reply to post by littlecloud
Didn't they teach you at school that the government announced decades back -- based on their own and commissioned research -- that the maximum
population which could realistically be sustained was 13 million ?
Sure, Australia's a massive land mass. It's also a barren landmass, with the vast majority of the population huddling on the eastern States' ocean
edge
Are you keeping abreast of the Murray Darling situation ? Are you aware that five generations of rice-growers are tossing in the towel due to
insufficient water supply ? You looking forward to eating foods grown in trenches in Southern Asia ? Better get used to the idea
Where to the migrants congregate ? That's right -- in major city ghettos. Do you see them heading out into that massive Aussie landmass to
establish farms, towns or industry ? No. They're not crazy. They're not interested in busting their guts trying to grow crops in sand and gravel
and salt pans
How many head of cattle per square mile provide a return for station owners ? Is it one -- or two ? And why is that ? Is it because there's an
abundance of grazing fodder out in that massive Aussie landscape ? No, it's because nothing grows out there. It's because you can kick up
fossillised shells and marine-life out there, just by walking along the ground. It's because it's parched and virtually sterile land where people
dig homes into the bare ground to escape the heat (Lightning Ridge, Coober Pedy)
Have you been to the Outback ? Seen the ghost towns ? Seen the grave-yards baking in the sun -- the graves of British migrants of the 19th and 20th
centuries who tried to farm and died in the effort through lack of water and lack of decent soil
You only have to travel a couple of hundred miles out of Brisbane, to regions around Kingaroy, to learn that the only things the soil will produce are
onions, peanuts and shrubs. Migrants from Germany and Poland were given land to farm and again, they busted their guts trying. But lack of rain and
poor soil defeated most of them. Most of those towns out there are dying on their feet - rail lines, schools etc. closed down, the last die-hards
scattered after three or more generations of struggle
But go ahead, seeing you seem to know more about it than Dick Smith and Australian government researchers and genuine environmentalists. Pack
Australia full of people -- fill that great big dry rock -- and watch them, like lemmings, rush to the sea, dying of hunger and thirst