Multimillionaire: Environmental Hero or 'Heritage' Thief?
After writing about U.S. diplomacy in the last post, here's a look at how an individual American is being received for his "good deeds" in South America.
Douglas Tompkins is a man who changed the way America dresses -- not once but twice, according to a 2004 U.S. News & World Report story. As a ski bum, he started The North Face, and after selling that business in 1968, he helped his then-wife, Susie, start the Esprit clothing label.
The Associated Press reports that Tompkins has used his wealth to buy huge areas of land in Chile and Argentina, saying his purpose is to protect it. In Argentina, for instance, he bought half a million acres of the Esteros del Ibera, a marshland full of wildlife. He has left the area untouched and says he eventually plans to turn it over to the government as a land sanctuary -- the same promise he made about his land in Chile. (The government there gave his land sanctuary status in 1995.)
But local politicians, business leaders and even farmers are complaining that he has stolen their land and heritage. Conservative Chilean senator Antonio Horvath asked in an article in the New Statesman earlier this year how Americans would feel if Horvath bought a huge section of land in Florida and then told Floridians they couldn't go there. "I think the U.S. would kick me right out of there."
Tompkins told AP that he intends to keep his promise and return the land to both governments to be preserved. He will, however, hold onto it for now "as a very good example of what private conservation can do." Maybe the locals would appreciate Tompkins more in the meantime if he offered to help them start their own brand of brightly colored, easy-to-wear clothing...
4:47 PM ET | 06-11-2007 | permalink
