As the world turns, retain the ability to adapt

The public discussion of climate change is broadening from an environmental focus to include economic concerns, especially as major corporations quantify the adverse impacts of droughts, floods and other extreme weather events on their bottom lines.

Coca-Cola, for example, has seen its supply of water, sugar cane, sugar beets and citrus fruit disrupted.

Coke executives and the leaders of other multinational companies are now speaking openly about climate change as a disruptive economic force that can drive up the price of food and other commodities and lower production.

This expanded discussion is especially welcome in Hawaii, where anti-GMO activists wrongly seek to thwart the use of biotechnology — a scientifically sound tool for farmers coping in the era of climate change.

Pot export proposal puts cart ahead of horse

State Rep. Rida Cabanilla has proposed creating a working group to study how Hawaii might capitalize on pakalolo as a cash crop.

It’s not going to take much work for them to figure out that shipping out marijuana, even to states or countries where it’s legal, is a nonstarter, given current federal laws and regulations on interstate commerce.

The urge to make pot-smoking jokes about this marijuana export proposal has been indulged a lot in all the media accounts on this issue (yes, some of them national). So we’ll resist that here.

We’ll just bemoan the likelihood that this bill will take time away from discussions of decriminalization and other, more worthy topics.