You’re probably wondering what the recent sand embargo by the Indonesian government has to do with cockroaches. Well, a lot.
Cockroaches are masters in thriving in an environment of resource scarcity. Man has been trying to kill them since the beginning of time. In the original script of the ancient classical Indian paramour, “The Mahabratha,” one of the Pandavas Princes mentions only two things would live beyond the end of time – “rocks and cockroaches.” In the 80’s movie, “Scarface” , the main protagonist played by Al Pacino kept ranting, “cockroaches, cockroaches, they’re everywhere!” After that, he got done in by a 6 ft 2 inch, 180kg DEA cockroach with a pump action shot gun.
Every year housewives all round the world spend nearly USD$2.83 Billion on roach sprays alone, that’s bigger than all the combined defense budget of Asean put together! ( we all know they don’t half work). Monsanto, the leading manufacturer of pesticides, projects at the current rate we are going, a can of roach spray is going to have to be a hundred times more potent than what it is today. Not only are roaches just surviving, they are adapting and thriving, and the more we spray them, the more they develop immunity. The score card doesn’t look good for mankind. We who managed to send a man to the moon and space probes to the surface of mars can’t seem to win the war in our pantries against those slippery, smooth and frictionless bugs. They just slip by us like wet glass – they are survivors, they know things we humans don’t, and they have a lot to teach us. It’s a lesson many policy makers, businessmen and even ordinary folk can learn; how to manage in an environment of resource scarcity. Read the rest of this entry »
