Idaho Wilderness Hearings

Statement:

Mr. Aland. Senator McClure, distinguished members of this committee, I thank you for the opportunity to appear before the Senate Committee on Energy and National Resources to testify on an issue as important as the management of Idaho resources. My name is Gordon Aland with Monsanto Co. located in Soda Springs, Caribou County. Monsanto Co. supports the position of no increase in wilderness. Monsanto is not against wilderness but asks the question, 'How much wilderness is enough?' The preservationists want Idaho locked up. A total wilderness is not enjoyed by the public or by their descendants as is so often claimed. A wilderness is only en joyed by a favored few, the wealthy who hire someone to take them in, or fly in, and the college student or college professor who can take 3 months off to hike the length of the wilderness. The key isn't to lock up, but to manage. The ever-increasing withdrawal of public lands to be locked up and enjoyed by only a favored few is not in the best interest of the State. The lands serve the State best when they provide public access, public recreation, public jobs, and public schools. Idaho, a natural resource State, needs the economy of multiple-use public lands to support the public education system. In these times when public services make higher demands on the State's economy, it makes more logic to choose a course where the public lands can be managed for the best interests of the State, multiple use. The claim of a wilderness being needed to support a tourist in dustry is hard to understand. If a wilderness area developed a tour ist industry, then tourism should be Idaho's No. 1 industry. The hard to get to areas have always been here. Even with multiple 721 use, many areas will remain hard to get to and should attract tour ists according to this theory. In the real world it is accessibility, not isolation that develops a tourist industry. Tourism depends on the ability of people to get to the scenic panorama, the fishing, boating, or picture-taking. Tour ism is participation, not oohs and ahs over a picture postcard. To develop tourism, Idaho should study Switzerland. No one has ever claimed that Switzerland has been raped and ruined, yet the Swiss have made nearly every area accessible. They use roads from Roman eras, trails, trains, and trams to make the beauty accessible to those who can't climb or hike. And yet those who do desire to take the more athletic approach can still climb or hike and enjoy the same beauty as the less arduous tourist. We support an accessible State managed for the benefit of all, not locked up for a few. Thank you.