http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/ RSS feed of The Equatorial Press en-us sBLOG 0.7.3 Beta (Build 20060309) Mon, 02 Aug 2010 23:32:01 GMT Mon, 02 Aug 2010 23:32:01 GMT http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=45

We exchanged questions with Bob MajiriOghene, a Nigerian journalist based in Abuja, about life in the country's oil region, what the future means for megacities, and how everyday life can lead to innovation.

Oil is on the mind of many in the United States, as it gushed into the Gulf of Mexico daily from the leaking BP well. Nigeria, as an OPEC member, has plenty of experience with oil spills, not to mention the social and economic pain they can cause, particularly in the oil-rich Niger Delta. How does the situation in Nigeria look today with regards to the oil industry?

Many Nigerians are disappointed that our own government has not come out to make a statement or two concerning the situation in Gulf. I guess they are embarrassed by it, too. But the point must be made that that oil spill in the Gulf, with all due respects, is just a drop in the bucket compared to that that had taken place in the Niger Delta since the 1960s. The indifferent and initial American government response was no different from the kind of response of the Nigerian government over the years. Permit me to say that if the Nigerian government has been responsive to the environment problems that oil spills present to us all (just the way Barack Obama is tackling it right now), perhaps [activists Ken] Saro Wiwa and the Ogoni 9 would not have died needlessly the way they did.

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I must also say that there was something hypocritical about the responses by both governments, the American and the Nigerian. While the American government holds BP responsible for the mess in the Gulf, it has not taken commensurate steps to kick the asses of Chevron, Mobil, and other American multinational oil drilling companies responsible for flaring gas everyday in the Niger Delta. When it affects them it is a problem but as it has affected us in decades, it is no problem.

On the side of the Nigerian government and the oil multinationals, it is a case of the pot calling the kettle black; the oil companies claim to have paid royalties to the Nigerian government and therefore cannot be responsible for the incessant cases of destruction of pipelines running right through the very communities that are impoverished and endangered by the activities of the oil companies.

In an interview with the Managing Director of Shell in Nigeria recently, he claimed that drilling oil-drilling companies cannot afford the technology needed to stop gas flaring.

So, if I was to give an honest assessment of situation in Nigeria today, I would say that it looks no different from that in the Gulf. As I write this, gas if still being flared in Kwale, Uzere and several other areas in the Niger Delta where oil is being produced. The people cannot drink pipe-borne or water collected in buckets from the rain. Rather than rivers, there are artificial lakes called burrow pits 'created' by Chevron, Mobil and Schlumberger seemingly in place of the dead rivers and aquatic life. People die quietly from bronchial infections.

Nevertheless, I want to highlight a particular scenario involving Mobil and a Nigerian inventor. It would interest you to know that Mobil agreed to pay the inventor of an anti-corrosive paint now in use on oil drilling platforms around the world $2 for every barrel of oil it is able to drill using this paint. Today, Mobil uses it widely, yet has denied ever having anything to do with this Nigerian and have been in court ever since in Nigeria to enforce its claim. The Nigerian government is mum on the issue.

Although he was ailing for most of his presidency, the late Nigerian President Umaru Yar'Adua did achieve some notable breakthroughs with some of the rebel groups that had armed themselves against the oil industry. Since his death, it seems the ceasefire has really unraveled itself. What do you see happening with guerilla-style movements in the Delta?

Allow me correct one impression please. What you call 'rebel groups' were no rebels.

These were ordinary people in the Niger Delta fed up with the incessant cases of environmental pollution, and who took up arms only after attempts at dialogue were rebuffed by the Nigerian state and its status quo.

And no, they were not actually fighting against the oil industry, but against a system that took the proceeds from oil to develop other parts of the country like Abuja, while leaving the oil producing regions impoverished and at the mercy of the hazards of the bye products of oil prospecting and exploration.

That was the fight.

And yes, President Umaru Yar'Adua did achieve 'some notable breakthroughs.' For me, our late president was a friend of the Niger Delta.

Initially, we all thought his amnesty deal was the same kind of deal brokered with Isaac Adaka Boro, in the 60s. Boro, if you look at our history, fought the same kind of guerilla warfare that these so-called 'rebels' fought with the Nigerian state. In the end, he was deceived into accepting an amnesty deal and killed secretly.

Therefore, when the late president came up with this same deal, we were skeptical. In due course however, everyone saw that the president was indeed sincere about solving the problems of the Niger Delta. Agitators for justice and equality known as 'militants' began to trust him. It was very sad that he died because we were hopeful that his policies would redress the many wrongs that have become institutions.

But what is happening now is not that the guerilla movements have totally embraced the amnesty deal. What is happening now is that the guerilla movements have ceased fire in the hopes that the incumbent president, who is a native of the Niger Delta, would move to address the issues that led to such guerilla attacks against the Nigerian state.

Nigeria seems to have a long tradition of literate activists who have championed the cause of ethnic groups caught between the state and the oil companies- people like Ken Saro-Wiwa and Wole Soyinka. Do you see any new faces protesting pollution, corruption, and the loss of land?

Yes, you are right, concerning the long tradition of Nigerian activists. Other very enlightened people are still championing the cause of the Niger Delta people.

One of them, whose methods are a shade different from that of Wole Soyinka's or Saro Wiwa's, is Asari Dokubo. He was involved in a fight between the other 'militants' in the Delta creeks over supremacy and when it became clear that he had the upper hand, the government of Olusegun Obasanjo invited him for a dialogue but incarcerated him instead.

He was freed after a very long court process. In the same vein, a group known as the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta, MEND, consists of very educated Nigerians from the region in question.

They are a guerilla outfit mostly involved in propaganda and armed struggle with the government. They send email to radio and TV stations arguing their case.

There is another chap, Tony Uranta, the local facilitator of the Commission of Nobel Laureates to the Niger Delta. The Commission is a body made up of Nobel Laureates interested in the environmental problems of the Niger Delta. Uranta heads the local Support Team and facilitates capacity-building programmes to sensitize people on the much travail of the people of the Niger Delta. I have listened to him on many occasions and I believe he is one of the new generations of agitators for the Niger Delta environment.

Beyond that however, he has added his voice other environmental issues in Nigeria like erosion and desert encroachment in the Northern part of Nigeria.

Last year you wrote a provocative piece for us here at that explored plans for a Lagos with updated infrastructure, city planning, and new relationship to the natural world. Is late President Yar'Adua's predecessor, the aptly named Goodluck Jonathan, planning to continue to press for those changes?

The chap involved in that bold initiative is Babatunde Raji Fashola, governor of Lagos State. Both Yar'Adua and Jonathan belong to a different political party from the forward looking and progressive governor of Lagos State, a state considered the nerve centre of Nigeria and controlled by the governor's party.

The relationship between Yar'Adua's predecessor and that governor's predecessor was frosty and both were always fighting. Yar'Adua's predecessor was envious of the updated infrastructure, city planning and new relationship to the natural world that Lagos had developed. Luckily, with government money given by Yar'Adua early in his term, the Lagosian Governor embarked on those projects to beautify Lagos, improve on infrastructure and build a road network that the city badly needed.

Now, even though Yar'Adua gave back to the Lagos State government all of that money, political relationship between both of them was hardly rosy. They towed the same path as their predecessors until Yar'Adua died. For now, there is no record of acrimony between Goodluck Jonathan and Babatunde Raji Fashola of Lagos.

Sadly though, there have been moves to impeach or remove this forward looking governor on allegations of 'financial impropriety'. Sadly again, those allegedly behind this are allegedly members of the governor's own party, The Action Congress, or AC.

For many outside observers, Lagos is the ultimate megacity: "go-slow" traffic jams, open-air freeway markets, spotty power grids. Yet there is also a lot of creativity going on, with people figuring out ways to make a life amid unpredictable conditions. As someone who knows Lagos well, have you seen Lagosians begin to change the city to meet their own needs?

Lagosians are a 'creative' people indeed. Let me give a personal anecdote. For most of the time I lived there, I had to buy my own power with a generating set. Others rely on some contraptions fitted with tiny bulbs connected to batteries. To beat the 'go slow', I would either rise up as early as 5 am to go to work or wait for all the traffic to ease up a little bit. Thereafter, I would embark on my journey to work via Governor Fashola's Bus Rapid Transport, BRT. To help commuters, the governor created dedicated lanes for these BRT buses so that they convey commuters to their destinations thereby beating the 'go-slow'.

As far as I am concerned however, most the ways and means that we as individuals devise [like the use of power generators] hurt the environment and create situations that expose us all to harm.

If I were to say whether Lagosians are beginning to change the city to meet their own needs, I would say yes. Yes because Lagosians were united in their condemnation of plans to remove from office, the man mostly responsible for changing the face of Lagos for good.

Sometimes discussions about Nigeria are dominated by these images of the warmer, wetter south. But there's a whole swath of Nigeria to the north that is largely dry and predominantly Muslim. It has not been the easiest of times for this region, with violent protests and links to an attempted Nigerian suicide bombing in the US. It's also hard to overlook the differences between the two halves of the country in geographic terms. How does this division of land- wet and dry, Christian and Muslim- affect the country?

These divisions you highlighted here certainly affect the country a great deal. For instance, one of the misconceptions that Nigerians who live in the South, East or West have of the arid North is that everyone there is Muslim and therefore a religious fundamentalist. But it is not so.

The northerners in Nigeria are a mixed bag, and are products of a rich history coming from the early Songhai, the Old Mali and Old Ghana empires.

Some Northerners claim to belong to the Hausa [ethnic group] Hausa and sometimes consider themselves outcasts. A lot of them are also Christians. Therefore, the Muslim hegemony that has ruled Nigeria for over three decades has consistently sidelined these Banza Hausa to the extent that riots immediately broke out when there was the likelihood that a qualified member of the group might have become governor of one of the local states.

When these riots broke out, Nigerians from the South, East or West that reside in the North and are Christians felt the sharp ends of the swords and guns used in the senseless massacres.

Yes, it has not been the easiest of times for this region, what with problems of bad leadership, religious intolerance, desert encroachment, epidemics, droughts, and lack of agricultural assistance for peasant farmers who produce the huge baskets of tomato, onions, lettuce, water melons, pepper and potatoes that feed the nation.

Temperatures here sometimes are as high as 40 degrees [Celsius] and cases of polio and meningitis were rampant a few years ago.

But if you ask me, I think the problems of the North benefit the elite who use the Islamic religion as a tool to keep the talakawa, the peasants, from education.

Another recent set of riots were fuelled by a Muslim minority manipulating the largely uneducated majority by insisting that western education is evil.

If the government could abolish the reprehensible almajiris caste system (which leaves some adolescents on their own amid rubbish and dirt) and begin to invest in their proper education, our country will be better for it.

Like other new capital cities, Nigeria's capital Abuja was constructed in the 1990's to form a neutral gathering point for the country. Building a new city gave the planners an opportunity to build in green space and other improvements for quality of life. Is there an interest in Nigeria in re-thinking its older cities and towns with new green space?

Yes there is, but only to some extent. Last year when my former employer sent me out on an assignment to Calabar, Cross River State, I was happy to see that the city and environs had a green culture.

And of course there's the effort by the Lagos State government to green the city.

Some officials I spoke with say they are keenly aware of the implications of climate change to a coastal city like Lagos, constantly in the throes of surges from the sea.

About two months ago, the authorities organized a stakeholders meeting to raise the level of awareness of the danger posed by climate change and the need to begin to put structures and machinery in place to mitigate it.

For most of the states in the North, tree planting is another way of stemming the onslaught of the desert and beating sporadic incidences of erosion and drought.

What is your favorite place in Nigeria?

Another hard question. I have lived in the East, the West, the South and in the Northern parts of this country. When I travel, I hardly fly, giving me an opportunity to see the country and countryside as it really is.

One thing that strikes me about my country is that it is a beautiful country, with huge potential. I cannot lay claims to liking one part of it but one thing makes me like one part apart from the other: I could live anywhere in Nigeria that is not hot!
]]> Mon, 02 Aug 2010 23:32:01 GMT http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/comments.php?id=45#comments http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=45 http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=44
Photo by Lilly Knits

By Fabricio Angelo

The question of infrastructure in the Amazon is central to the development of the region. Unfortunately, the Brazilian government too often works with concepts that fail to take into account the importance of a low carbon economy.

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A series of plans are being imposed on the people of the Amazon under the guise of 'bringing development' to the region. The pressure of civil society groups, however, is helping to create a new vision for regional development.

This new way, however, is not the easiest road to take. The construction of hydroelectric plants, and the increase of the road grid inside the forest, to the detriment of other forms of transport, often takes precedence over new technologies that demand less cost and environmental loss.

According to Marcos Mariani, president of the NGO Preserve Amazonia, data from electronic maps showing real-time deforestation provided by the federal government shows that deforestation is strongest in those areas where paved roads exist.

"It's clear that the risk of deforestation in one area is directly linked to the possibility of access to that area. Therefore, the highway offers far greater risk to the Amazon than it does benefits," he said.

In accordance with a resolution of CONAMA, the national body that studies and advises on the environment in Brazil, environmental impact studies must be conducted for major projects like road building in the Amazon, and should include all technological alternatives.

Mariani explained that the impact of highways in the Amazon has been a hotbutton issue for all branches of the Brazilian government charged with protecting the national environment.

"The topic of transport in the Amazon was the subject of intense debate during national environmental discussions last year. Although there seemed to be the opportunity to really shift the paradigm of development in the region, supporting it with all the necessary legal studies, it just doesn't seem to be happening," Mariani said.

He offered the example of the more than 3,000 kilometers of road that are being planned to be built inside the forest in areas where the risk of deforestation is already high. He pointed out railroads and barges
as safer forms of transport- not to mention cheaper and more democratic.

"The substitution of the road model of transport for one of the other less impactful forms creates an enormous potential to attract foreign capital, since the deforestation prevented by the less harmful modes can be converted into 'positive carbon credits' and sold to developed nations who need to diminish their CO2 emissions," he said.

According to research presented in the annual meeting of the Brazilian Society for the Progress of Science in July 2007, only 10% of the residents who live along the major Amazon highway BR 163 own automobiles. This demonstrates that the real intention of road building schemes is less to benefit the local
communities, but rather to help facilitate access to the forest for big businesses.

"The ease of indiscrimate access to the highways brings with it the economic impetus to cut down trees for a profit," Mariani explained.

To that end, Mariani affirmed that the government must review its transport policies in the Amazon, and the sooner the better.

Government representative Johannes Eck did not dispute Mariani's allegations. She did say that concern toward sustainable development has been a key motivation since the beginning of Lula government.

"We are still trying to correct the errors of the past and to establish social and environmental standards for the Amazon region. It is a long and complex process."

She explained that the government's job is further complicated by the many stakeholders and their differences of opinion.

"We are trying to bring infrastructure with the least possible environmental impact, as well as trying to resolve the question of farming in the Amazon, which is also one of the main problems associated with deforestation," she said.

Eck cited the creation of protected biodiversity zones on the edges of the highways, among other accomplishments, as proof that the federal government is searching for less impactful alternatives for the Amazon.

"We support initiatives such as the Amazon Sustainability Forum that help open up a dialogue with all sectors of society to help find the best way to establish social development and environmental preservation in the region," she said.

According to Diogenes Alves, senior researcher at the National Institute for Space Research, which runs an Amazon research center, one of the major causes of the region's environmental troubles stems from Brazil- like so many other countries- suffering drastic economic and industrial changes in the last few decades and lacking the time to think about the consequences.

"Today it's becoming more important to think about infrastructure models that are economically viable, ecologically correct, and politically and socially balanced," he said. "The highways constructed in the 90's have been a big cause of deforestation. In a radius of 100 kilometers around those highways you will find 90% of the deforested areas. We've made many advances since then, so it's important to rethink these paradigms so that new disasters do not occur."

The assistant Attorney General, Dr. Mario Gisi, goes one step further. He criticizes the forms of licenses that give big business the freedom to harm the Amazon. "The licensing of businesses in this country is one that is supposed to keep them accountable. How, then, can a gigantic project, such as a hydroelectric plant, get environmental approval in four months? Unfortunately, what we are seeing more often are the interests of politicans above social interests."

According to Gisi, a bigger participation by the people of the region and stronger studies of the environmental impact of projects can help establish social and environmental equality. "A greater transparency in the licensing processes is necessary to stop the destruction," he said.

Currently, the construction of highways is the leading cause of degradation to the Amazon's environment. If the work continues on the same scale, the environmental impact of highway projects, like BR-319, which will cross the largest area of unbroken forest in Brazil, will have irreversible consequences.

As University of Sao Paolo professor Virgilio M. Viana reminds, the deforestation necessary to clear space for the pavement of BR-319 will launch more than 4.9 billion molecules of CO2 into the atmosphere by 2050. "The potential negative impacts of the construction of highways in the Amazon will further prove the importance of a new transport system for the Amazon," he said.

This article was originally published in Envolverde, in Portuguese. It can be
found at: http://www.ecoagencia.com.br/?open=noticias&id===AUUF0dZhFaWJlVaVXTWJVU
]]> Tue, 07 Jul 2009 15:38:34 GMT http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/comments.php?id=44#comments http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=44 http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=43
Photo Courtesy of hmerinomx/Flickr

by Talli Nauman

By the time the World Health Organization (WHO) announced the 2009 influenza virus pandemic on June 11, the country of the flu’s discovery was just beginning to get back on its feet.

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Mexico today is coming out of an emotional and financial tailspin caused by draconian measures to prevent the spread of the infectious disease.

Among the early, isolated but alarming outbreaks around the world of the new strain of the A(H1N1) influenza, beginning in late April 2009, the most cases and fatalities confirmed were in Mexico. Verifying 2,059 cases of infected people out of the approximately 5,300 substantiated in 30 nations worldwide by mid-May, Mexico drew national and international attention for the previously unknown virus strain. Authorities’ declaration of an “epidemic” and then an “imminent pandemic” fueled an environmental health scare of staggering socio-economic impact in the country, weighing heavily on top of existing fiscal woes and survivors’ heartbreak over 56 lost loved-ones, by that time.

Mexican President Felipe Calderon declared a national alert tantamount to the 2002 anti-terrorist U.S. Homeland Security decree in its broad-brush abridgements of protections for privacy and civil liberties, such as waiving search-warrant requirements and cancelling travelers’ right to move about freely.

In Mexico City, the government allowed private workplaces to remain open but closed all schools, eating establishments (except for take-out orders), public institutions such as museums, and finally even government offices. They remained shuttered through most of the first week of May. More than 500 mass meetings and hundreds of smaller ones were postponed. The national sport of soccer was played on a field off-limits to spectators.

With officials warning against travel and promoting the use of surgical masks to prevent the spread of the viral disease, the devastating effects on Mexico’s economy ranged from entertainment business losses -- reportedly $57 million a day in the capital -- to cessation nationwide of the traditional greeting kiss on the cheek. More than fever and coughs, fear and tension gripped residents across the country.

The total death toll attributable to the new A(H1N1) was a mere drop in the bucket, compared to the 36,000 who die every year from other flu strains in the United States alone. But the scare raised the issue of industrial hog farming security, since the strain is officially classified as a recent outgrowth of the H1N1 virus dubbed swine flu, which the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention had first isolated in pigs in 1920 and documented in humans in 1988.

Swine flu can be transmitted between pigs, between people, between swine and poultry, and from people to pigs. It can not be transmitted via the cooked meat of inspected pork, and no evidence exists to show that pigs have caused the new strain to develop or multiply and spread in the human population.

Yet the new strain is a combination of swine flu, with avian flu and other flu variants. Its disproportionate impact on Mexico focused the spotlights on the country’s role in the planet’s growing number of industrial hog farming operations, known to be breeding grounds wherever they are for the spread of disease.

The world’s largest producer of hogs and leading U.S. pork packer, Smithfield Foods, announced that its Granjas Carroll subsidiary near Perote, Veracruz, Mexico, was free of the strain, according to testing done of its more than one-half million feedlot pigs and its nearly 1,000 employees there.

“Our joint ventures in Mexico routinely administer influenza virus vaccination to their swine herds and conduct routine testing,” said Smithfield CEO C. Larry Pope.

Nevertheless, the company pledged to continue monitoring and testing for viruses at the facility, in acknowledgement of the susceptibility to virus production created by confined animal feeding operations (CAFOs). One of the first confirmed cases from the new flu was a child from La Gloria, adjacent to Smithfield’s Mexico joint venture, where flu symptoms ran rampant throughout April.

The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) issued a statement that hogs need not be slaughtered to stem the disease, after Mexico sacrificed 900 pigs in the state of Guerrero and Egypt threatened to destroy its 300,000 head. The organization found that swine had been infected through contact with humans in Canada, but in any case the animals usually recovered quickly.

Following the outbreak, the FAO ordered teams of investigators to check Mexico’s feedlots. FAO Chief Veterinarian Joseph Domenech advised that the human-hog transmission possibility should be closely watched. “This was expected and FAO was already saying there was a need to do more pig surveillance,” he said.

Biosecurity measures such as quarantine of pigs at CAFOs might become necessary to prevent farm-to-farm spread of the disease where it is found, he added.

The FAO has been scrutinizing Mexico’s pig pens since as far back as 2000, when its experts launched a pork project in central Mexico to study the effects of CAFOs on the environment. This led to a carbon trading program that allowed Mexican businesses to profit on exchange of carbon credits the country receives based on reductions of methane greenhouse gas emissions obtained from covering the excrement ponds at the hog lots, under the Kyoto Protocol’s Clean Development Mechanism.

With an expanding population of more than 17.5 million pigs in the feedlots back then, a research project sponsored by the Montreal-based trinational Commission for Environmental Cooperation of the North American Free Trade Agreement noted: “The proper handling of this large quantity of CAFO animal waste is critical to protecting human health and the environment.”

Smithfield’s Granjas Carroll is only one of dozens of major factory farms in states all around Mexico that is subject to examination. Sonora, Guanajuato, Nuevo Leon and Queretaro are among the big pig producing states. The production model is also prevalent nationwide in chicken and egg farming, as well as shrimp farming.

Mexico has been receiving carbon credits for the pig projects since 2006. Unlike Granjas Carroll, the CAFOs in the carbon trading equation have covered effluent ponds. By covering the lagoons, the original 14 carbon reduction projects registered in the country were expected to reduce annual methane emissions by the equivalent of 621,513 tons of carbon dioxide. At the same time, the method reduces volatile organic compounds, stench, and water pollution. It also provides a renewable energy source, methane biogas.

However, it does not resolve underlying problems with what critics have widely publicized as CAFOs’ health and environmental drawbacks. The mass-production style of raising meat creates global warming gases, other air pollutants and pathogens by using a water-based excrement handling method that results in anaerobic decomposition. By contrast, family farming or small-scale production units rely on dry composting and aerobic decomposition, in which the carbon is returned to the soil and sequestered for enrichment of crop production.

Organizations promoting alternatives to CAFO proliferation, such as the non-profit U.S. Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy, note that animal welfare is at stake in CAFOs because the extremely close confinement typical of the facilities goes against natural instincts; prohibits exercise; encourages disease transmission; and weakens, hurts and crazes livestock. This in turn affects human welfare, because the pigs must be maintained with antibiotics and vaccinations, traces of which enter the consumers’ organisms, affect immune systems and are transmitted genetically.

Traditional production models that integrate hog farming into a diversified crop and livestock operation are the recommended alternative, they say.

Some six weeks after the new swine flu reared its ugly head, the worldwide statistics for its impact were staggering, not in terms of severity but in terms of contagiousness in humans. Nearly 30,000 confirmed cases had been reported from 74 countries. Officially, 6,241 of them were in Mexico, including 108 deaths – less than half as many cases as in the U.S., but with four times as many mortalities. “This is only part of the picture,” said WHO Director Margaret Chan, adding that the countries with less surveillance may be under reporting.

Indeed, it is only part of the picture, when the risks of CAFOs are factored in. ]]> Sat, 20 Jun 2009 03:19:48 GMT http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/comments.php?id=43#comments http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=43 http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=42
Photo Courtesy of wade2tall/Flickr.com

by Julia Bonds

Coal is poisoning our children and us and it is the number 1 cause of Climate Change.

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I say coal is public enemy number 1 to humans and wildlife, from the mountains in ancient Appalachia to the world’s oceans.

We are all brothers and sisters on this earth. The environment is the one thing that connects us all. We are the environment; we eat it, drink it, bath in it, cook in it, excrete it and then drink it again. The environment should be our number 1 priority and we should be preaching it to our children. Green is the color that connects all of us. Green IS the color of change.

I don’t mind as much being poor or being made fun of but I DO mind being poisoned and blasted.

Don’t you dare poison my babies.

We owe our children a huge apology and we ask forgiveness. We told our children to clean up their rooms but look at the toxic mess we are leaving them to clean up. Shame on us. I have spent the last 11 years of my life trying to make up for my over consuming ways of past.

The cradle part of coal in Appalachia starts with clear cutting of the world’s most diverse temperate hardwood forest of perhaps the oldest mountains in the world. The coal industry then uses 3 ½ million pounds of explosives daily in West Virginia alone to blast our homes and mountains. The rock dust, silica, coal dust and the mix of explosives poison and foul our air, and end up in our homes and lungs. Our water and streams are poisoned and polluted and if we dare speak out then we are threatened by the coal industry and ignored by the media. It seems like mainstream media don’t want to hear about corporations poisoning neighborhoods of people of color or poor whites or hillbillies.

We won’t shut up and we aren’t going away-we are organizing together for Environmental Justice. From West Virginia to Detroit, from Kentucky to South Bronx and from Harriman, Tennessee to Little Village in Chicago, we are just starting to fight for our children. Tennessee’s toxic coal ash disaster has opened up people’s eyes living near coal plants. From Appalachia to the UK and Australia, direct action is shaping up as part of the strategy to raise awareness.

From bombing Appalachia to choking our babies living near coal fired power plants it is time to stand together. The mercury from coal-fired power plants is dumbing down our babies, causing ADD, Autism, low IQ’s, mental retardation and behavioral problems. People ask, “What wrong with our kids?” We are poisoning our kids-that is what’s wrong with them. We ask that our children hold us accountable, the world’s children. I would assume that the coal industry, along with their partners in crime, are content to continue to dumb down our children.

If you saw some one dumping poison in a baby’s bottle –wouldn’t you push them away and scream- “stop it” and don’t come back or I’ll hurt you? Well then—Lets stop them NOW! Our children are beginning to understand what is happening to them and they will hold us responsible. All of us are responsible, not just the industry, but also those that did nothing to stop them. Let us all remember that silence is approval.

As people talk of carbon capture to solve our problem so that we can burn coal, those of us on the front lines realize that will never solve the problem. Too much carbon, not enough room to store the carbon.

Carbon capture does nothing to solve the other filthy and devastating affects of coal. What about the other particulates as a result of burning coal?

What about the destruction during the extraction of coal, the environmental justice issues and human rights issues? I can point to the famous words of Gandhi- “Science without humanity” as the fools rush to carbon capture. Solar panels and wind turbines for every home is a better solution.

We need more actions, more protests, letters to the editor and much more commenting and blogging on the Internet. We hope to Help President Obama implement his plan for better lives for our children and us. Our actions will give our president the Mandate he needs to silence his critics. He can then look to his critics and say, “See, this is what the people want”. Our president needs our help and he can’t do it alone.

We must package hope and change for a new future and wrap it in truth. Environmental activists must become cool and sexy as if our lives depend upon it, because our lives DO depend upon it.

We realize that the rest of the world is waiting for America to lead on Climate Change. Now that we have elected a new President, we will move forward to take leadership and make change. We know the whole world is watching.

Julia Bonds is a community leader based in Rock Creek, West Virginia. She is the recipient of a 2003 Goldman Environmental Prize.


]]> Sat, 20 Jun 2009 03:16:42 GMT http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/comments.php?id=42#comments http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=42 http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=41
Photo by mjwinoz/Flickr.

It is an issue that has polarized environmentalists and has enticed buyers, as well as been a very lucrative part of the economy of the Solomon Islands: the trade in captured dolphins.

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Since it began in 2003, the trade- which offers up dolphins captured in Solomon Islands waters to buyers around the world- has been the center of moral and legal debates throughout the world. The government, for its part, is sticking to the trade, but also making sure it is done in a sustainable and humane way- and is pinning its hopes on a major forum in late March to help alleviate concerns and allow all parties to have a say in how the business is regulated. An announcement on the forum said, "There has been so much media publicity done on this issue by different interest groups in recent years and the forum offers us the opportunity to come together and present this information while everyone is present."

There is no doubt that the business is booming. As the Sydney Morning Herald reported, 28 Solomons dolphins were purchased by a resort in Dubai in 2007, and 28 dolphins were shipped to Mexico in 2004. Most recently, a shipment of dolphins was purchased for a resort in Singapore. Despite the profits, the publicity is rarely positive. Environmental groups as well as the governments of Australia and New Zealand have condemned the sales. It remains to be seen if a forum- an olive branch to critics- will help to stem some of the concerns and criticism surrounding the practice.

-Equatorial Press Staff Report.
Originally published March 2009.

]]> Sat, 20 Jun 2009 02:23:51 GMT http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/comments.php?id=41#comments http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=41 http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=40
Photo Courtesy of Mrlins/Flickr.

Prime Minister Apisai Ielemia of Tuvalu announced in a February meeting in Taipei that global warming poses a serious flooding risk to his nation, so much so that he worries if the islands will remain above sea level.

[more=Read more]

Visiting a Taipei school, Ielemia took the opportunity to tell the assembled schoolchildren that the threat to Tuvalu was rising, literally, as sea levels gain every year.

Though Tuvalu is the third smallest nation on earth, with 12,000 citizens, it sits only 4.5 meters above sea level and has been at the forefront of the debate over climate change. Government officials have announced that, if sea levels continue to rise at predictable intervals, within 50 years the series of nine atolls that make up Tuvalu will be evacuated. The threat is so real that neighboring New Zealand has already guaranteed Tuvalu that it will take in islanders in the event of submersion.

Tuvalu is far from alone in this plight, as most of the low-lying islands of the Pacific are threatened by rising sea levels. Though Tuvalu will likely be the first to be submerged, and thus the first nation swept away by climate change, many of the other island nations in the Pacific may have similar timetables to contend with.

-Equatorial Press Staff Report.
Originally published March 2009. ]]> Sat, 20 Jun 2009 02:22:36 GMT http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/comments.php?id=40#comments http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=40 http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=39

This story has been specially formatted to include traditional Hawaiian accents. Please click here here to read.]]> Sat, 20 Jun 2009 02:19:04 GMT http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/comments.php?id=39#comments http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=39 http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=38
Photo Courtesy of Yoewatzup/Flickr.

An abandoned conservation effort appears to have paid off in the Philippines, as wardens at the Northern Sierra Madre National Park reported in early February that four out of 47 protected areas were used as nesting places for an endangered sea turtle species.

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According to the Philippines Business Mirror, park superintendent William Savella said that the nesting sites were those of the endangered green sea turtle and the hawkbill sea turtle. He cited the efforts of locals for keeping the turtle population protected. Townspeople from Bantay Kalikasan and Bantay Dagat have partnered with the Philippines Department of Environment to protect the nesting sites and to stop the practice of stuffing turtles for international sale.

Though 13 years elapsed since the previous sighting of the turtles in the park, the news is nonetheless a success for the Sierra Madre area, which began life as a conservation project by the World Wildlife Fund sponsored by the Royal Government of the Netherlands. The plug was pulled on the project because, it was claimed, local support was too weak to sustain the program. Now, it seem as though fortunes have changed, if only slightly.

-Equatorial Press Staff Report.
Originally published in February 2009. ]]> Sat, 20 Jun 2009 02:16:13 GMT http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/comments.php?id=38#comments http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=38 http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=37
Photo Courtesy of Lazslo Ilyes.

It can be one of the sea's largest edible fish, and also one of it's most expensive. Tuna has been a staple of the Pacific economy for decades, commanding exorbitant prices in Japanese and Chinese fish markets which, in turn, ship the product around the world.

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Eight island nations announced in early February that they felt their share of the profits was being unfairly scooped away by rival fishermen who, they claim, catch much of their tuna inside the zones legally set aside for the islanders themselves.

In a report from the Australia Broadcasting Company, nations stretching from Papua New Guinea to the Marshall Islands announced that their annual take of the harvest, which amounts to roughly 5 percent of the total market, is too low. To rectify the situation, they vow to meet in New Zealand to discuss ways to profit from their undersea commodities, and to make sure that they are returned a share of the proceeds from every fish caught in their national waters. ABC also reported that the countries will seek cooperation in fishing and- in an important declaration in an often frenzied market- will attempt to introduce sustainable practices into their fishing.

-Equatorial Press Staff Report.
Originally published February 2009. ]]> Sat, 20 Jun 2009 02:14:49 GMT http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/comments.php?id=37#comments http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=37 http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=36
Photo by IISD.

The Crown Prince of Japan opened the second day of the 5th World Water Forum in Istanbul with a keynote address that tackled water issues due to nature's wrath.

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The prince focused particularly on the challenging intersection his own country faces: how to protect the country from natural disasters while also making sure water stays clean and flows freely to an ever-growing population. The prince urged "creative minds" to tackle these problems, and praised the Hyogo Framework for Action as a positive step in the right direction toward reaching a global standard for disaster relief.

The Framework, signed in Kobe, Hyogo, Japan in 2005, developed a 10 year disaster planning strategy that was eventually adopted by 168 world governments. The target goal for implementation is not far off; by 2015, the Hyogo Framework will, according to its mandate, have made the prevention of catastrophic natural disaster damage a top priority for the signed governments.

Disaster prevention often becomes a critical issue in the aftermath of a disaster itself, which makes Japan uniquely suited to lead discussions on the topic. Arguably few other countries have taken the vast steps that Japan has enacted to protects its coastlines, harbors, and cities from typhoons, rising sea levels, and seismic shocks. Yet the environmental component of natural disasters is often overshadowed, something that the World Water Forum would like to see brought back into focus. Massive flooding and rupture of infrastructure can quickly and lethally contaminate water sources that are relied upon by huge populations, and without clean water, sanitation and healthcare grind to a halt.

A strong supporter of the prince's statements was Han Seung-soo, Prime Minister of neighboring Korea, who followed up the keynote address with a call for nations around the world to share data on water flows and work together to lessen the damage that comes from rising seas. Arjun Thapan, a representative from the Asian Development Bank, encouraged listeners that Asia, in fact, was one of the premiere locations for disaster planning and water sanitation programs, citing the bank's own investments and the increase in sanitation programs in Asian mega-cities.

-Equatorial Press Staff Report
Originally published March 2009.

]]> Sat, 20 Jun 2009 02:12:50 GMT http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/comments.php?id=36#comments http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=36 http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=35
Kashmir's lakes- among them the largest freshwater lake in Asia- are weathering a tide of pollution, while the villages that cling to its banks struggle with a poverty level that traps them in a cycle of waste and sickness. Can the Indian government step in and restart defunct sanitation programs, or is it their negligence and disinterest that has exacerbated the problem? (Photo by Shahbasharat/Flickr)

By Athar Parvaiz

Water bodies in Indian Kashmir are shrinking at a rapid pace even as large-scale pollution poses an equal threat.

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Environmental experts say that the devastation of these bodies of water has started particularly in the last two decades. The world famous Dal Lake, which attracts international tourists, has shrunk from 58 square kilometers in 1953 to 11 square kilometers. The lake has also lost 12 meters in depth.

"Massive encroachments and erection of many structures, house boats, and hotels have led to the reduction in the size of the lake," says Professor M. Yousaf, the chairman of the Environmental Science department at the University of Kashmir. "Apart from the reduction in its size, the lake has also witnessed massive pollution," he added. Sewage from 1014 houseboats find its way into the lake. Around 65,000 people live in houseboats and small islands in the lake.

A report released by the state government said that tests conducted by the state's Pollution Control Board (PCB) from samples taken from the lake have shown high levels of lead, arsenic, iron, manganese, copper, and cadmium. The report said that these elements were consumed by fish, who were in turn eaten by local people, causing risk to their health.

The state's high court has issued several mandates ordering the government to safeguard the lake, which, according to the court, has "turned into a swamp." The Dal Lake is not an isolated case in Kashmir, however. Reports show that the Wullar, Mansbal, and Anchar lakes are likewise under threat. Wullar, the largest freshwater lake in Asia, has shrunk from 190 square kilometers to 72 square kilometers. Despite having been named a Wetland of Intertional Importance under the 1990 Ramsar Convention, illegal use of 8260 acres of land officially designated as federally-protected lakefront continues at Wullar.

The 240 kilometer Jehlum River, with a catchment area of thousands of kilometers, is also quickly becoming polluted. "The river has become a garbage dump over the last several years as most of the garbage finds its way into the river. Almost all the drains in Srinagar city and its suburbs flow into the Jehlum," said Sutinder Singh of the Kashmir government's Environment and Remote Sensing Department. The depth of the river has also been significantly reduced thanks to soil erosion. Much of the eroded sediment that flows into the river can be traced back to the widespread deforestation in the forest areas where the Jehlum flows.

Statistics from government researchers show that the Jehlum is dying. Physically, the Jehlum is deteriorating thanks to a shrinking water channel and a rising of its bed. Biologically, nutrient levels are increasing and the presence of pollution resistant algae- a major indicator of poor water quality- is likewise on the rise.

Pollution is so widespread throughout Kashmir's waters that it is being reported even without the full gamut of testing from the PCB, which lacks the equipment necessary to perform the needed tests. Among the tests that the PCB is unable to perform are two of the most basic and important diagnostics for determining pollution levels in water, the biological oxygen and fecal coliform tests.

A lack of infrastructure maintainence also contributes to the pollution levels. The majority of water sanitation stations in Kashmir date from the 1970's or earlier, and the lack of repairs has forced many to shut down. Those sanitation stations that do run empty their contents into the very bodies of water they are intended to protect. A total of 37 million liters of untreated waste is reportedly discharged from these stations everyday.

Solid waste management remains another barrier to cleaning up Kashmir's waters. Government officials charged with managing solid waste have been unable to even collect the necessary data on sanitation in the state. For example, no accurate data exists on how many households in Srinagar city have flush toilets, or how many rely on pit latrines or no toilet systems at all.

The majority of the state's population continues to dispose of solid waste on streets and open spaces, as well as down drains and storm water drainage areas. According to a 2006 survey by a local NGO, more than 70 percent of Kashmir's citizens throw solid waste on the streets and down the drains in residential neighborhoods and 47 percent in commerical areas.

To demonstrate the complexity of the issue, a look at animal sacrifice is revealing. Sacrifice is highly common in Kashmir, with more than 3000 animals sacrificed every day in Srinagar alone. Unofficial estimates put the number at closer to 15,000. The expected quantity of waste generated from that level of sacrifice is 7.5 tons per day. Without being treated, this waste is disposed of in municipal dumping areas and then, finally, into Kashmir's waters.

Athar Parvaiz is a journalist based in Kashmir.
Originally published in March 2009. ]]> Sat, 20 Jun 2009 02:11:18 GMT http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/comments.php?id=35#comments http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=35 http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=34
India's major cities have long slumbered under a haze of air pollution. Now, the Indian government is launching a major push to improve its air quality by calling upon the country's vast agricultural holdings to produce biofuels. With slow public interest and minimal infrastructure investment, can India's government rally its people around the concept? (Photo by Eirik Rief)

By Anil Upadhyaya

India has experienced major environmental damage in the past decades, especially in urban areas. One such damage comes from poor air quality, the result of environmentally unfriendly transport.

[more=Read more]

Though some cities such as New Delhi and Mumbai have attempted successful policy initiatives to combat air pollution, most major urban areas in India have met with little success. In response, the Indian government has combined the country's intensive agriculture with the need for pollution reduction in a major push for biofuels.

As one of the largest sugar producers in the world, India has the capacity to produce alcohol for ethanol from molasses, a major byproduct of the sugar industry. Nevertheless, ethanol use in India is still very low, with very few national projects set up to produce ethanol. The present capacity for ethanol use in the country is 3.2 billion liters per year but the current production only reaches 1.3 billion liters. To encourage the use of ethanol, the Indian government has mandated the use of 5% ethanol-gasoline blends in nine Indian states and four territories. Much of the enthusiasm for ethanol comes from the fact that it has been used successfully in other countries and can be easily blended with gasoline. Ethanol-blended gasoline also reduces dependence on imported oil and avoids toxic substances present in gasoline, such as benzene.

The Indian government is also partnering with states to promote biodiesel. Produced from oil pressed from the seeds of plants or from waste vegetable oil, biodiesel avoids the toxic sulphur compounds found in regular diesel, and its production offers employment opportunities for the rural poor. In the state of Uttar Pradesh, biodiesel refineries are being implemented with funding from the Indian government and a major Indian oil company. This public-private partnership may be an indicator that biofuels will become an important component of the Indian economy in years to come.

Anil Upadhyaya is a journalist based in New Delhi who covers South Asian affairs.
Originally published March 2009. ]]> Sat, 20 Jun 2009 02:09:10 GMT http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/comments.php?id=34#comments http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=34 http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=33
As nations have begun to assemble ever more advanced systems of weaponry in a quest to ensure military supremacy, the risk of catastrophic loss of life is constant- but this risk goes for beyond human populations. From the gasses of World War I to the Agent Orange of Vietnam, the practice of war and its willingness to despoil the environment has raised the question if it is truly possible to defend a nation while defending a planet. (Photo Courtesy of Ronald Haeberle)

By Dr. Arthur Westing

As human numbers keep increasing - and with associated human needs and desires increasing even more rapidly - the impact of those increases on the global biosphere is becoming ever more worrisome and ever more urgently in need of amelioration.

[more=Read more]

The civil sector of society accounts for a major part of that impact largely through the over-exploitation of the world's renewable natural resources (agricultural and rangeland soils, trees, ocean fishes, etc.) on the one hand, and through the discharge into the global atmosphere of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases responsible for anthropogenic climate change (global warming, etc.) on the other. However, the military sector of society is also a substantial part of the problem, especially in wartime, but also in peacetime.

Regrettably, the pursuit of war remains one of the abiding characteristics of humankind. War is by its very nature and intent a deadly and destructive pastime. So it comes as no surprise that warfare inevitably leads to enemy fatalities (human, livestock, wildlife) as well as to disruption of the ground on which it is fought, whether urban/industrial, agricultural, or more or less natural. It is hoped that in highlighting those environmental impacts ways can be found to minimize them. This is a good time to do so since public awareness of the ever worsening environmental deterioration is spreading rapidly throughout the world.

The high-explosive munitions often employed so lavishly in modern times are in general aimed at enemy personnel and infrastructure, with the inevitable associated environmental damage for the most part unavoidable, and referred to by the military as collateral damage. Heavy off-road vehicles (tanks, trucks, etc.) lead to further local environmental disruption. Moreover, the "necessities" of war lead to environmental damage beyond the battlefield through the construction of base camps, fortifications, lines of communication, and so forth. Armed forces also place extended demands upon timber, food, and feed well beyond the actual war zones, with such increased exploitation inevitably subject to relaxed environmental safeguards and thus exacerbated environmental deterioration.

Armed forces expend huge amounts of fuel during peacetime and voracious levels during wartime, thereby contributing inordinately to the dangerously excess carbon dioxide being discharged into the atmosphere. Moreover, on the high seas, naval vessels are by international law and practice essentially exempt from the normal environmental restrictions that apply to merchant shipping, whether during wartime or peacetime. Pre-war (between-war) military activities such as the manufacture and testing of munitions as well as the disposal of obsolete ones, training exercises and maneuvers, and routine deployment and patrolling all lead to environmental disruption. Finally, displaced persons during and following a war often overload urban sanitation facilities in their own or neighboring states or else tend to do considerable environmental damage in and around rurally situated refugee centers.

Beyond the inevitable collateral environmental damage occurring during warfare outlined above, the pursuit of war may additionally involve the intentional decimation of field or forest as a specific means of denying an enemy the benefits of such central components of the environment. The benefits being denied the enemy might include access to water, to food, to feed, and to construction materials. Often even more important, the denied benefits could include denial of access to cover or sanctuary. These usually take the form of heavy and repeated bombing and shelling; incendiary attacks, site conditions permitting; the placement of mines or cluster-bomb submunitions, whether manually or by remote delivery; mechanical clearing with heavy tractors; or flooding. Indeed, all of these approaches have been employed in the past with greater or lesser military success.

The intentional disruption of the environment for military purposes is generally called environmental warfare, and is often accomplished through repeated and/or massive attacks upon the environment under siege. However, under certain circumstances the intended environmental attacks can be accomplished through a relatively minor expenditure of destructive energy that in turn leads to hugely successful military impact plus inevitably immense environmental damage. Such more "elegant" environmental warfare involving the release of so-called dangerous forces can be accomplished through the breaching of a dam or dike to produce massive flooding or the bombing of nuclear or chemical facilities to produce widespread release of noxious airborne substances.

The Second Indochina War of 1961-1975 provides a major example of intentional forest and agricultural destruction by US forces through massive chemical poisoning and equally massive bombing, and secondarily through tractor clearing - all carried out primarily in order to deny the enemy cover and sustenance. The Persian Gulf War of 1991 provides a major example of the intentional release into the terrestrial and marine environments by Iraqi forces of huge amounts of both liquid oil and smoke from burning oil, actions perpetrated primarily in order to harass and debilitate the enemy. The Second Sino-Japanese War of 1937-1945, World War II of 1939-1945, and the Korean War of 1950-1953, all provide major examples of intentional flooding of extraordinarily wide areas, the first by Chinese forces and the second two by US forces, and all primarily in order to destroy industrial and agricultural facilities or capabilities.

The employment of chemical, biological, or especially nuclear weapons - that particular group of weapons often collectively referred to as weapons of mass destruction, and their employment as "unconventional" warfare - can be extraordinarily destructive not only of enemy personnel and infrastructure, but also of the environment. Some major powers might argue that any resulting environmental devastation from the use of nuclear or other weapon of mass destruction would "merely" be an unintentional collateral effect. However, both the likelihood and likely severity of the environmental impact would not allow of such a disclaimer. That is to say, the employment of weapons of mass destruction is ipso facto a form of environmental warfare. World War I of 1914-1918 and the Second Indochina War of 1961-1975 provide major examples of the intensive use of chemical weapons - in the first instance by British, French, German, and US forces, primarily against enemy personnel, and secondarily against enemy livestock; and in the second instance by US forces, primarily against enemy trees and crops, and secondarily against enemy personnel.

For better or worse, the world is now divided into more than 190 sovereign states (sovereign nations). It has long been taken for granted that one of the central rights and obligations of each of those states is to prepare and provide for the security of its citizenry. Such national security has traditionally been interpreted to mean the state's obligation to protect its citizens both from domestic dangers to life and limb and from outside aggression, the former generally accomplished through a police force, and the latter through an army. However, especially since the end of World War II this circumscribed notion of a state's obligation to provide its inhabitants national military security has been slowly (and unevenly) expanding to additionally embrace the need for a state to provide its citizenry such newly recognized human rights as access to adequate space, food, housing, jobs, education, health care, old-age care, judicial recourse, and so forth. Provision for that cluster of human rights, referred to as national social security, has over the years been adopted little by little by a growing number of states as a legitimate extension or component of the national security it has long been tacitly obligated to provide, with the implicit understanding that the latter could not be achieved without the former.

In time, it has become ever more apparent that the attainment of national security requires more of a state than achieving a combination of military security and social security. As human numbers and their needs and desires have expanded in recent decades, the inexorable demands upon the national environment, the high seas, and the remainder of the global biosphere have become ever more problematic. It has thus become obvious that in order for a state to achieve national social security for its citizenry it must simultaneously achieve a sustainable natural resource base - that is to say, it becomes necessary to further expand the concept of national security to include as well environmental security. The achievement of environmental security is, of course, additionally necessitated in its own right in order to ensure the long-term well-being of the plants and animals with which we share this finite globe.

The necessary environmental security must rest on a firm basis of the sustainable exploitation of renewable natural resources and the frugal exploitation of the non-renewable ones. It must further rest unambiguously upon the sustainable discard of waste products (solid, liquid, and gaseous), upon the release of pollutants into the environment that pose no threat to human or animal (livestock, wildlife) health, and upon the setting aside as sacrosanct some modest fraction of the global biosphere (including representative areas of each major biome and adequate portions of the world's several major species hot spots). Moreover, it must soon become quite clear that for those states not able to provide their citizenry with environmental security on their own, they must be able to do so in cooperation with other states regionally or even further afield. This now all-encompassing national security that derives from an intertwined relationship among military security, social security, and environmental security has been referred to as comprehensive human security.

The global biosphere upon which all human and other life on earth ultimately depends is being ever more seriously over-utilized, both in terms of extractions and discharges - one poignant indication of such biospheric abuse being the increasing numbers of plant and animal extinctions. Achievement and subsequent long-term maintenance of environmental security is thus becoming an ever more elusive goal for most states and for the world at large. The military sector of society of necessity contributes to this dilemma, more or less in proportion to its contribution to a state's gross domestic product (GDP). During wartime - and there are always a dozen or more wars in progress throughout the world at any one time - the undermining of environmental security can become serious owing to the collateral environmental damage inflicted upon the environment from the conventional means of warfare alluded to above, such impact exacerbated by the truly profligate consumption of oil by armed forces. And the impact can become truly grievous when armed forces resort to means of environmental warfare.

It no longer seems necessary to alert the general public, nationally or internationally, or even many of the world's governments to the debilitating impact of global warming and other rapidly increasing assaults on the global biosphere - a biosphere on which we all depend for our day-to-day well-being and ultimate survival. However, what is still necessary is to make it eminently clear to all - to the citizenry, legislative bodies, governments, and armed forces - that environmental warfare should simply not be tolerated in the future to exacerbate this tragedy. To that end, there is the urgent need to find means to accomplish this formidable challenge.

Dr. Arthur Westing is a forest ecologist who has long studied the military's impact on the environment. He was instrumental in calling for the end of military use of pesticides during the Vietnam War. He is a United Nations Environment Programme Global 500 Laureate.
]]> Sat, 20 Jun 2009 02:07:08 GMT http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/comments.php?id=33#comments http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=33 http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=32
Photo Courtesy of Tylerdurden1/Flickr.

Sultan Haji Hassanal Waddaulah announced in late October that he would sponsor a major environmental conference in Brunei in 2010. As he announced to the Brunei Times, he would seek out promising young scientists from both Europe and Asia to attend the meeting and discuss steps toward environmental protection.

[more=Read more]

Announced at an Asia-Europe Meeting summit in Beijing, the conference will focus on the impact of climate change on tropical forest regions. Brunei, which shares a small section of the Malaysian island of Borneo, seems to be a likely figure to emerge as host, as a recent estimate said that 79% of Brunei's land mass was protected by government decree. Much of this environmental largesse can be traced back to the country's rich oil reserves which have helped to support the small kingdom and are expected to remain profitable for 20 more years. Nonetheless, the Sultan appears to recognize the need to tackle global warming and its associated carbon emissions, and endorsed the Beijing Declaration on Sustainable Development which emerged from the Asia-Europe Meeting, a document which showed strong support for renewable and clean forms of energy.

The meeting should be a clear sign to its Asian island neighbors that business as usual may have to change. Indonesia was recognized in 2007 as the country with the highest rate of deforestation in the world, with 4,447,896 acres of forest lost per year from 2000-2005. This represents a 2 percent chunk of forest lost every year.

-Equatorial Press Staff Report.
Originally published February 2009. ]]> Sat, 20 Jun 2009 02:04:14 GMT http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/comments.php?id=32#comments http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=32 http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=31
Photo Courtesy of Abigel.

Vietnam and Laos opened 2009 by signing an international cooperation agreement, much of which dealt with environmental issues across their borders.

[more=Read more]

As reported by the Vietnam News Agency, the two countries agreed to a sharing of technical and economic advice, as well as something slightly more practical: Vietnam donated aid of $18.3 million to Laos, with Laos agreeing to train 30 Vietnamese students at vocational schools.

A major component of the agreement was the sharing of environmental information and cooperation on mutual public works projects to jumpstart the two countries' economies while also improving agriculture, mining, and environmental protection. Ecotourism will likely enter the mix as well when Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam partner again for the tourism campaign "Three Nations-One Destination."

Laos has long been a trading partner of Vietnam, relying on the country for industrial advice. In 2008, Vietnam became the number one foreign investor in Laos, helping to construct hydropower plants and mines.

-Equatorial Press Staff Report.
Originally published February 2009. ]]> Sat, 20 Jun 2009 02:02:51 GMT http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/comments.php?id=31#comments http://www.equatorialpress.com/pages/blog.php?id=31