed was better conference management. For £15 we got lousy PA standards and a translator whose monotonouse Adams family voice was like nails being scratched on the blackboard.

But these were minor hitches compared to the real problem - the whole thing was an exercise in avoiding the elephant in the living room. When the audience was finally allowed to ask some questions, one man pointed to the issue of laying blame on the indigenous farmers who committed slash and burn, but did not mention once the plantation owners. The man who started to talk about this was abruptly asked to stop by Sir Gordon. Now, it might have ended right there, but a friend of mine, Sagar Shah, asked about hemp, and then I pulled the rug out further by pointing out that Sir Gordon was in bed with the Rockefellers, who made their fortune in a most evil way by running plantations in Brazil - Gerard Colby wrote a lengthy tome on this in the '90; the same author is famous for his 1974/1984 book on the Du Ponts, from which I quoted extensively in Hemp for Victory.

The audience was mostly a posh crowd, and no surprise to hear the usual idiots ramble on about how much they know hemp cannot be a solution but who know nothing about hemp. A bit of left wing feel good and do-nothing waste of time. Next month I am hoping to ambush the evasive George Monbiot, who will be speaking with Zac Goldsmith at Friends House. Yes, Monbiot who writes for the sandal wearing, 4x4 driving Guardian readers and wears environmentally destructive cotton. Goldsmith, hopefully, will see through him and cease to share a platform with him.