January, 1998
Winston Aldworth
Why did the chicken cross the road? As anyone who has ever jaywalked across a busy city intersection will know, such an experience can be filled with danger and risk. With cars, trucks and maniac cycle-couriers threatening injury or even death, the stakes sure are high.
Given that it's so dangerous, why do people take such a great risk? To post a letter? To meet a friend or pick up some groceries? Or just for the sheer exhilaration of it?
The fact is; we take risks like this on a daily basis.
We leave the kids alone in the car for one and a half minutes, we forget about washing the lettuce that goes in the salad because we're in a hurry and we consume coffee, nicotine and preservatives even though we know that we probably shouldn't. But we decide that the risk is worth it. The kids'll be fine... how bad could a lettuce be?... and just leave me alone; I really need this coffee!
Without even thinking about it, we recognise and assess the relevant dangers before instantly deciding if the possible gains make the risk worthwhile. It's a basic part of modern living.
At school we were taught to `look right, look left and look right again' before crossing the road. We also learnt that the highest bars on the jungle-gym offered the greatest thrills as well as the greatest dangers. So, right from the outset, we learnt to think about the risks and dangers that surround us and to make rudimentary calculations that balanced the risks against the pay-offs.
And now there's a new government agency that has the job of assessing the risks we take with our environment - ERMA New Zealand (The Environmental Risk Management Authority). What's more, they do it in pretty much the same way that ordinary folks assess the risks of crossing the street.
"Most people already have very well developed attitudes to risk," says ERMA's Chief Executive Officer Bas Walker. "And it's all purely instinctive. We just have to take that kind of thinking to a public policy level and work with scientific knowledge of the issues involved."
Indeed flirting with risk has always been a key ingredient of the New Zealand character. This is evidenced in the typical Kiwi attitude - a willingness to go to the edge and take on new innovations, pushing new boundaries along the way.
Our tourism industry has benefited from this attitude. New Zealand has made much of the opportunities we can present to thrill-seekers to put themselves in grave danger. Just think of all those brave souls who throw themselves off bridges with nothing more than a thin elastic cord between them and an audience with Princess Diana.
It's easy to say that they must be crazy, but perhaps bungy jumpers simply run different equations through their heads when considering the element of risk and the amount of reward involved in their actions.
Even those of us who aren't quite as brave and would never dare to take a bungy jump happily spend our hard earned money on a long-shot at lottery millions. The numbers may be stacked against success, but the possible rewards make the risks worthwhile. Five dollars down the drain today could mean a luxury retirement - or (more likely) enough money to pay for next week's ticket.
These are just some of the types of personal risks that we choose to take as individuals, but what about the risks we take as a society? What are the equations we run through when deciding if something is too risky for our community, or for our environment? And who does the sums?
A group of farmers in the South Island recently decided that the advantages of importing a banned virus (the now infamous rabbit calicivirus disease, or RCD), which was rumoured to provide a possible solution to the rabbit problem, outweighed the risks. In fact the full effect (and effectiveness) of the virus is still not yet known, but, as far as the farmers were concerned, the possible eradication of a pest which ruined arable farm land made all of the risks worthwhile.
Of course the risk assessment made by those farmers didn't take into account the perspectives of other New Zealanders. Some people were alarmed at the illegal introduction of a virus, the possible effects of which weren't fully understood. That's why an institution like ERMA is needed - one which can objectively consider the broad spectrum of views held by different New Zealanders and try to determine what will best serve the public interest.
ERMA has been given the task of evaluating risks associated with the environment and making decisions about how acceptable those risks are. This will be done by regulating which hazardous substances and new organisms are allowed into the country.
"Risk management as a discipline is still relatively young and undeveloped", says Bas Walker. "So whilst we will borrow very heavily from the discipline in what we do, I expect that ERMA will also be a big contributor to the development of the discipline itself".
Although the science of risk management may be young, ERMA can draw on New Zealand's previous mistakes when it starts its work analysing dangers to the environment. Our experience with dangerous substances like cyanide and introduced species like possums and rabbits (and the imported pesticides subsequently needed to counter them) highlight the need for forethought in environmental planning.
And ERMA will have to assess these dangers in much the same way that everyday people consider the dangers of dashing across a busy street. Is it worth the risk? By combining commonsensical risk equations with expert scientific knowledge, ERMA will have to achieve the best outcome for New Zealand's people, environment and economy.
With one centralised agency, the public will be able to make submissions on the planned introduction of hazardous substances and new organisms. This creates an opportunity to identify and address the concerns of a broad range of New Zealanders.
"And that's important," says Bas Walker. "Because these are ultimately social decisions in which we all have a personal stake."
For further information contact:
Karen Cronin,
Manager Communications.
Phone: 04 473 8426
or email to: enquiries@ermanz.govt.nz