CAPÍTULO 4: Propuesta e implementación de un Sistema
4.3. Instrucciones técnicas para la notificación
Oasis systems such as Shibam, Matera and Petra show how archaic societies developed a resource-scarce econ- omy and survived, thanks to their very prudent and frugal management of natural resources. The reason why such cities are so aesthetically pleasing is precisely because they lived in harmony with their environment over long stretches of time. When this balance between resources and their productive use – painstakingly maintained over the centuries – is lost, then the urban ecosystem collapses and sets off a process of deterioration of the hinterland as well. In the Mediterranean basin and in its islands and peninsulas, in Syria, Lebanon, Mesopotamia, Palestine, Arabia and Northern Africa, the sites of the most ancient civilizations, where archaeological excavations bring to light cities which were once surrounded by immense greenery, with fertile fields and thriving gardens, are now abandoned and buried in sand. For 3,000 years the process of desertification has marched onwards; it has worsened during the industrial age and has reached cata- strophic proportions over the last fifty years.
This continuous natural deterioration is not due to natural and climatic conditions, but rather to indiscriminate pres- sures being brought to bear on natural resources. In devel- oped countries, the traditional models of life, of production and of consumption have been cast aside in favour of a system which totally depletes local resources; this fosters overgrowth of the developed areas by means of massive recourse to external resources, first from the hinterland and then from more and more remote areas. Thus, the entire planet is involved in this mechanism which destroys our plant heritage and our landscapes. The chain of transmission of knowledge of how to deal with our environment, which has been handed down from genera- tion to generation over thousands of years, is broken.
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This lost knowledge is why we are at the end of our capa- bility of maintaining and governing lands whose balanced and harmonious aspects are the fruit of labour and culture. Today this entire process is endangering the balance of nature of the whole planet; it is therefore necessary to plan interventions aiming to reintegrate the historical memory of how the environment was cared for, in that it consti- tutes a strategy for survival for all humanity.
Oasis communities show that humanity has not only trod the path of enormous, powerful empires, but has also carved out small and self-sufficient communities. Vast, far- flung empires require a continuous supply of outside energy in order to stave off catastrophe. This is what is happening in the Nile Valley, in the large metropolitan conurbations of Palestine and in many other areas of the Mediterranean and Arabia, whose enormous growth rates are underpinned by major dams, complete overuse of deep water tables, costly desalination plants or huge proj- ects to use ever more remote resources. The alternative model is that of the oasis, which allowed human life and society to continue even after the collapse of the great empires. The oases were able to hand down collective knowledge and draw up rules for peaceful coexistence that are indispensable to survival. They were able to live in harmony with the surrounding environment, and to make use of its resources without depleting them completely. The underlying philosophy is that of transforming a disad- vantageous situation in renewable resources. The delay in modern development becomes an advantage as the cul- tural landscape and settlements are intact and are of great value for the future. The combination of traditional tech- nology and new appropriate technologies could set in motion a true cultural recovery: we could safeguard the remnants of the past and revitalize them as sources for progress and as models to learn how to save our planet, which is an oasis in the cosmos.
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