Week's Watch

Where does Gerald Ford stand on the environment? Last week, at a ceremony opening a $27 million environmental research center in Cincinnati, he declared that he was for it--with an important qualification. The President called for a "detente with nature" and pledged his commitment to clean air and water: "As long as I have anything to say about it, this country's symbol will never be an empty beer can in a river of garbage." On the other hand, Ford continued, efforts to protect the environment might have to be eased in order to increase the nation's supply of energy and improve the economy--the same philosophy that the President expressed in May when he vetoed a bill to control the ecological damage done by strip mining for coal. The result would be a slowdown, but not a reversal, of the U.S.'s environmental programs. Pointing to progress in cleaning up the Connecticut and Hudson rivers, Ford quipped: "The salmon are back. They cough a lot, but they have reappeared."

o According to a recently completed year-long study commissioned by the California state assembly, an average of 300,000 Californians are injured every year by stepping on broken glass, sharp-edged pull-tabs and other varieties of jettisoned junk. Medical treatment for the injuries costs about $3 million annually. The next step for the lawmakers is to act on a pending bill to clean up the state--and reduce the risks.

o After years of protest by conservationists around the world, the 15-member International Whaling Commission, an organization that controls whale hunting, has just set drastically reduced quotas for next season's catch. The total number of harvestable whales was cut by 9,000, to 32,500. Most important change was a complete ban on hunting the endangered finback whales except in a small area of the Antarctic. The two biggest whaling nations--Japan and Russia--apparently are going to comply with the new limits. Reason: self-interest. Under new procedures that were designed in response to pressure from the U.S., the commission determines its quotas to ensure the survival of the various species of whales--and thus the jobs of the whale hunters.

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