No place for tuna to hide

Nilesh Goundar, The Fiji Times 14 May 08;

THERE are far less tuna in the sea than there used to be.

What we see now is tuna being pursued with more sophisticated technology and there really is no place for fish to hide any longer.

That is the observation of Callum Roberts, Professor of Marine Conservation at the University of York in the United Kingdom.

Dire words of warning by the Pacific's very own marine scientists are still not being heeded by those responsible for managing the region's valuable tuna resource.

So Greenpeace is defending pockets of international waters in the Pacific in a bid to have them declared marine reserves and off limits to greedy tuna fishers. Our activities at sea have already seen four foreign fishing vessels leave the area that Greenpeace is defending.

Colloquially known as "donut holes", "high seas pockets" or "Pacific Commons", these areas of international waters belong to everyone.

There are three distinct donut holes in the Western and Central Pacific Ocean (WCPO) that should be made into marine reserves.

They have great ecological importance and face a number of threats, including overfishing and potentially mining.

They are entirely bound by the Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZs) of the surrounding island nations Papua New Guinea, Federated States of Micronesia, the Solomon Islands, Tuvalu, Kiribati, Nauru, Marshall Islands, Fiji, French Polynesia and the Cook Islands.

What's a donut hole

Well, a donut hole is an ungoverned space surrounded by waters of Pacific Island states.

A cleverly positioned vessel fishing illegally in a Pacific Island country's waters could slip into a donut hole every time a surveillance vessel or plane came by and would not have to pay a single cent to Pacific Islanders.

Tuna has given the Pacific people food, jobs, education, roads, health care and life, and now faces an imminent crisis.

Since 2001, Pacific fisheries scientists have been warning that strong measures are needed to conserve tuna stocks.

Despite these warnings, over-fishing and destructive fishing methods continue to threaten the Pacific's fragile ocean environment and the tuna that depend on it.

Today, more than half the world's tuna is fished from the Pacific.

Too many ships are fishing for too few fish and bigeye and yellowfin tuna stocks are under threat.

While over-fishing continues, the best distant water fishing nations can manage is to haggle over the science!

Many boats fish without observers on board, satellites can't weigh the fish in the holds, and many island governments only have one patrol boat to cover a huge area of ocean.

Marine reserves tabu ocean zones

Marine reserves are highly protected areas which are off-limit to activities such as fishing and mining.

They are the most powerful tool available for the conservation of ocean life.

Marine reserves protect breeding areas, ocean habitats and fish that have been targeted by unsustainable fishing.

The three marine reserves Greenpeace has proposed cover extensive areas that include biologically rich undersea mountains, migration routes of tuna species, habitat of endangered leatherback turtles and breeding areas of skipjack, albacore and bigeye tuna.

About 75 per cent of the world's fisheries are exploited up to and beyond the point where they can be regarded as sustainable.

According to global fisheries expert Dr Daniel Pauly, in the future people will be eating jellyfish, because that is all that will be left, unless we act now.

Since early April, Greenpeace activists on board the MV Esperanza have been defending the Pacific Commons.

Lately, five Pacific Islanders joined the crew to challenge fishing vessels in the Pacific donut holes and defend them as no-take marine reserves.

These intrepid oceans defenders have found eight industrial fishing vessels, all from foreign countries, contributing to the overfishing of the Pacific's yellowfin and bigeye tuna.

On April 17, The Olympus owned by Korea's largest tuna company, Dongwon Industries Co. Ltd, a significant global player in the tuna industry was told by Esperanza's ocean defenders to leave the Pacific Commons immediately.

The same day, activists confiscated a device used by purse seiners to attract tuna and intensify overfishing called a "fish aggregation device" (FAD).

On April 21, the ocean defenders, at the invitation of the captain, boarded the Taiwanese vessel Nian Sheng 3 when it was found in international waters.

The Esperanza's crew then peacefully escorted the vessel out of the Pacific Commons and into Solomon Islands waters where the Taiwanese vessel had a license to fish.

Three days later, the Ocean defenders took action against the US purse seiner, Cape Finisterre, in the Pacific Commons.

Purse seiners are responsible for two-thirds of the total tuna catch in the Western and Central Pacific Ocean.

The ocean defenders painted the side of the vessel with the words Tuna overkill' and held a banner reading Marine reserves now'.

The fishing vessel was asked to leave the area immediately. Just last weekend, north of the the Solomon Islands, Greenpeace ocean defenders freed sharks, tuna, marlin and an endangered Olive Ridley turtle from the hooks of a Taiwanese longline vessel fishing in the Pacific Commons.

We encountered the Taiwanese longliner, Ho Tsai Fa 18, while it was hauling tens of kilometres of fishing line. This vessel has a record of a controversial landing of shark fins.

The activists asked the captain to release all marine life hooked on the lines and painted Pirate' on the hull of the ship. Large foreign companies which are major players in the Pacific tuna industry own ships such as the Ho Tsai Fa 18.

Their uncontrolled fishing activities are destroying tuna stocks by overfishing and killing large numbers of other marine life with their destructive fishing methods. But the action did not stop in the Pacific Commons; it even went as far as Brussels.

There, at the European Seafood Exposition, the future of Pacific and international tuna was vigorously defended by 80 Greenpeace ocean defenders from 15 countries.

The Greenpeace activists closed the stands of five large tuna suppliers in a bid to save Pacific tuna stocks.

They covered the stands with fishing nets, chained themselves to the stands and put up banners in 13 languages saying: Time and tuna running out'.

A message was broadcast through the exhibition halls urging visitors to buy only sustainably caught seafood.

Greenpeace called on the fishing companies to stop trading in threatened bluefin, yellowfin and bigeye tuna and other unsustainably caught tuna until stocks recover.

Among these companies are the major Pacific tuna players Dongwon industries, Dongwon F&B, Mitsubishi and Moon Marine.

If the industry does not shift toward sustainable seafood there will simply be no tuna left to trade and their businesses will be closed forever.

The Pacific supplies about 60 per cent of the world's tuna, worth more than $US3billion. Pacific nations are being ripped off.

They only receive 5-6 per cent of the value of the catch caught by foreign vessels in their national waters.

This is because of the unfair and unsustainable agreements negotiated by foreign companies and countries for access to fish for tuna in their waters.

It's do or die for Pacific tuna stocks and Pacific Islanders need to come together as they did at the 2007 Pacific Island Forum leaders meeting and move toward halving their catch and become instrumental in turning the Pacific Commons into marine reserves.

Turning the tide

The people of the Pacific have the right to say how our precious marine resources will be managed.

It is time to stop our resources from being stolen with minimal or no benefit to island nations.

We must stand together and support the call for new marine reserves in the Pacific commons areas and an easy way to get involved is to enter the Greenpeace competition to give these significant areas a name.

Anyone can enter the competition just send your inspiring name for any of the three areas and say why you have chosen that name for our Pacific heritage.

Entries can be posted to Greenpeace Australia Pacific, Private Mail Bag, Suva or email: greenpeace@connect.com.fj

Nilesh Goundar is the Greenpeace Australia Pacific oceans team leader.

Read more!

Myanmar biofuel drive deepens food shortage

Griffin Shea, Yahoo News 13 May 08;

Myanmar is struggling to feed its people in the aftermath of Cyclone Nargis -- in part because the regime has been forcing some farmers to stop growing rice in a plan to produce biofuel instead.

In 2005 the military government's leader Than Shwe ordered a national drive to plant jatropha, a poisonous nut he hoped would be the cornerstone of a state industry that would capitalise on growing world demand for biofuels.

Taking a page from the textbook of planned centralised economies, he issued a quota for jatropha production for every township in the country -- even in cities, where people were forced to grow it in their yards and along roads.

"It was the national duty," said Sai Khur Hseng, a Myanmar exile who has extensively studied the government's biofuel programme. "Everybody had to plant it."

A flowering bush which produces a nut that is poisonous to humans and animals but high in oil, jatropha is usually planted in arid regions where little else can survive.

But in fertile regions such as the southern Irrawaddy delta, where the cyclone hit, Than Shwe's edict meant that fields producing rice and other foods were torn up, said Monique Skidmore of the Australian National University said.

"This has meant that people have either had to not plant paddy or pull up paddy" to grow the crop, she said.

In some cases, the military actually confiscated land from farmers to grow the nuts, said Dave Mathieson, a researcher with Human Rights Watch.

"It's just absurd," Mathieson said.

"In the rural areas, it's the military that's responsible for meeting the quota. So they've just been seizing land and ripping out food crops to grow jatropha."

But after the crop started to grow, farmers discovered a bitter truth -- they could not sell it.

The government has not bought the jatropha nuts because it hadn't set up any facilities to process biofuel, Skidmore said.

"They don't have even the sort of tanks and trucks and warehousing and distribution to handle" biofuel production, she said.

The fiasco has now turned to tragedy for the people of Myanmar, which was once one of the world's top exporters of rice.

Decades of central economic planning along with other autocratic policies have made it difficult for the regime to feed its people.

Even before the cyclone, the UN's World Food Programme estimated that 10 percent of Myanmar's more than 50 million people did not have enough to eat.

The cyclone, which left at least 62,000 people dead or missing, has now further imperilled the nation's food supply because so much of the fertile delta has been turned into swampland by the storm.

The United Nations has warned that the country, where up to two million victims of the cyclone face immediate needs for food, water and shelter, could face food shortages for years to come.

"This is the rice basket of the country, and clearly damage has been done to the paddy fields," said Richard Horsey, of the UN's emergency relief arm.

"Some ... have been inundated with salt water, others flooded and stocks of seed for planting destroyed. So it will be an issue, and there are agricultural assessments under way to determine the full extent of the problem."

Read more!

South Korea steps up fight against worst bird flu outbreak

Channel NewsAsia 13 May 08;

SEOUL : South Korea is to disinfect all poultry farms nationwide to combat its worst outbreak of bird flu, the agriculture ministry said Tuesday.

In the capital Seoul, all 15,000 chickens, ducks and other fowl -- including pet birds in school aviaries -- have been culled after a second case of the potentially deadly H5N1 virus was confirmed there.

Nationwide, more than 6.8 million chickens and ducks have been slaughtered since the latest outbreak began around April 1. But the ministry has reported 40 cases of bird flu at 31 places nationwide.

An association of poultry breeders estimated losses at 500 billion won (US$478 million).

The agriculture ministry said it would restrict the distribution and sale of live poultry for human consumption. It has already banned the butchering of chickens and other poultry at traditional markets.

"The government will take strong steps to stop the spread of bird flu, which is causing enormous damage to our poultry industry," an agriculture official told AFP.

The H5N1 strain has also spread to Busan, the country's second largest city, where officials plan to cull some 4,000 birds.

Police have also stepped up a crackdown on smugglers selling infected birds.

They are questioning six poultry breeders and distributors who have sold thousands of culled ducks for dog-food and hundreds of ducks from infected farms to chicken food stores, Yonhap news agency said.

No human infections have been confirmed in South Korea even though the H5N1 strain has killed more than 240 people worldwide since late 2003.

In the country's 2003-2004 outbreak 5.28 million birds were culled while a 2006-2007 outbreak resulted in 2.8 million birds being destroyed.

- AFP/vm

Read more!

Sea change possible with people power

Jonathan Wootliff, Jakarta Post 13 May 08;

There's a war being waged in the oceans of Indonesia with death and destruction to be found along the vast coastline of this country.

Cyanide and explosives are being used by unscrupulous fisherman to extract sea life for commercial gain.

Trawlers from Taiwan, China and other foreign parts are stealing the nation's fish. Some of the country's most precious marine life is being threatened with extinction.

Invaluable mangroves are being ripped out and replaced with shrimp farms. An alarming amount of precious species living in our oceans are endangered. Coral reefs, rich in biodiversity, are being destroyed.

There can be no doubt that healthy marine life is essential to this country, not only for the sake of the environment.

The oceans provide an important source of food, give livelihoods to millions, and bring in much-needed income for the Indonesian economy.

As the world's largest archipelago comprising nearly 14,000 islands, Indonesia has a readily-available source of protein for domestic consumption in its waters.

Fish is the main food staple for the millions of Indonesians living along the coasts and an estimated quarter of the entire population is financially dependent on fishing.

Sales of fish products to overseas markets contribute around US$2 billion annually.

The Maritime Affairs and Fisheries Ministry, created just five years ago, is taking steps to tackle these problems. But the future of Indonesia's marine biodiversity remains severely threatened.

While supporting growth in the industry, the government recognizes the need to protect marine life to ensure its long-term sustainability. But it is a huge challenge.

Environmental non-governmental organizations have been leading the call for sustainable fishing. They warn that short-term gains threaten the future of Indonesia's fisheries.

Key to their success is targeting the private sector, and particularly the international markets. NGOs have taken their cause overseas, to the United States and Europe where Indonesian fish products are exported.

High profile campaigns are helping to encourage fish buyers, suppliers and retailers to demand sustainably harvested products. Appeals have been made to powerful retailers like the US giant, Wal-Mart, to ensure that they only buy responsibly-sourced produce.

The Sustainable Fisheries Partnership (SFP) is a new organization that is breaking ground in the world of sustainable seafood and marine and freshwater conservation.

It aims to enable leading private-sector stakeholders to be proactive in the management of unsustainable sources of seafood, and help them to buy sustainable products.

"We need to get the international market to agree not to buy unsustainably produced seafood from Indonesia," says the SFP's Jakarta-based chief operating officer, Sari Surjadi.

"If the demand is there from the lucrative overseas markets for sustainable products, then the producer has no choice but to supply it," she adds.

As a veteran of the environmental NGO community, having previously worked for a decade for the Indonesian arm of Conservation International, and witnessed many destructive fishing practices, Sari is now seeing signs that the market is becoming more responsible.

In Indonesia, the SFP is focusing its initial efforts on the challenge of protecting the future viability of the blue swimming crab.

The SFP is making headway in getting the export industry to reject egg-bearing female crabs and ones that are too young, which are all-too-often being scooped from the seas.

But there's a long way to go. As marine habitat destruction abounds, more of Indonesia's magnificent marine species are facing extinction, especially the grouper, reef fish and turtle.

And the viral-like spread of fish farms, inappropriately located along some shorelines, is destroying mangroves that play a vital role in protecting coastal communities from battering from the seas. Indeed, there is evidence that the mangroves saved communities from devastation in the tsunami.

If we don't respect marine life it will disappear, thus depriving people of jobs, making coastal communities vulnerable to the elements, and irreversibly destroying our rich biodiversity.

The message has yet to resonate with ordinary Indonesians. It's important for citizens to vote with their feet. The time has come for Indonesians to ask more questions about how their seafood is being harvested and produced.

Ask questions when you buy. Can the supermarkets and restaurants assure you that their fish products have been sustainably sourced? If in doubt, why not leave it out.

People power can save our marine life, safeguard jobs and protect coastal communities.

We are the foot soldiers in the war to save our seas. For the sake of our environment and our economy, we cannot afford to lose.

Jonathan Wootliff is an independent sustainable development consultant specializing in the building of productive relationships between companies and NGOs. He can be contacted at jonathan@wootliff.com

Read more!

Best of our wild blogs: 13 May 08

Stop demolishing, start integrating
by Tan Mingjuan on yawning bread

Big, Beautiful and Bizarre: low tide highlights
a roundup of some of the sightings during the last week of spring low tides on the singapore celebrates our reefs blog

Corals and Climate Change
on the wildasia website

Where do birds go when they die?
on the bird ecology blog

May Day Dugong Ambassadors Outreach at Chek Jawa
in the news on the pulau ubin stories blog

Green Tip #12: on furniture
Select refurbished, recycled or eco-friendly furniture and building materials on the AsiaIsGreen blog

Cyrene Synaptid in action
video clip on the sgbeachbum blog

Cyrene cucumber in action
video clip on the sgbeachbum blog

Moon snail feeding
a video clip on the manta blog

Short-tailed Babbler
on the bird ecology blog

Recycling at Schools
on the SG Recycle blog

Read more!

Dubai's "The World" project

Worldly pursuits in Dubai
No doubt about it - The World in Dubai belongs to the rich and famous. This cluster of real estate is shaped like a map of Earth
Cara Van Miriah, Straits Times 13 May 08;

YOU can buy Australia, New Zealand, Shanghai or even the Antarctica, and develop it into a private kingdom.

But first, you have to be invited to purchase this exclusive piece of real estate located 4km off the coast of Dubai - The World, a spectacular man-made archipelago shaped like a map of Earth.

Every year, 50 invitations are sent to businessmen, celebrities and members of royalty.

Nakheel, the United Arab Emirates-owned property developer behind the project, wants to turn it into the world's first island community for the elite.

Covering 931ha, The World is twice the size of Sentosa, which has a total area of 463ha.

According to Mr Christopher O'Donnell, Nakheel's chief executive officer, half of the 300 islands with names such as Ireland and Shanghai, have been sold.

Although there had been talk that celebrities such as British singer Rod Stewart, footballer David Beckham and Hollywood couple Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie have each bought an island here, Nakheel did not confirm any of these purchases.

Instead, the confirmed buyers include Chinese businessman Bin Hu who paid 103 million dirhams (S$38 million) for Shanghai island with plans to build a resort; Kuwait-based investment group The Investment Dar and Efad Holdings, which will transform Australasia into a resort with private residences; and Singapore-based firm Cinnovation Group, which will build a 730 million-dirham resort and spa on Nova Island.

Each island, with an average size of 300,000 sq ft, is priced between 73.5 and 183.6 million dirhams, says Nakheel spokesman Aaron Richardson.

He declined to reveal the exact cost of the multi-billion-dollar project. With The World's barren islands, buyers will have to factor in other costs, such as building a house, ferry terminal and desalination plant.

Currently, only one island that is part of Greenland is fully developed with a three-storey glass-framed mansion, equipped with water, sewage and electrical systems. Mr Richardson would only reveal that the island belongs to an 'influential local family'.

According to locals, it is believed to be owned by Sheikh Mohammed Rashid Al Maktoum, the vice-president and Prime Minister of the UAE and ruler of Dubai.

He is also the man behind Nakheel's other island developments, such as The Palm Jumeriah, the smallest of the three artificial palm-shaped islands along the coast of Dubai.

These island developments, along with the skyscrapers rising rapidly from the desert plains, have reshaped Dubai in recent years.

The remnants of the old city, though, is tucked away at the Bur Dubai, known for its winding alleys, beautiful palaces, mosques and old homes.

Just like the old days, the bustling local markets or souks see merchants selling spices, gold, silk, fishes and textile.

As developers compete to build the world's tallest supertower in this fast-growing city, mega-resort Atlantis will open at the 560ha Palm Jumeirah in September.

Located on the Palm's crescent, the facilities will include an Aquaventure water park and a 1,539-room resort.

On the Palm, there are also waterfront condos and double-storey villas, which are located on the 16 'fronds'.

According to Edward Sands Towers properties, which specialises in the Palm's residences, a 1,184 sq ft one-bedroom seaview apartment is priced at 3 million dirhams, while a four-bedroom garden villa, spanning 5,000 sq ft, costs 15 million dirhams.

Homeowners come from China, South America, Britain, the United States and even Nepal.

So far, more than 4,000 properties have been snapped up, with 2,000 families now living on the island.

But with over 5,500 residential units, and more to come from third-party developers plus 30 new hotels, the island is in danger of becoming congested.

The construction of the Palm also sparked environmental concerns. The continuous breakwater was subsequently modified to create gaps on either side to allow tidal movement to oxygenate the water within and prevent it from stagnating.

Mr O'Donnell tells Life!: 'During the planning stages, we have local, regional and international institutions to prepare a comprehensive environmental impact assessment of the marine environment.

'The creation of new landscapes and seascapes promotes the existence of marine life.'

And two F-100 Super Sabre fighter jets have been stripped and sunk near the island to create an artificial reef, intended to encourage marine life.

At the end of this year, Nakheel will be developing yet another man-made island called The Universe.

Spanning 3,000ha of reclaimed land below The World, it will form a cluster of islands in the shape of the solar system. It is expected to have residential units and hotels.

Asked what would follow next, Mr O'Donnell jests: 'We have already conquered The World and next, The Universe. These are icons of Dubai.'

Making of The World
Straits Times 13 May 08;

Design: Map of Earth

Number of islands: 300

Size: 931ha (twice the size of Sentosa)

Reclamation: 320 million cubic m of sand dredged from the sea, plus 34 billion kg of rocks to construct 27km of breakwater

New coastline: 232km

Reclamation period: Five years

Types of real estate: Private homes, estate homes, luxury resorts and community islands, plus retail and dining options

Number of islands sold: Half Price of each island: From 73.5 million dirhams (S$28 million) to 183.6 million dirhams

Average size of each island: About 300,000 sq ft, about 100m between each island

Island facilities:

# Marinas to service estates and customers of resort islands

# Transportation: Helicopter, seaplanes and boats. Journey to and from the mainland takes about 10 to 15 minutes each way

# Coming up: Centralised system to provide water, power and sewage disposal

# Source: www.theworld.ae, Nakheel

The Palm, his island paradise
Before The World, there was The Palm Jumeirah. Fanned out like a palm tree, it is a development that boasts luxury living
Cara Van Miriah, Straits Times 13 May 08;

BRITON Andrew Dukes could have bought a luxurious holiday home in Monaco or France.

But the 44-year-old retired businessman bought not one but two beachfront villas in Dubai, where temperatures can soar to a sweltering 50 deg C during summer.

Mr Dukes, who used to run an animation company based in Britain and Dubai specialising in electronic greeting cards, paid 5.6 million dirhams (S$2 million) for a five-bedroom villa at The Palm Jumeirah in 2006.

In February, he forked out 10 million dirhams for a four-bedroom seafront villa nearby.

Both properties, spanning 5,500 sq ft each, are located along one of the 16 'fronds' of the palm-shaped island.

Mr Duke tells Life!: 'I heard about the villas from my friends a few years ago. At that time, I was considering a holiday home in Monaco because of its proximity to London.

'But Dubai is a better choice because it's a tax-free city. It is also cosmopolitan with a large expat community.'

The Yorkshire-born entrepreneur, who now lives in his second villa, was among the first to move onto the Palm in February last year, according to its developer Nakheel.

He recalls, with a laugh: 'I didn't even see the villa before I bought it in mid-2006. No one was allowed on the Palm until last January. But Dubai is known for its pristine beaches and I like the privacy the Palm offers.'

Mr Dukes' homemaker wife Jane and two daughters - Georgia, 11, and Mariella, nine - live in London and spend about five weeks of the year with him in Dubai.

He says they had initially planned to move as a family but have put that plan on hold for now.

So far, he has spent about 430,600 dirhams furnishing his first villa, which has a modern and colourful interior.

The second villa, which has a contemporary design, is still under refurbishment.

When asked why he bought the second property, he points to The Palm Jumeirah's positioning as a major tourist attraction.

He says he bought the waterfront villa so he could lease his first villa to holiday-makers. He advertises it on his website www.dubai-holiday-villa.com.

Last year, he rented out his villa for 15 weeks when he was visiting his family in London.

With rental rates averaging around 35,900 dirhams for six days, and 1.7 million dirhams for a year, he could recoup his initial investment of 5.6 million dirhams in less than four years.

He says: 'The properties have 12 to 14 per cent annual returns. When the theme parks and hotels are completed in the next few years, the property prices will appreciate even more.'

But the Briton says he has no intention to sell his villas for a tidy profit.

He explains: 'It's a wonderful experience waking up to a beautiful beach every morning. Although it can get very warm between June and August, Dubai has a cool season from September.

'I have no reason to relocate anywhere else in the world. It's a paradise here.'

Palm facts and figures
Straits Times 13 May 08;

Design: Shape of a palm tree, consisting of a trunk, a crown with 16 fronds, and a surrounding crescent island that forms an 11km-long breakwater

Size: 560ha (equivalent to over 600 football fields)

Reclamation: 94 million cubic m of sand and 7 billion kg of rocks

New coastline: 78km

Reclamation period: Over five years

Types of real estate: Villas, garden homes, canal cove town homes and shoreline apartment buildings

Total number of residential properties: Over 5,500

Properties sold: More than 75 per cent

Price of property: From 4.4 million dirhams (S$1.6 million) for three-bedroom seaview apartments to 15 million dirhams for double-storey four-bedroom villas

Island facilities: Beaches, marinas, themed parks, 30 hotels, restaurants, cafes and retail outlets

Transportation: Car and boats

Eco features: Two F-100 Super Sabre fighter jets have been stripped and sunk near The Palm Jumeirah to create an artificial reef, intended to encourage marine life

Coming up: A 5.4km-long monorail is being built on the island, which will transport 2,000 to 3,000 people to and from the island every hour

# Source: Nakheel, Edward Sand Towers

Related article
Pitfalls in paradise: why Palm Jumeirah is struggling to live up to the hype
Low-paid workers and villa gripes cast a cloud over 'eighth wonder of the world' in Dubai by Robert Booth, The Guardian 26 Apr 08;

Read more!

Visually handicapped kids get a feel of nature

Lee Pei Qi, Straits Times 13 May 08

FOR 21 students - most of them at least partly blind - a visit to the mangrove wetlands in Pulau Ubin yesterday gave them a chance to touch the sea creatures they could not see.

Goh Wei Bin, 12 and partially blind from birth, felt what it was like to have a hermit crab crawl across his palm. And Sakinah Zainal, also 12 and partially blind, touched the rough skin of a starfish for the first time.

Both were thrilled.

Wei Bin, a self-confessed science enthusiast with limited vision, said he had never come this close to marine animals like starfish, sea cucumbers and sand dollars before.

He said: 'I like to touch and feel all these things because I cannot see clearly.'

The pair were in the group, aged between nine and 16 and hailing from the Singapore School for the Visually Handicapped, who visited the island with guides and volunteers.

The jaunt, sponsored by the Singapore Press Holdings Foundation and initiated by the National Parks Board, was part of a Special Projects to Understand Nature or Sun Club programme organised for children with special needs.

Sun Club has 60 such nature trips lined up this year for about 1,200 children.

Seven schools are now in the club, with four more due to join it this year.

Read more!

4 cats found dead - 3 with stab wounds

Straits Times 13 May 08;

ANOTHER four cats have been found dead in Pasir Ris, bringing the death toll to seven felines since May 2.

Of the four, three were found in Pasir Ris Town Park yesterday, within 50m of one another and with abdominal puncture wounds.

The fourth cat was found nearby, in an open field near Block 536. It had a fractured jaw.

It had no other observable wounds, and it is not known whether its death was related to that of the other three.

The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA), alerted to the deaths, said the wounds on the three in the park were stab wounds, not the result of dog bites.

On May 2, three cats were found in Pasir Ris Street 21, doused with what is believed to be thinner.

Two died and the third was eventually put down as a result of its injuries.

The SPCA is offering a $1,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and prosecution of the person or persons involved in this spate of cat deaths.

The SPCA may be contacted on 6287-5355, Extension 9.

Read more!

Think green before printing e-mail - that's the message

Goh Chin Lian, Straits Times 13 May 08;

CIVIL servant Shayne Prashan signs off his e-mail these days with an image of a small pine tree and a green message: 'Please consider the environment before printing this e-mail.'

The 28-year-old associate for social programmes at the Ministry of Finance learnt about this eco-friendly signature in January this year, when the corporate communications department asked staff members to consider putting it in their e-mail sign-offs.

'It's a natural extension of what I do and it's to remind others to also take the step,' said Mr Prashan, who tries not to print documents but downloads them instead on his laptop, which he takes to his meetings.

The Ministry of Finance is not alone in advocating this green message. The National Parks Board's (NParks) 700-plus employees were encouraged early this year to use a similar tagline.

Theirs reads: 'Save our planet. Please don't print this e-mail and/or attachments unless you really need to. Thank you.'

Some companies have adopted variations of the same message, including transport group ComfortDelGro.

Since February, its e-mail messages come with the tagline: 'At ComfortDelGro, we are committed to the preservation of the environment. We encourage you to print this e-mail only if it is absolutely necessary.'

Said its spokesman Tammy Tan: 'It's part of our green movement.' It complements a range of green measures the group has adopted, from rolling out buses that meet Euro IV emission targets, to introducing paper recycling at all its offices.

Multinational companies here, such as marketing agency Ogilvy and real estate provider CB Richard Ellis, have also adopted similar taglines.

A spokesman for CB Richard Ellis said it took on the tagline last June after a directive from its Los Angeles headquarters.

Individual employees are also doing it on their own. Like public relations manager Bernadette Low, who learnt about the tagline from an Australia-based colleague last year.

She had become more eco-conscious after watching former United States vice-president Al Gore's climate-change movie, An Inconvenient Truth.

'I believe in it,' said Ms Low, 33, who does not print most of her e-mail. If she does, she uses both sides of the paper. 'There are a lot of things you don't need to print. But usually people don't think twice and just click the print button. So it's a good reminder.'

The eco-friendly taglines appear to have surfaced en masse abroad last year, and spread further, though detractors say most taglines are hardly noticeable and will be missed by most people.

But Singapore Environment Council executive director Howard Shaw thinks it is an important first step to promoting a green office, especially with the public sector - which accounts for one-fifth of commercial activity - also cottoning on.

So far, the only government agencies that have obtained the green office label are the National Environment Agency and Ministry of the Environment and Water Resources.

They practise measures like separating paper waste from other waste, and recycling printer and ink cartridges.

Mr Shaw thinks the new taglines in the Ministry of Finance and NParks are a positive start. And while the council does not have a similar tag as yet, he said: 'I'll consider it.'

Read more!

Underground 'city' to free up space

Ronnie Lim, Business Times 13 May 08;
Possibilities include power stations and logistics centres beneath the surface

(SINGAPORE) Singapore is looking at building underground power stations, water reclamation plants, wafer fabs and R&D labs, data centres, warehouses and port and airport logistics centres to free up surface land for other economic uses.

Industrial landlord Jurong Town Corporation has called a tender for a wide-ranging 'underground rock cavern (URC) usage feasibility study' to see how best caverns beneath the island can be used.

The consultant awarded the study will have to work with various government agencies on possible uses for the caverns.

For instance, it will have to work with the Energy Market Authority on power stations, the Civil Aviation Authority of Singapore on airport logistics, or the Public Utilities Board on water reclamation plants.

The study will cover such 'space, technical and functional requirements, operation and maintenance requirements and identification of issues of concern', the tender document says.

The tender, called on Friday last week, closes on June 6. Due to the specialised nature of the project, only tenderers with proven URC expertise and experience are eligible.

The winning consultant will have to identify and study proven URC usage in other countries and determine the technical and operational feasibility of such usage here.

The consultant will also have to look at the environment, health and the likely public reaction on such matters as radiation and pollution, harmful airborne particles and damage to existing buildings or infrastructure, among other things.

A JTC spokeswoman said yesterday JTC will be the facilitator for the multi-agency study. 'The study will look at possible uses for URCs as well as costs,' she said. 'The latter include costs for excavation and facility construction for each specific use.'

JTC declined to say which areas of Singapore have potential for URCs. 'The latest feasibility study is looking just at usage, and not sites,' the spokeswoman noted.

Singapore has so far used underground caverns for munitions storage for the defence forces. It blasted caverns out of granite beneath the disused Mandai Quarry.

And it is currently constructing Phase 1 of the $700 million Jurong Rock Cavern (JRC) project beneath Jurong Island to store 1.485 million cu m of crude oil and oil products like naphtha, condensate and gas oil.

JRC will be used by petrochemical companies such as Jurong Aromatics Corporation, which is building a US$2 billion aromatics complex and is the first committed customer.

The first of five caverns being built under Phase 1 will start operating at end-2010. Phase 2 of the project will add another 1.3 million cu m of storage.

In March, when Defence Minister Teo Chee Hean commissioned the underground munitions facility at Mandai, he said it would free up 300 ha of land - half the size of Pasir Ris Town - and need 20 per cent less manpower to operate than a surface facility.

Likewise, JRC will free up 60 ha of surface space - bigger than Bishan Park - to accommodate the storage needs of the oil industry here.

Land on Jurong Island is being snapped up by new petrochemical investors. BT understands that no more land is available from JTC for above-ground oil storage terminals, after Hin Leong's Universal Terminal and Emirates National Oil Company's Horizon Terminal.

Industrial landlord Jurong Town Corporation has called a tender for a wide-ranging 'underground rock cavern usage feasibility study' to see how best caverns beneath the island can be used.

An underground reservoir?
Govt tender to study feasibility of more facilities in rock caverns
Ansley Ng, Today Online 14 May 08;

LAND-SCARCE Singapore is already storing some of its military munitions in this way. And work is underway on similar storage facilities for crude oil and oil products.

Now, the Government wants to look at building power stations, warehouses, incineration plants, airport logistics centres and reservoirs — all below ground.

Industrial landlord Jurong Town Corporation (JTC) last Friday called a tender for a "underground rock cavern usage feasibility study" to see how subterranean grottos could be used to maximise land use. Among other things, the winning consultant will have to study the costs and the use of underground caverns in other countries. It will also advise JTC on the possible environmental and health issues, such as pollution, radiation and damage to existing buildings and infrastructure.

Last July, Today broke the story of how government agencies including the JTC were exploring the feasibility of creating caverns for living.

Professor Zhao Jian, who led early feasibility studies on cavern development in Singapore, had said then that the potential for space underground was "almost limitless" and was "particularly useful for any facilities that are not desirable at surface level, for example, sewage treatment plants".

The study now up for tender will look merely at feasibility and not sites, a JTC spokeswoman told the Business Times.

However, potential sites could be areas with deposits of igneous rock, such as granite, in the central, northern and northeastern areas of the island.

A 1995 paper by Nanyang Technological University researchers including Prof Zhao, in the Quarterly Journal of Engineering Geology, concluded that the Bukit Timah granite — which forms one-third of the surface area of Singapore — had good potential for underground cavern construction.

The tender closes June 6, and the consultant is expected to work with the Civil Aviation Authority of Singapore and the Energy Market Authority, among others.

other cavern projects:

• In March, the Ministry of Defence opened caverns under the disused Mandai Quarry to store ammunition such as bullets, bombs and missiles. The warehouse caverns – each about the size of six basketball courts – were blasted out of solid granite underneath the quarry, freeing up surface land the size of Pasir Ris town.

• The JTC is constructing the $2-billion Jurong Rock Cavern beneath Jurong Island, for use by petrochemical companies. The first caverns under Phase 1 should begin operations in 2010.

• A plan in the late 1990s to construct a Science City, a mixed-use commercial project, under Science Park 2 was derailed by cost factors.

Read more!

Green buildings in Singapore: Going green to stay in the black

Business Times 13 May 08;

Builders who go green can also expect to see more cost savings in their bottom lines over time, reports JOEL CHUA

A NEW species of building is sprouting up in our concrete jungle. And in the near future, the proliferation of this species may render the term 'concrete jungle' an anachronism.

'Green buildings' are taking root across our cityscape and redefining our living and working environments. They may serve the same functions and generally occupy the same forms as conventional buildings, but they do so with more energy-efficiency and greater regard for the environment in terms of the materials and construction methods used.

While the impetus for this new building paradigm was ecological, it has since taken on an economic dimension as well. And it is the latter consideration that is fuelling the commercial viability of the trend. Industry experts say that companies which make their office buildings green will eventually add more black to their bottom line in energy cost savings.

And the government, with its new green thumb, is actively helping to prune the industry of unnecessary waste.

From April this year, the authorities have made it mandatory for all new buildings to be certified with the Green Mark, a scheme under the Building and Construction Authority that ensures structures are environmentally friendly.

Besides that, the authorities are giving cash incentives to builders who achieve certain standards set out under the scheme. To attain the certificate, new building plans are graded on five areas - energy efficiency, water efficiency, environmental protection, indoor environmental quality as well as green features and innovation.

According to the director of local energy-audit firm G-Energy Global, Vincent Low, getting certified should not be the main focus of building planners. In his experience, builders sometimes approach the Green Mark as though it were a test, trying to score easy points in less challenging areas (50 out of 100 is the pass mark).

But this, he says, is myopic and defeats the purpose. They need to appreciate the spirit of going green in the first place. While bureaucratic standards may require them to score a certain amount of points in an overall assessment, builders need to look at the big picture - saving their clients money in the long run through cutting energy consumption. And there are various ways to do this.

Construction materials and processes also determine how green a building is. During construction, how much material from existing structures is recycled for use in a new building is a factor in the Green Mark assessment.

As is how conscientious contractors are in preserving trees and greenery on site. Specialised materials and paints that do not harm the environment also add to the score.

Energy-saving functions

A green building is more energy-efficient than a grey one because of technologies and design elements that enable it to adapt to the behaviour and changing needs of its occupants without compromising functional quality and comfort. It does this by dynamically tracking human and environmental factors, then moderating the allocation of resources to parts of the building that require them. Less energy is wasted.

According to G-Energy Global's Mr Low, if properly designed and managed, a green building can save up to 30 per cent in energy. This is something that developers need to focus on when deciding how much to invest in typically more expensive green materials and technologies.

Such a level of energy-efficiency translates into significant operational cost savings in the long run. The government has, in fact, set up a $10 million fund to subsidise up to 50 per cent of the cost of companies that wish to audit the energy efficiency of their buildings.

But the 'long run' is an issue that must be reconciled with this move to green technologies.

With his years of experience, the past-president of the Singapore Institute of Building, Yan Kum Seng, has noticed that buildings here are generally torn down or renovated after just 10 years. He believes that installing green components makes sense only if buildings last for at least a couple of decades. If not, spending on more expensive technology designed to save money in the long term won't make any sense.

But according to Chan Kim Kai, the manager of Temasek Polytechnic's Intelligent Building Technology course, a building need not employ sophisticated technology for it to be green. Changi Airport Terminal Three (T3) is a good example. It employs technology and simple but effective design in order to save energy.

Sophisticated sensors are used in the ceiling louvres that react to sunlight and adjust their angle automatically to let in an optimal amount of natural light and a minimal amount of heat. This results in less energy spent on artificial lighting and, because it also keeps heat out, less is spent to cool the interior.

There doesn't seem to be anything particularly hi-tech about the air-conditioning vents in the departure hall, apart from the fact that they are placed as close to the ground as possible. The simple but thoughtful design element is their energy-saving efficiency - because they are close to human level, the ventilators do not have to be on full blast for occupants to feel their effect.

Another simple feature with significant benefits - which T3 shares with several other green buildings - is a 'green wall'. Surfaces that are covered with greenery tend to absorb less heat and thus help keep the internal temperature cool. And of course, they look great too.

But well-considered basic design touches will only take a building so far. It will still require technology to deepen a building's shade of green. Centralised controls that regulate lighting, air-conditioning, water-flow, waste management and security, ensure that every ounce of energy and resource is expanded to its fullest potential.

Colour of money

These features do not just make buildings green, but also 'intelligent'. Indeed, a building that responds intuitively to facilitate the human and organisational activities of its occupants, while saving money at the same time, warrants such a term.

And with regulations now calling for all buildings to encompass green components, the intelligent building industry is growing, as Singapore becomes an attractive market for companies that specialise in building materials and equipment.

One such example is Baur Asia, a Swiss company that markets European building materials and precision equipment. Having set up shop here a year ago, it is using Singapore as a regional hub. According to Eleonore Taillens, its business development manager, the prospects are attractive and the company has achieved good growth so far. She says that companies here are generally enthusiastic about adopting newer technologies and materials, even though they may initially cost more. They understand the cost-saving aspect of such investments.

One area of the industry caters to customers with special needs, typically physically-challenged people who need customised equipment to negotiate conventionally-structured spaces.

With government regulations that require buildings to be outfitted with specialised devices to facilitate accessibility by the physically handicapped, this is another niche industry that is expanding. IGV is an Italian company that designs and builds specialised elevators. These lifts, known as hydraulic vertical platforms, can be retrofitted with relative ease into existing buildings to make them compliant with those regulations.

According to Nicole Wong, the marketing manager of Lift-Mech Engineering, a Singapore company that markets and installs IGV products, this is particularly useful for heritage buildings that may have renovation limitations. Without a lift, such a building may not qualify as handicapped-accessible.

Compared with conventional lifts, which require a pit of up to 1.5m-deep to be dug, hydraulic vertical platforms needs only a depression of 150mm to be installed.

Ms Wong also reveals that for the first time, such a lift was recently approved by the Housing and Development Board to be installed in a maisonette for an occupant who has trouble climbing stairs. The lifts are also relatively energy-efficient, requiring the same amount of energy as a washing machine.

With innovations such as these and interest growing in the intelligent and green building industries, Singapore is quickly becoming a hub for such products.

The burgeoning local construction industry, which is expected to generate US$55 billion by 2011, is one sure sign of the opportunities that lie ahead for industry players.

Another sign is the BEX Asia Exhibition that takes place here later this month. It is expected to bring together not only the latest construction technologies and materials from around the world, but experts from various industries as well.

Green, as they say, really is the colour of money.

Read more!

Microwaves 'cook ballast aliens'

Mark Kinver, BBC News 12 May 08

US researchers say they have developed an effective way to kill unwanted plants and animals that hitch a ride in the ballast waters of cargo vessels.

Tests showed that a continuous microwave system was able to remove all marine life within the water tanks.

The UN lists "invasive species" dispersed by ballast water discharges as one of the four main threats to the world's marine ecosystems.

The findings will appear in the journal Environmental Science and Technology.

Shipping moves more than 80% of the world's commodities and transfers up to five billion tonnes of ballast water internationally each year, data from the UN shows.

Vessels, especially large container ships, need ballast tanks to provide stability in the water and correct any shift in the ships’ mass.

When a ship's cargo is unloaded, it fills with ballast water; when it is later reloaded, often on the other side of the world, the water is discharged.

Co-author Dorin Boldor, from Louisiana State University’s Agricultural Center, said the team envisaged the microwave device being fitted to the exit valve of a ballast tank.



"The basic idea is that you take the ballast water and pump it through a microwave cavity."

He added that the system would follow the same principle as a household microwave oven.

"The power level is much higher and a different frequency, but it creates a very high intensity electric field in the centre of the cavity that oscillates rapidly.

"The water molecules are going to start spinning around very fast and they are going to create a lot of friction that generates heat," Dr Boldor explained.

"But it generates heat in the whole volume at the same time, unlike if you try to use another heating mechanism where you have to take the heat from somewhere else and conduct it through the liquid."

This means that the researchers have a high degree of confidence that the system is treating all of the water to remove the unwanted organisms.

"It is extremely fast and very efficient at transferring the energy from the microwaves into heat," he told BBC News.

Biological stowaways

For thousands of years, marine species have been dispersed throughout the oceans by natural means, such as currents and drifting on debris.

But natural barriers, such as temperature differences and land masses, have limited the range of some species' dispersal and allowed different marine ecosystems to evolve.

Since the emergence of the modern shipping fleet and growing trade between nations, these natural barriers have been broken down, allowing the introduction of alien species that upset the equilibrium of ecosystems.

The UN-led Global Ballast Water Management Programme (GloBallast) estimates that at least 7,000 species are able to be carried across the globe in ships' ballast tanks.

While many of these plants and creatures do not survive the journey, some find the new environment favourable enough to establish a reproductive population and go on to undermine native species.

For example, GloBallast says, European zebra mussels ( Dreissena polymorpha ) have infested more than 40% of the US's inland waterways.

Between 1989 and 2000, up to $1bn (£500m) is estimated to have been spent on controlling the spread of the alien invader.

The arrival of an invasive jellyfish-like organism, Mnemiopsis leidyi , led to a major ecological "regime change" in the Black Sea, which contributed to the collapse of commercial fisheries in the region.

At one stage, the species accounted for about 90% of the sea's entire biomass. Its appetite for native plankton stocks meant that other fish species were unable to compete and re-establish viable populations.

In February 2004, the international shipping community agreed to establish tougher measures to prevent discharges of ballast water releasing potentially invasive species.

The International Convention for the Control and Management of Ships' Ballast Water and Sediment requires all vessels over 400 tonnes to eventually fit systems to treat ballast water.

The team’s development is ideally suited to help commercial operators meet their obligation under this legislation, Dr Boldor explained.

"It will probably work very well for it to be installed on very large ships themselves, but when you are talking about smaller vessels it may be more cost effective to have some sort of barge system based in the ports.

"It can just pull up to the ship, take and treat the ballast water while the ships are waiting to berth at the dock."

Read more!

Fewer Caribou Born as Warming Causes Missed Meals

Brian Handwerk, National Geographic News 12 May 08

Greenland's caribou work up quite a hunger during their long migrations. But global warming now has the animals arriving late for dinner—and paying a heavy price.

Fewer caribou calves are being born in the western part of the Danish island, and those that are born have slimmer chances of surviving, a new study reports.

The declines are tied to availability of the willows, sedges, and flowering tundra herbs that caribou and their newborns feed on in spring.

As global warming causes these plants to bloom ahead of schedule, herds are arriving when the bounty is past its peak.

"For these animals, the cafeteria is closing earlier and earlier," said Eric Post, a Pennsylvania State University biologist who co-authored the new study with Mads Forchhammer of the University of Aarhus in Denmark.

Caribou haven't adjusted their arrival time, because they rely not on temperatures but on the steady lengthening of daylight hours to mark the onset of the calving season.

"The problem is twofold: Not only can't you rely on getting the best meal when you're most hungry, you also can't rely on being able to keep up with changes to the cafeteria's opening hours in the future," Post said.

The exact impacts of this developing "trophic mismatch" are still unclear.

"Alone, trophic mismatch might not be the most important factor," Post said, "but it might be the spark that ignites the forest fire when other factors converge."

Fluctuating Populations

Caribou, also known as reindeer, depend on tundra plants. During the Arctic's frigid winter months, they find sustenance mostly from lichen, which they dig from under the snow.

As spring approaches, longer days spur the females to migrate to areas where plants are more abundant so they can give birth.

But temperature climbs of 7 degrees Fahrenheit (4 degrees Celsius) in recent years have caused peak plant availability to occur earlier, impacting caribou birth and survival rates.

Caribou are the first terrestrial mammals to be documented with a trophic mismatch, the study authors say.

Other affected species, such as great tit birds in England, have been able to adjust, and Post and Forchhammer say it's possible caribou could also adapt to shifting plant cycles.

In fact, caribou have survived many climate fluctuations in the past.

Morten Meldgaard, director of the Natural History Museum of Denmark, compiled in the 1980s a comprehensive study of historical population data on Greenland's caribou.

"Over the past 250 years there have been a number of cycles in populations," he said.

By observing climate shifts during that same time period, Meldgaard was able to "pinpoint a relationship between climate change and caribou calving populations."

The data show that athough they didn't always fare well, caribou populations did survive more than two centuries of climate changes.

Juggling Factors

Caribou also survived an ancient period of dramatic warming—the Pleistocene-Holocene transition some 10,000 to 12,000 years ago.

But given today's rapid and unpredictable rate of climate change, Post believes the future of modern caribou is uncertain.

"If this were the only factor caribou had to contend with, they would undoubtedly adjust if the rate of environmental change were constant," he said.

The current rate of change could accelerate, decline, or—worst of all for caribou—fluctuate unpredictably.

"Add on top of this the fact that these caribou are also constrained by other factors like winter conditions, population density, human land use, hunting pressure, parasite loads, and competition with musk oxen," he said.

"Suddenly, there's another ball in the air that the juggler has to keep track of."

The study, to be published this summer in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, was partially funded by the National Geographic Society's Committee for Research and Exploration.

(National Geographic News is part of the National Geographic Society.)

Read more!

Kashmir census shows decline in rare deer population

Reuters 12 May 08;

SRINAGAR, India (Reuters) - The numbers of a rare species of red deer found only in Indian Kashmir have dropped by a third in the last four years, a preliminary census revealed on Monday, highlighting the threat of poaching in the region.

The red deer known commonly as the Hangul was once the biggest draw of Dachigam, a mountainous sanctuary on the outskirts of Kashmir's summer capital, Srinagar, where they grazed in thousands decades ago.

Experts said the numbers of the majestic looking deer with a brownish coat and antlers have fallen from 228 to 160 in just four years.

There were about 900 of them in the mountains in 1989, but rampant poaching, neglect by authorities and a 17-year-old separatist rebellion in the region have taken its toll.

"Hangul is critically endangered species. There has been a steady decline in Hangul population from 2004 to 2008," a preliminary census report said.

The census was carried out in March this year by Kashmir's wildlife department and Wildlife Institute of India.

Poachers continue to kill Hanguls for their antlers, which fetch them a good price in the international black market.

"Hangul hunting continued even during militancy, as the animals come down to plains in winters," said Shameem Ahmad, who lives near Dachigam sanctuary.

"It (Hangul) assumes a great significance as the only Asiatic survivor of the red deer," the census report added.

(Reporting By Sheikh Mushtaq; Editing by Bappa Majumdar)

Read more!

A rice cartel may not be a bad idea in the long run

G. Panicker, Business Times 13 May 08;

PREDICTABLY, talk of a rice producers' cartel has been howled down. The Thai proposal produced a huge backlash from importing countries such as the Philippines. But while the proposal was untimely amid global anguish about high prices, it should still serve as a wake-up call to importers.

Thailand's Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej had said that the five rice producers in South-east Asia had agreed to form a grouping to cooperate on fixing international prices. Being the largest exporter with about 10 million tonnes a year, his country is in a pivotal position to influence the working of such a cartel.

Vietnam, which exports five million tonnes, did not publicly back the idea. The other members of an 'Organisation of Rice Exporting Countries' (Orec) would be Laos, Cambodia and Myanmar. The cartel idea has been put in the freezer for now, but consultations will continue, its proponents say.

Asia accounts for the bulk of the world's rice trade. India and China grow half of the world's rice but are small exporters. South-east Asia, producing 60 million tonnes of milled rice annually, claims 14 per cent of world production and 40 per cent of exports.

Unlike other staples such as corn, biofuel production has been only an indirect factor in the rise of rice prices. The tripling of rice prices over the past year has essentially been driven by strong demand, supply worries, hoarding, speculative commodity trades as well as export bans by some producers.

The idea of a cartel may be anathema, particularly when prices are this high. The World Food Programme recently termed the general rise in food prices a 'silent tsunami' that could drive some 100 million people to the brink of starvation. For poor people in developing countries, expenditure on food accounts for a substantial part of income. These people need help.

Some relief from high prices will come with increased production. But a growing and increasingly affluent population will demand ever more staples, which will continue to add pressure on prices. Climate change and lack of water will exert further pressure.

While prices are a good motivator for Asian farmers to increase production, they also need other incentives and assistance. Mechanisation can also help increase production but a major drive to mechanise is unlikely to materialise when countries fear that this would displace millions of farm workers - which it would.

Cartels are considered passe these days. But the success of oil producers may have been too appealing for the rice producers not to attempt to emulate. Mr Samak, however, was quick to say the grouping would not work like the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec).

In fact, oil prices, having grown 11-fold in the past decade, have had a dramatic impact on input costs for the farmers. 'With the oil price rising so much, we import expensive oil but sell rice very cheaply and that's unfair to us and hurts our trade balance,' a Thai government official said as the reasoning for the aborted move.

Indeed, a rice cartel cannot work like Opec. Oil is a finite resource and producers have just their diminishing reserves underground. Rice production, by contrast, is renewed annually and is at the mercy of the weather. So it will be difficult to control production as the Opec's 13 members can do relatively easily by turning off their taps to enforce a collective output decision.

Still Opec, which supplies 40 per cent of the world's oil, has shown how prices can be driven up. Further, the oil cartel has begun to inspire gas producers such as Russia and Iran to contemplate a similar grouping to ensure better prices.

So, a rice cartel will have to overcome competing commercial interests and differing economic policies. It will also face stiff opposition abroad, particularly from the United States, and major importing countries. But the oil grouping also faced similar problems. Yet, it focused on its own economic interests and thus gained its pre-eminence in the energy trade.

Any grouping that ensures a fairer return to farmers should be welcomed in the long-term interests of the consumer. A rice cartel will force countries with arable land to respond to this current wake-up call and reduce import dependence and step up production in innovative ways. For instance, China is trying to expand the cultivation of aerobic rice, which like wheat grows in dry soil conditions and also to grow food abroad. Such initiatives, if multiplied across rice-growing nations, would be both pro-farmer and pro-consumer.

A rice cartel may thus turn out to be a blessing in disguise.

The writer is with BT's Foreign Desk

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Feel-good 'green' policies misguided

Nayan Chanda, Straits Times 13 May 08;

SKYROCKETING food prices have finally dampened the enthusiasm for biofuels. But in Europe a new fad is catching on to save the environment: labelling imported food so that consumers can choose local food, which requires less transportation and thus supposedly less consumption of fossil fuels. In reality, it might end up hurting the world's poor without making any dent in global warming.

Rising energy prices and concern over climate change once led to a stampede to turn food crops into biofuel. Now, neo-nationalism and environmentalism are pushing European businesses to adopt quick fixes like slapping labels indicating foreign origin.

British supermarket giant Tesco, which last year sought to pacify environmentalists by putting 'air- freighted' labels on imported fresh fruit and vegetables, has launched a new campaign of 'carbon labelling' grocery items that would supposedly reveal how much carbon was released in their production, and transport.

Although environmental scientists have difficulty agreeing on how to calculate the carbon cost of a product, Tesco has jumped on the green-market wagon. The onus is now on shoppers to save the world by checking the emission costs of products in the same way they might the caloric content listed on cereal boxes. Carbon labelling will become another tool in the hands of protectionists.

Tesco has been one of the earliest to warm to the environmental slogan about curbing the food mile - the distance food has to travel from the farm to the dinner table - by slapping aeroplane icon stickers on imported food. The label is supposed to warn consumers that eating foreign imports is tantamount to increasing global warming.

Such a simplistic analysis ignores the much higher carbon emissions resulting from growing the same vegetables in Europe's greenhouses, using chemical fertilisers or keeping them in cold storage for months. And the gain? The boycott of air-freighted African produce, for example, according to an estimate, would cut Britain's total emissions by less than 0.1 per cent. The net result of such a misguided choice would be to deny poor farmers in developing countries the benefits of globalisation while increasing rather than curbing global warming.

For over a century, since the arrival of refrigerated ships, Britain has imported fresh food, improving the island's diet while providing new opportunities to farmers abroad. Queen Victoria dined on the first consignment of frozen Australian lamb to arrive in London in 1880.

Thanks to liberalisation of trade and falling air-freight costs, the world's non-traditional food producers have found ways to access the world market. The availability of fresh fruit from the tropics during the northern hemisphere's winter offered a healthy and cheap alternative. Since 1996, the total export value of fresh fruit worldwide has more than doubled to US$11 billion (S$15 billion) in 2003. Rising health consciousness allowed farmers in sub-Saharan Africa to join the world supply chain. The burgeoning horticultural trade has opened new avenues to farmers in Asia and South America as well.

Traditional methods of farming with organic fertiliser and non-mechanised irrigation not only produced agricultural products that address the West's environmental concerns, but also provide jobs to people who would otherwise be left out of the globalised network. Although rising CO2 emission from increased global freight demands attention, an aeroplane sticker on a packet of beans is hardly a solution. Other factors such as cold storage, greenhouses and high-energy production cost also need to be worked into calculation of carbon footprint.

A policy that focuses exclusively or mainly on the transport content to calculate a product's carbon footprint helps neither the climate nor the producers or consumers. There has to be an agreed framework to calculate the lifetime carbon costs of a product - from the seed to the dining table - before poor farmers are denied their paltry gains by the very countries whose industrialisation is responsible for the build-up of greenhouse gases.

These feel-good policies will likely fail to reduce carbon emissions substantially while delivering a blow to those with the smallest of carbon footprints.

The author is director of publications at the Yale Center for the Study of Globalisation and editor of YaleGlobal Online.

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Global Warming Worries Wealthy, Polluting Nations Least

Andrea Thompson, LiveScience.com Yahoo News 12 May 08;

The wealthier a country is and the more greenhouse gases it spews into the atmosphere, the less worried its citizens are about the effects of global warming. Residents of the low-lying Netherlands, ironically, are the least worried of all.

The findings are the result of a study that started when Hanno Sandvik, a biology postdoctoral researcher at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, came across on online survey conducted by ACNielsen that polled people in 46 countries asking about their attitudes toward global warming.

Sandvik had been "a little depressed" about what he perceived as the poor state of understanding of climate change and the lack of public concern over its effects in Norway, he said. When he saw the survey results, his suspicions were confirmed: Norway was in the top 10 of the least concerned countries.

More surprisingly, The Netherlands, which stands to be one of the first nations to feel the effects of climate change through sea level rise, topped the list. The flood-prone country with a lot of coastline was followed by Russia and the United States (in a tie), with Latvia, Estonia, Denmark, Belgium, New Zealand, and Finland rounding out the top 10.

Europe vs. U.S.

While the majority of the respondents from these countries said they were concerned about the effects of global warming, a substantial minority said they weren't. For example, while only about 2 percent of respondents from France said they weren't worried about climate change, around 20 percent of U.S. respondents said the same, Sandvik said.

"European countries as a whole are much more concerned than the United States," he said.

The data on attitudes toward global warming came from an online survey, which suggests that the data were not generated by a random sample. For instance, only respondents with Internet access could respond. Only random samples generate results that accurately represent a population's attributes.

Two recent national surveys conducted by Yale University have found, however, that nearly three-quarters of Americans are willing to pay more taxes to support local mitigation efforts. A more comprehensive Gallup poll of 150 countries will come out in the next few months, and some questions will address attitudes toward climate change in these nations.

GDP and greenhouse gases

Sandvik was curious as to what might be shaping these attitudes at the national level, especially in countries where there was ample information on global warming, so he looked to see if there was any correlation between either a country's gross domestic product or its per capita greenhouse gas emissions and the level of concern of its citizens.

When he ran the numbers, he found: Countries with higher GDPs and more greenhouse gas emissions tended to have a larger segment of their population that was less worried about global warming. The findings will be detailed in an upcoming issue of the journal Climatic Change.

While Sandvik is the first to note that he isn't a psychologist, he suspects that some psychological reasons could be behind the lack of concern. People in wealthy, highly polluting nations may feel guilty about their contribution to the problem and subconsciously decide to simply ignore the issue.

"The more responsible you feel for a problem," the more likely you are to ignore it, Sandvik told LiveScience.

There could also be an unwillingness on the part of the rich to sacrifice some of their wealth to solve the problem.

"If you take global warming to heart, you understand that you have to sacrifice something," Sandvik said. "And the richer you are, the less willing you are to sacrifice."

From a more biological perspective, Sandvik thinks that we simply aren't adapted to fear certain things. If a dog is growling menacingly at us, we know to be scared, but, "we can't cope with invisible or abstract danger," he said.

Sandvik did notice a shift in Norwegian concern over global warming after the very mild winter of 2007. When people saw that the lack of snow that winter affected their traditional skiing trips, it brought global warming home to them, he said.

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Power-hungry IT firms change focus

Clare Davidson, BBC News 15 May 08;

Vapour trails across the sky makes pollution from planes highly visible. Not so the pollution from the computer industry.

Yet the information and communications technology industry - or ICT - is responsible for the same amount of carbon dioxide emissions as those from planes.

Each year, both sectors emit 2% of total CO2 emissions, though there are signs that the ICT industry is changing.

"In fact, there has been a radical shift in the industry," insists Randy Allen, a vice-president at computer chip firm AMD.

Finite resources

Just as is the case with the aerospace industry, the computer industry has long been driven by one concern - performance. But the better the performance, the more energy it tended to need.

So data centres - the heart of computer networks worldwide - had a vast and ever-increasing appetite for power.

The fundamental problem, explains Jerome Riboulon, manager of Hewlett Packard's power and cooling solutions, is that this model works only as long as energy supplies are plentiful.

"Data centres have begun to reach the physical limit of the energy they can use."

Regardless of the questions about climate change, there simply is not enough available energy, he says matter-of-factly.

Business sense

Another glaring and related issue prompting change in the ICT sector is cost.

Energy efficiency "is a question of fiscal responsibility", says Mr Allen. "It just makes good business sense."

Michael Fahy, managing director of infrastructure services at Lehman Brothers, agrees resoundingly.

"Efficiency and sustainability dovetail to being the same thing," he says.

"Being sustainable is not altruistic. Given rising costs of energy, it just makes business sense."

Energy needs

Given the vast energy demands of data centres, they have been a key focus.

It is commonly estimated that for every pound spent to power machines in data centres, two or three times as much is spent on energy on cooling devices to prevent overheating.

HP, for example, is streamlining its operations by reducing its data centres to six worldwide. Three years ago, it had 85.

The firm spent four years developing a smart cooling technology that links computers and IT equipment, and adjusts how much air conditioning is needed in real time, using only what is necessary.

The technology is aimed at reducing data centre energy use by 25%.

Meanwhile, network supplier Cisco has developed a technology that lets organisations access a so-called wide-area network and move away from multiple networks in different locations, thereby reducing the total amount of IT hardware needed.

What such developments mean in practice varies.

For example, Barclays has adopted HP's cooling technology to reduce its own carbon emissions, while Inchcape Shipping Services has adopted Cisco's wide-area network. This allows an agent on a vessel in Singapore to exchange information with the UK data centre.

And if what a broad-based coalition announced in late 2007 is anything to go by, change is on the cards.

Google, Dell, the Environment Protection Agency and Lenovo launched the Climate Savers Computing Initiative, with new targets for energy-efficient computers and components.

The initiative aimed to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 54 million tonnes, saving more than $5.5bn (£2.75bn) in energy costs. And that was before energy costs soared recently, so the savings could be even greater.

Supply chain

But if data centres gobble up huge amounts of energy, this is only a fraction of the amount the ICT sector is responsible for as a whole, warns Peter Madden, who heads Forum for the Future, a charity focused on sustainability issues.

"There is a huge trail of energy and raw materials used in the supply chain."

UN data suggests that the manufacture of one computer uses 75 times its weight in raw materials and water.

"And of course, there is the energy used over the lifetime of a computer," says Mr Madden.

Mr Madden is among those who say there needs to be a change in design so that hardware is easier to dismantle and re-use, in order to reduce the amount going to landfill, whether it is aluminium chips, plastic or copper cables.

Wider application

With Gartner predicting that the knowledge economy will account for half of Britain's gross domestic product by 2010, the need for change is clear.

In the average office, nearly 40% of emissions come from monitors.

But beyond the office, there is a growing view that the ICT sector could bring about a fundamental change in the way we work, not only to cut emissions but also to create more flexibility for workers.

Mr Madden cites HP's partnership in a DreamWorks animation project as an example of this.

HP's Halo video-conferencing technology was developed for DreamWorks while working with Aardman Animations on a Wallace and Gromit film.

The system was designed to be realistic enough to let creative people in different countries work together to make a Hollywood film without constantly getting on planes.

Such changes would not have been imaginable in the past, he says.

It seems they might be an imperative.

Read more!

Sweet sorghum promoted as "smart" biofuel

Deborah Zabarenko, Reuters 12 May 08;

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A corn-like plant that can grow as high as an elephant's eye on some of Earth's driest farmland shows promise as a "smart" biofuel that won't cut into world food supplies, an agriculture expert said on Monday.

Sweet sorghum, used in the United States mostly as animal feed, offers a 10-foot (3 meter) stalk that can be turned into ethanol without damaging the food grain that grows at its top, Mark Winslow said in an interview.

Unlike corn-based ethanol, which uses one and a half times as much energy in its production as it offers as an end product, sweet sorghum produces eight units of fuel for every unit of fuel used to make it in developing countries, Winslow said.

Even in the United States, where mechanized production uses more fuel, sweet sorghum ethanol should still have four times the energy yield of corn-based ethanol, said Winslow of the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics.

Use of corn-based ethanol also pushes up demand for this crop on international markets, cutting the supply of food grain, and that would not happen with sweet sorghum, he said.

"Sorghum isn't traded internationally, it's grown and consumed locally in dry areas," Winslow said. "Since you're producing the grain on this plant, it's not a trade-off as it is with corn."

The institute is a nonprofit, non-political organization that does agricultural research focusing on "smart crops" and production systems aimed at helping poor dry-land farmers without hurting the environment.

TEAMING WITH TATA

The research institute has teamed up with the Tata conglomerate in India for a distillery that produces more than 10,000 gallons (40 kilolitres) of ethanol daily from locally grown sweet sorghum.

The farmers who grow it can still use the grain to feed themselves, turning it into traditional porridge and flatbread, and their livestock, while selling the fuel-producing sugary liquid contained in the stalks to the distillery.

The crop can survive without irrigation, but also tolerate flooding and even some salinity, Winslow said. Because it grows in arid areas, it does not threaten sensitive rainforest as palm oil biofuel does in Southeast Asia and sugarcane biofuel can in Brazil, Winslow said.

Like other biofuels, ethanol made from sweet sorghum does not produce the emissions of climate-warming carbon dioxide that fossil fuels do.

Because it grows in some of the poorest places on Earth in Asia and Africa, it has the potential to keep limited resources from these parts of the world at home, rather than sending them to oil-producing countries, Winslow said.

Sweet sorghum differs from the so-called grain sorghum grown on some 100 million acres of agricultural land worldwide, the institute said in a statement. Sweet sorghum could be grown on about half of this land.

The United States, the world's largest sorghum producer, is organizing a conference this year on using sorghum as biofuel. Other countries exploring this possibility include Mexico, Kenya, Nigeria, Mali, Mozambique, Uganda, China, the Philippines, Indonesia and Brazil.

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Oil powered Norway gradually turns into the wind

Nina Larson, Yahoo News 13 May 08;

As Norway prepares for a future after oil, the gale-force potential of harvesting wind power off its long coastline has become an increasingly attractive proposition.

"Wind-mapping shows that ... Norway is among the (world's) most ideal locations for wind power, both on the coast and offshore," said Norwegian Deputy Petroleum and Energy Minister Liv Monica Stubholdt.

Yet the Scandinavian country, one of the world's leading oil and gas exporters, today lags far behind others in taking advantage of this natural resource.

Norway has 15 wind parks, producing a little less than one percent of its electricity, and environmentalists and industry players complain Oslo has done little to encourage what is considered one of the "greenest" energy sources.

"The government should dare to spend much more to promote wind than they do," Ane Brunvoll, a renewable energy expert with Norwegian environmental group Bellona, told AFP.

There are signs of change, however, as concerns over falling oil reserves and global warming become more prominent, with some 150 new installations either authorised or are awaiting permits.

Companies too are racing to develop new technology making it possible to place monster wind turbines out at sea where winds are stronger and there are few people to complain about noise levels and obstructed views.

"The government's ambition is to become a net exporter of renewables and that cannot happen if we do not develop" strong wind-powered sources, Deputy Minister Stubholdt said, adding the government was exploring whether wind production "blocks" could be licensed off in much the same way as North Sea oil blocs are today.

On the tiny, gusty island of Utsira, off Norway's southwestern coast, Mayor Jarle Nilsen says he is well aware of the powerful potential for wind power.

The island, measuring just six square kilometres and counting only 210 inhabitants, has become a virtual laboratory for innovative wind power technologies.

"We have wonderful wind conditions here, with a constant and very even breeze that allows for very high wind power output," he explained on an ironically calm day.

The island's two wind turbines, towering 40 metres (130 feet) in the air on a small hill overlooking several red-painted wooden houses, produce more energy than the small community can use.

The windmills, which are less than half the size of the largest models, are also part of the world's first full-scale system for converting wind power into hydrogen.

The hydrogen, created when the oxygen and hydrogen atoms that make up water are separated through electrolysis, is stored in a fuel cell that starts sending energy to 10 Utsira households participating in the trial as soon as the windmill's blades come to a standstill.

"This system allows us to deliver power with expected quality and reliability (and) the only emission is oxygen," said Halgeir Oeya, who heads up the hydrogen technology unit at Norwegian energy giant StatoilHydro, which is running the test project.

But the energy produced here remains very costly and it will take "a number of years" before the technology can be scaled up enough to actually make money, Oeya acknowledged.

Holding more financial promise are perhaps two deepwater floating wind turbine demonstration projects to be built near Utsira over the next two years using technology similar to that of floating oil and gas platforms.

"Offshore makes sense in a way. It is our area of competence," said Jan Fredrik Stadaas, the head of project development at StatoilHydro's New Energy Wind division, which is behind one of the demo projects.

The same sized wind turbine can produce double the amount of power out at sea as on land, he said, adding that the need for more robust technology to withstand maritime weather conditions however drove up costs.

StatoilHydro, which one day hopes to build a park of giant turbines capable of floating in depths of up to 170 metres and each capable of providing power for 1,000 homes, says such deepwater wind farms are still years off.

Both the industry and environmentalists say Norway's government should do more to help get the new projects up and running.

"This is a very capital intensive industry ... You need price and incentive schemes to make it profitable," Stadaas said.

Bellona's Brunvoll meanwhile described the government's investments so far as "farcical," pointing out that Norway, with its 2,500 kilometre-long coastline, held the theoretical potential to generate 14,000 terawatt hours (TWH) of wind energy a year.

"Of course, we don't want to fill our entire coast with wind turbines but even a fraction of that would be good," she said.

In comparison, Norway, the world's fifth largest oil and third largest gas exporter, only produces some 2,300 TWH annually from its petroleum industry, she said.

A major reason for the slow uptake is Norway's virtually unlimited access to renewable hydro power, which today covers about 99 percent of its domestic energy consumption, Deputy Minister Stubholdt explained.

"That may have served to inadvertently slow us down on other renewables," she said, but added: "We are working to improve incentives ... We want wind to be a much larger part of the energy supply."

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Use of wind energy expected to grow dramatically

H. Josef Hebert, Associated Press Yahoo News 13 May 08;

Two decades from now Americans could get as much electricity from windmills as from nuclear power plants, according to a government report that lays out a possible plan for wind energy growth.

The report, a collaboration between the Energy Department research labs and industry, concludes wind energy could generate 20 percent of the nation's electricity by 2030, about the same share now produced by nuclear reactors.

Such growth would pose a number of major challenges, but is achievable without the need of major new technological breakthroughs, said the report released Monday.

"The report indicates that we can do this nationally for less than half a cent per kilowatt hour if we have the vision," said Andrew Karsner, the Energy Department's assistant secretary for efficiency and renewable energy.

If achieved, it would be an astounding leap.

Wind energy today accounts for only about 1 percent of the nation's electricity, although the industry has been on a growth binge with a 45 percent jump in production last year.

To reach the 20 percent production level, wind turbines would have to produce 300,000 megawatts of power, compared to about 16,000 megawatts generated today. Such growth would envision more than 75,000 new wind turbines, many of them larger than those operating today. About 54,000 megawatts would be produced by turbines in offshore waters.

And it would require a major expansion of the electricity grid system to move power from high-wind areas to other parts of the country, the report said.

"The United States possesses abundant wind resources," said the report spearheaded by DOE's National Renewable Technology Laboratory in Golden, Colo., and a 20 percent share of electricity production "while ambitious, could be feasible."

But the report cautioned that its findings were not meant to predict that such growth would, in fact, be achieved, but only that it is technically possible. And it acknowledged "there are significant costs, challenges and impacts" associated with such rapid growth.

It would require improved turbine technology, "significant changes" and expansion of power line systems and a major expansion of markets for wind energy to accommodate an annual growth rate of 16,000 megawatts of electricity a year beginning in 2018, more than five times today's annual growth.

Randall Swisher, executive director of the American Wind Energy Association, said the report confirms that wind energy "is no longer a niche" in the power industry.

Dan Arvizu, director of the department's National Renewable Energy Laboratory, said that the 18-month study provides a "vision" of the kind of wind energy growth technically possible.

"First of all, it's doable, second of all it's desirable," said Arvizu at a news conference.

"It's time for America to change the way we think about wind power," said Bob Lukefahr of BP Alternative Energy North America. The oil company is a leading wind developer, said Lukefahr.

If wind energy's share of power production grows to 20 percent, natural gas consumption is expected to decline by 11 percent and coal consumption by 18 percent in 2030, said the report. As a result carbon dioxide emissions linked to global warming would be reduced by 825 million metric tons a year.

"This is the equivalent of taking 140 million cars off the road," said Swisher.

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