Nudi at Hantu: new record or new species?
on the colourful clouds blog
Blue-winged Pitta catching a snail
on the Bird Ecology Study Group blog
On clear wings
on the annotated budak blog
Anemone in bloomers
on the annotated budak blog
Clifford Pier returns
on the wild shores of singapore blog
Venus Once Had as Much Water as Earth -What Happened?
on The Daily Galaxy: News from Planet Earth & Beyond
Grace Chua, Straits Times 27 Dec 08;
'There are so many captive-bred dolphins, it's not necessary to take them from the wild,' said Mr Louis Ng, executive director of the Animal Concerns Research and Education Society (Acres)
THE first of Resorts World Sentosa's bottlenose dolphins are en route from their Solomon Islands habitat to their new home; but not without some controversy.
Although the importation of bottlenose dolphins is legal with a permit, animal activists are upset, saying the wild dolphins were not collected sustainably and will not thrive in captivity.
Earlier this month seven of the animals travelled from the Solomon Islands in the Pacific to Ocean Adventure Park at Subic Bay, in the Philippines.
Another 11 are to arrive soon, the Philippine Daily Inquirer reported last Sunday.
The dolphins are bound for the Marine Life Park at Resorts World Sentosa when the integrated resort opens in 2010 and are in the Philippines for training, the Inquirer reported.
Bottlenose dolphins, one of the most common dolphins in the world, are listed in Appendix II of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).
The listing means that trade in these animals is strictly regulated.
A Marine Life Park spokesman said the transport of all the park's animals would 'comply fully with international standards, including those set by CITES'.
The Solomon Islands bottlenose dolphin trade has attracted controversy since 2003, when 28 bottlenose dolphins were shipped to an aquatic park in Mexico.
International organisations and activists said the size of the islands' dolphin population has not been established, so exporting dolphins may deplete the population in the Solomon Islands beyond sustainable levels.
Last June, cetacean specialists from world conservation organisation International Union for the Conservation of Nature wrote to the Solomon Islands' marine resources and environment ministries, expressing concern about dolphin exports without population studies.
In Singapore, non-governmental organisations objected to the Marine Life Park's provision of wild-caught dolphins.
'There are so many captive-bred dolphins, it's not necessary to take them from the wild,' said Mr Louis Ng, executive director of the Animal Concerns Research and Education Society (Acres) - one of the local animal protection organisations.
In August, the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, the Nature Society of Singapore and Acres spoke out against the park's move to bring in whale sharks. That plan is still underway according to reports.
The Agri-Food and Veterinary Authority (AVA) has yet to receive an application from Resorts World Singapore to import the bottlenose dolphins, a spokesman said.
However the permit would be granted if the shipment was accompanied by a valid CITES export permit, and if it met quarantine and housing standards, the AVA added.
Resorts World Sentosa plans to continue their development of the new marine park on the island, despite protests from Singapore's animal activists.
'There are already dolphins in Sentosa. Do we really need another marine park?' asked Mr Ng. He said Acres is in discussion with Resorts World Sentosa to address the animal welfare group's concerns.
The Acres website urges Singaporeans not to support marine parks that keep dolphins in captivity.
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from the wild shores of singapore blog
What's in a name? A scientific legacy
From insects to diseases, surgical methods to mathematical theories, global scientific discoveries and developments bear the names of local researchers. Shobana Kesava speaks to some such pioneers.
Straits Times 27 Dec 08;
PROF DENNIS MURPHY: The zoologist extraordinaire
SINGAPORE'S first, and longest-serving, zoologist has had over 100 species of animals named after him, local biologists estimate.
The man himself, Professor Dennis H. Murphy, has lost count.
Having a new discovery named after you is an honour bestowed on scientists who have made an enormous contribution to the field.
Prof Murphy, 77, named none of the animals - ranging from sea slugs to insects and arthropods - himself. Other scientists did, after they discovered his finds were new.
A British citizen who moved here in 1960, he never bothered to write a doctoral thesis. But his wealth of expertise led to him being made an associate professor in 1983 at the then-University of Malaya and later the National University of Singapore (NUS).
He retired after 31 years in 1991. Recognised as one of the most outstanding insect taxonomists in the region, however, he still serves as a consultant to the Government and companies in the identification of medical, forestry, agricultural and stored-product pests.
Interviewed by The Straits Times recently at his Bukit Timah home, he was dressed in his usual house attire of T-shirt and sarong, with a white 'Good Morning' tea towel draped across the back of his neck. The only thing not local about Prof Murphy, a permanent resident of 40 years, is his British accent and blue eyes.
He admits that scientists as far afield as Finland and Papua New Guinea have been tapping his expertise in both small plants and animal species for decades.
His hands shake as he lights his bidi. 'It's cheap', he explains of the small but potent rolled cigarette he buys on Chander Road in Little India. But his sense of humour, like his mind, remains razor sharp.
Speaking as a scientist and a Buddhist, he says: 'I expect by the law of probability to come back in my next life as a bacterium, as it is the world's most common life form.'
Currently, he is the adviser on a climate change survey being carried out by the National Parks Board, helping NUS students make a complete list of fauna in the central catchment area. Data will be compared to his lists submitted in the 1990s.
Of his own volition, Prof Murphy has also created a full topographical map of the area. The information will help researchers understand how climate change has affected Singapore's biodiversity.
For his work, Prof Murphy was last month affectionately conferred the title 'King of the Mangroves' by Singapore's top zoologists, at the launch of the Singapore Red Data Book, a classification of endangered plants and animals on the island.
Professor Peter Ng, head of the Raffles Museum of Biodiversity Research at NUS and Prof Murphy's former doctoral student, is one of his many fans.
'His impact was great because he provided a wealth of information on the animals' behaviour and ecology which gave experts vital information for analysis,' says Prof Ng.
'He loved the detail, the underdog, the things no one else noticed. He felt that just because they weren't noticed, it didn't mean they weren't important.'
Prof Murphy feels his greatest discovery is one named not after him, but his wife, who died last year.
The Pseudanurida yini is a 1mm-long insect. Following its generic Latin name is a name incorporating that of his Hokkien Singaporean spouse, Yin. The couple met as researchers in Africa, while both were working with the medical research council of Gambia in the late 1950s.
To those who aspire to be outstanding researchers, Prof Murphy says: 'You just have to like people. You will be thought of, and things will just happen for you.'
Plethora of 'murphy' bugs
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Drawn to the web
Frank Starmer has been avidly photographing spiders for the past six years. And it all began when he met a spider named Natasha.
Cheah Ui-Hoon, Business Times 27 Dec 08;
Frank Starmer
Associate Dean of Learning Technologies,
Duke-Nus Graduate
Medical School
Spiders are everywhere in Singapore, he points out.
DURING the week, Frank Starmer puts together Web-based learning programmes on the Internet. In his free time, he checks out the real web-weavers in nature. Photographing spiders has been a hobby for six years now for the associate dean of learning technologies at Duke-NUS Graduate Medical School.
It started when he was living in Charlston, South Carolina, when a large banana spider (also known as a golden silk spider) appeared in his garden one day. 'Each morning on my way to work, I would walk past her large web (about three metres in diameter) and usually she was doing something. Soon I realised that she was doing the same thing each morning when I passed by, re-weaving half her web. Today the left half, tomorrow, the right half,' he relates.
This predictable behaviour so fascinated him that he started photographing and videoing it to share with his grandchildren, putting it on a webpage. 'Natasha' the spider eventually became the neighbourhood attraction, and even appeared on national TV as Dr Starmer's video on her was featured in a Discovery's Super Hero Science programme.
'Soon, I was trapped by the challenge of how to photograph something moving and fascinated by the behaviour exhibited by the spider as it rebuilds its web, captures prey and processes captured insects,' says the North Carolinian who joined Duke's department of medicine (cardiology) in 1966 and was the first PhD in a clinical department there. His research was focused initially on clinical databases and later on how anti-arrhythmic drugs work.
Dr Starmer, 67, who moved to Singapore three years ago, now spends several hours each Saturday morning looking for insects to photograph with his Nikon D300 and a Tamron 180mm macro lens.
When he first started, he visited MacRitchie Reservoir several times, as well as the Botanic Gardens, Pulau Ubin, Sungei Buloh Wetland Reserve and Bukit Timah.
Now, though, his favourite weekend spot is the forest between McDonald's at Queensway and Margaret Drive (at Queensway Secondary School) where he once chanced upon several different spiders, butterflies and dragonflies. 'By visiting the same place every weekend, I would observe behaviour - which was actually more interesting than taking good photos,' says the professor, who has also worked in Moscow and Chennai.
In reality, spiders are everywhere in Singapore, he points out. Some interesting ones that he has found include the Gasteracantha mammosa that has little horns (near the carpark at SGH's Block B); a large banana spider (Nephila clavipes) halfway between the Botanic Gardens and Tanglin Mall; and the most unique, the Miagrammope which looks like a twig, and has a single-strand web.
'The most interesting time to look for spiders is around sunrise and sunset,' he says, as many spiders are nocturnal - hunting by night and sleeping by day. 'In fact, they often eat their web in the morning, find a sleeping place, then as the sun sets, they rebuild their web in virtually the same place,' he shares. 'I also like to visit my spider place after a storm and see if spiders are busy rebuilding their web.'
By now, he's figured out that the best way to find a spider is to look for sunlight reflected on the silky strand of web.
Though not claiming to be a spider expert, Dr Starmer has learnt some fascinating facts about spiders. Like how the male Nephila approaches the female from the top and taps one of her rear legs when he wants to mate. And if she doesn't want to, she gives him the brush-off. When she finally agrees, he starts weaving a carpet of silk on the upper side of her abdomen and on the top of her head. That supposedly calms the female, he found out from fellow spider enthusiasts.
Some of his best photographs may not be of the 'big' spider, but the little one. The Argyrodes flavescens, for example, is a klepto-parasite which lives in the web of the Nephila. 'They steal food from the hostess (hence klepto and parasite) and when there is no food to steal, they harvest and eat the web and glue. Their abdomen is highly polished and, when everything is just perfect, you can see a reflection of the sky on her abdomen,' says Dr Starmer who's managed to get several photos of this over the past three years here.
For one whose job is to make learning fun and to build a learning portal on the Internet that facilitates learning, it's no surprise that he constantly writes about his spider adventures and uploads photographs in his website (see http://frank.itlab.us/photo_essays/) for the benefit of his grandchildren in the US and the world at large.
Dr Starmer's familiarity with the Internet is unusual for someone of his vintage, and that's because he was one of the pioneers of Duke's computer science department in 1971 up till 1997. 'I had one foot in computer science and the other foot in cardiology,' he quips. Several students had started UseNet in the late 1970s, which was his introduction to the power of the Internet, he explains.
Now, his latest hobby strikes a poetic parallel - as he photographs spiders, he's also adding strands of knowledge and content on the World Wide Web.
Rethink Travel: Trouble in paradise
Leong Siok Hui, The Star 27 Dec 08;
Terengganu’s Perhentian Islands are “arguably the most beautiful islands in Malaysia,” so says the Lonely Planet guide. Though the islands have dodged major developments so far, they are starting to creak under the strain of burgeoning tourist arrivals.
For the past 16 years, expatriates Bill and Sally Addington have been soaking up the sun and exploring the glorious underwater world in the Perhentian Islands with their family.
Based in Kuala Lumpur, the Addingtons have holidayed in most islands in Peninsular Malaysia, but find Perhentian irresistible.
We used to like Tioman and went there quite a bit. Then a friend recommended Perhentian and we haven’t gone anywhere else since,” says Bill, 52. “Our kids are keen divers, the diving here is superb, and we like the laid-back, peaceful lifestyle.”
Sandy beaches, clear waters and great diving aside, the islands also boast forests that harbours a rich diversity of flora and fauna. This year, herpetologist Dr Lee Grismer from La Sierra University in California discovered a few new gecko species that are endemic to Perhentian.
“We have had tourists who have visited Taman Negara, come here and tell us they wished they hadn’t bothered because they see more wildlife here,” says Peter Caron who manages the Watercolours Resorts and Dive Centre in Perhentian Besar.
Caron, who joined Grismer and a couple of other researches on their expedition this year, says, “You can spot monkeys, monitor lizards, and various insects in a 30-minute stroll just behind our resort.”
Issues cropping up
Though repeat visitors to Perhentian like the Addingtons think the islands haven’t changed dramatically compared to destinations like Redang and Tioman, they are starting to notice the effects from the increasing tourist arrivals and new resorts.
A 2007 Reef Survey done by Reef Check Malaysia (RCM) found the reefs in Perhentian have the poorest health as its live coral cover is only 34% compared to Tioman, Redang and Tenggol which have 50% or more. Also the islands have a high number of algae-coated reef, indicating nutrient pollution, probably from poor sewage treatment.
At low tide, visitors can see the algae-smothered corals in front of the chalets. The algae could be a result of overflowing septic tanks from the chalets/resorts in Pulau Perhentian.
Poorly planned tourism development, ineffective sewage treatment and solid waste disposal, and illegal fishing are some of the factors affecting the health of Perhentian’s reef.
During peak season, in July and August, visitors are likely to spot a mound of overflowing black plastic bags on rickety pontoons scattered around the islands. These are waste left on the pontoons by resort operators. A rubbish barge, sub-contracted by Besut District Council, is supposed to collect the bags daily and dispose the waste on the mainland.
“After an evening storm, you’ll see black bags bobbing in the sea because they fall from the overflowing rubbish platform,” says Caron. “The amount of plastic is phenomenal, and the leachate from the rubbish pollutes the sea.”
The thing is, every resort operator already has to fork out a monthly fee for the rubbish collection.
“Sometimes when there is too much rubbish, the contractor just dumps the rubbish somewhere without bringing them back to the mainland,” claims Azman Sulaiman who runs the Flora Bay Divers. “No one is monitoring. And with the number of tourists here, we need a twice-a-day collection, and not once every couple of days.”
Stinky smells in ‘algaeland’
Originally from Kuala Lumpur, Azman has been running a dive shop in Perhentian for 14 years.
“Thank God, there are no major developments like golf courses and mega resorts here,” says Azman, 35, who also trains dive instructors. “But if you put the number of small chalet resorts together and each has 10 to 15 rooms on average, you end up having a lot of sewage.”
The proliferation of alga-coated reef on the beaches in front of the resorts hint at a problem.
“The resort next to ours is so crowded, and when you walk by, you smell the overflowing sewage,” says Sally. “Six years ago, when it’s low tide there was no smell and you don’t see the algae.”
Septic tanks overflow due to the increasing number of tourists and the limited capacity of these tanks. Some resorts apparently release their untreated sewage directly into the sea.
“There was a state initiative last year to try to get resorts together to share the cost of treating their sewage effectively. However, some resorts have 100 rooms while others have five rooms. Not all are owned; some like ourselves are on short leases,” says Caron, a former environmental consultant.
“If we don’t know whether our lease will be renewed next year, why would we invest all this money on tertiary treatment? What we need is the state government’s intervention to hook up the resorts.
“The cost can’t go to the resort operator in one go but it needs a system (like instalments or subsidies) so we can afford it.”
Where is ‘Nemo’?
To some of Perhentian’s regular divers’ chagrin, the fish stock in some of the dive sites are declining.
“No longer can you dive at Tokong Laut, the best site on the island, and see big schools of trevally this year. We heard a local fisherman made an illegal RM15,000-catch on trevally last year,” Caron says.
“Every year, we are seeing less of the big fish,” chips in Sally, 52, an avid diver. “We used to be able to see humphead wrasse and swim along with them but now they’re harder to see.”
Most divers come for the charismatic species like turtles, black-tip sharks and whale sharks, Azman explains. But with the degradation of the reef and rampant illegal fishing, divers may eventually shy away.
“I think the snorkelers are the biggest culprits — they trample on the corals, the smokers will flick cigarette stubs into the water or throw empty plastic water bottles,” says Azman.
“To please their clients, some boatmen gets into the water, grab the turtle by its carapace, pull it up to the surface to show the snorkelers,” adds Caron. “Some snorkelers actually hitch rides on the turtles and hold their fins, distressing the turtles.”
Frequently, kids will scoop up clownfish (popularly known as Nemo because of the Hollywood movie), keep them in small bottles and release them at a different spot later. But the fish, which forms a symbiotic relationship with sea anemones, will die if it’s placed in an environment with no anemones, Caron says.
“It’s all 90% education, but is anyone educating the boatmen on the do’s and don’ts?” Caron asks.
“Can the marine park introduce training schemes for boatmen to be ‘eco’ operators. They can learn how to brief the snorkelers - don’t stand on the corals, touch the turtles, and stop feeding the fish. Resorts can cooperate by using only responsible operators.”
Each visitor to Perhentian has to pay a RM5 conservation fee when they enter the marine park.
“A lot of tourists are annoyed, and I know some who refuse to pay or ask for their money back because they can’t find much information at the marine park centre,” says Caron, who signed up for the volunteer warden programme set up by the Marine Park.
However, there has since been no follow-up activities by the park.
“Where are the patrol boats? Why are some local villagers or operators fishing within the marine park?”
The Perhentian ‘loyalists’
The lure of Perhentian keep tourists like the Addingtons and Giampaolo Gepesio of Rome, Italy, coming back over and over again. Gepesio, 33, first came to the islands in 1999.
“Of course, there’s a big difference in the number of corals now, and I meet many Italian tourists in other resorts,” says Gepesio.
“Ten years ago, I was probably the only Italian here. Italians are not usually independent backpackers so their presence here means the tour companies are selling Perhentian packages in Italy. I’m a little worried for the islands in the next 10 years. This place is in my heart — the sea, the nature and the people,” Gepesio says.
If you develop the place responsibly, bring in income for the locals and take care of the environment, the islands will remain a sustainable destination, Bill says.
“A couple of years ago, a friend of ours came here to dive and then he went on to Australia’s Great Barrier Reef. And he sends us an e-mail saying ‘I don’t know why I bother coming to the Barrier Reef, Perhentian is so much nicer,’ “ adds Bill.
The Addingtons usually stay for a week each time they are in Perhentian. Two days before they went to Perhentian on the most recent trip, they asked their four kids, ages ranging from15 to 21, where they preferred to go for their holiday.
“It was a choice between going to JW Marriot in Phuket with the Playstation, videos, soft hotel sheets and five-star restaurant, or coming to the basic chalets here and eating local food,” says Sally smiling. “And they go, ‘Oh, Perhentian of course.”
For now, I guess the Perhentian folks are — as Sally concludes — “doing something okay here”.
But if the authorities don’t nip the emerging problems in the bud, this sandy paradise may become yet another casualty of irresponsible tourism.
Rethink Travel is a series of monthly articles on responsible tourism in collaboration with Wild Asia, a Kuala Lumpur-based conservation group. Hopefully we can help promote sustainable practices in Asian travel destinations and challenge common perceptions and ideas on travel. Click on www.wildasia.net for resources on responsible travel. For more information, check www.wildasia.net.
Doing their part
The Star 27 Dec 08;
The Perhentian islands — Perhentian Kecil and Besar — have been a tourism destination since the 1980s and started out as a small-scale backpacker destination. Today there are about 20-odd beach chalets with several upmarket resorts and 20 to 25 dive operators.
One establishment, Watercolours Resorts and Dive Centre, started out as a dive centre in Perhentian in 1995 with an environmental slant. One of its founders, Anke Caron, even had her own turtle hatchery and used to buy eggs from the poachers at slightly above market value.
“Tourists used to donate money to help buy the eggs. But Anke closed the hatchery because the beach is eroded and now there’s a government project,” says her husband Peter Caron, a diver and former environmental consultant.
Today, Caron runs a weekly Reef Talk at the dive centre, a free one-hour presentation open to the public. He talks on coral reef ecology, why it’s important, the threats to coral reefs and what we can do about it.
Watercolours also operates as the only reef check facility on the island, under the Sustainable Island Programme with ReefCheck Malaysia. They have surveyed virtually every reef on the islands, collecting data, monitoring the health of the reefs and documenting their potential decline.
“The info is passed to marine park centre. Hopefully the authorities are listening,” says Caron.
Watercolours has also collected signatures (through petition) to encourage the state government make the illegal the sale and consumption of marine turtle eggs.
Watercolours’ dive centre has a strict no-touching policy for divers and snorkelers. Guests who have buoyancy issues and are damaging the corals are usually not advised to dive. Most of the staff have conservation experience or have a passion for marine environment.
“Essentially, the environment comes before our customer. And it has cost us some business,” Caron admits.
Some resorts like Bubu Long Beach, Flora Bay and Watercolours also initiate beach clean-ups and invite their guests to participate.
“We offer free dives to people who contribute to the clean-up at beaches like Tiga Ruang. In our last clean-up we collected 75 bags and an old TV from the beach,” says Caron. “Some tourists also take their own initiative and ask for rubbish bags so they can pick up litter.”
The more established dive centres usually keep each other in the loop about what’s happening on the islands.
“Some of us are thinking why not close a dive site for one or two seasons and let the corals regenerate,” says Azman Sulaiman of Flora Bay Divers. “I think it’s about time we have schedules for the dive sites because on some days there are too many divers in the same spot at the same time.”
Since 2004, the local government had stipulated that any new resort with more than 15 rooms has to instal the more efficient Hi-Clean sewage treatment system. Flora Bay Resort’s Mahadi Idris, a Perhentian local, has installed the Hi-Clean tank in his 30-room, Flora 2 resort.
“The tank cost RM140,000, and every three months we have to monitor the underground water,” says Mahadi, 38. “But only we are doing this in Teluk Dalam while the rest of the resorts are not.”
Bubu Long Beach Resort’s director, Ken Cheah, thinks that all the chalet and resort operators should form an association of sorts to enable dialogue with the villagers, district council, state tourism department and marine park, to discuss and solve the issues.
“All parties should do their part,” says Cheah. “We — the chalet and dive operators and the boatmen — as stakeholders must understand that our livelihood and commercial well-being are tied to a sustainable and well-preserved environment.”
What the authorities say
The Star 27 Dec 08;
Commencing operations in 2003, the Pulau Perhentian Marine Park Centre was meant to protect, preserve and manage the aquatic flora and fauna in Perhentian islands, promote marine research, create educational awareness and regulate activities to prevent damage to the environment.
“We try to focus a lot on educating schoolchildren on the importance of marine conservation,” says Mohammad Ismail, head of the Perhentian Marine Park. “We also work with NGOs like Coral Malaysia, organise beach clean-ups and special projects like Panasonic’s artificial reef projects.”
The marine park has five or six staff members who work on shifts to patrol the islands for two to three hours a day. Aside from fixing buoys to mark snorkelling areas or off-limit sites, the marine officers look out for illegal fishing activities, mostly done by local fishermen, he adds.
“Due to a lack of resources, we only patrol the islands every other day,” admits Mohammad. “As for the lacklustre park information centre, Mohammad says they’re still in the process of compiling and setting up more educational material.
“Twice a year, once in the beginning of the tourist season and then at the tail end of the season, the marine park tries to organise a meeting to encourage dialogues between marine park, operators and boatmen, but the response is usually lukewarm,” he adds.
“And when we initiated the volunteer warden programme to help our staff patrol the islands, the response was not very discouraging. Only eight people signed up.”
The bottomline is this: the Marine Park needs continuous feedback and cooperation from the operators and villagers on the islands to improve its operations, Mohammad stresses.
Waste issue
The waste collection in Perhentian Islands only runs for about nine months a year. During the monsoon season (November till January) when all the resorts are closed, waste disposal is the operators’ and villagers’ responsibility.
“Technically, our sub-contractor who picks up the waste is supposed to do it every day (February to October),” explains Besut District Council’s Assistant of Public Health Department, Shamsuddin Ibrahim. “But there are 10 rubbish pontoons on the islands, and with only one boat, the operator can’t do his rounds in one day. Hence the rubbish start to pile up especially on weekends or holidays.”
Recently, Shamsuddin and several village development and security committee chiefs (JKKK) from Perhentian and Redang did a study tour to Tioman to observe their waste management.
“One of the solutions we need is to request for a bigger budget from the state government to provide more boats to ensure frequent waste collection on a daily basis,” says Shamsuddin. “We had a meeting with Terengganu’s State Economic Planning Unit (UPEN) in November and will submit the proposal for a budget increase for waste management.
As for the public beaches, the council office will respond if somebody calls up to inform them of litter problems.
“At the end of the day, the operators should take the initiative to tell us if there’s any problem and to give suggestions,” says Shamsuddin.
“Even if they can’t physically come to our office, they can send their request via fax or give us a call.”
What the experts say
The Star 27 Dec 08;
Though Perhentian Islands lack big resorts, airstrips and massive jetties, Reef Check Malaysia’s general manager, Julian Hyde, thinks “it is the most developed of the islands due to the number of small resorts that have sprung up in the past few years.”
“When I first visited Perhentian in 2000, there was only one resort on Pasir Panjang. Now it is end-to-end resorts, dive centres and restaurants, etc,” says Hyde.
A non-profit organisation founded in 1996, Reef Check is an international coral reef monitoring programme involving volunteer recreational divers and marine scientists. RC Malaysia was set up in 2007. This year, RCM collaborated with Sime Plantations and Wild Asia to run the Sustainable Island Programme (SIP), which runs reef checks and workshops to educate tourism operators on Tioman and Perhentian Islands.
“There is no adequate control of development, so there has been lots of physical damage from the transportation of building materials and siltation of the reefs from land clearing,” adds Hyde.
“There are huge numbers of people visiting now, and there is NO regulation over their activities; I suspect divers and snorkelers have been responsible for a lot of physical damage to the reefs.”
Smaller resorts rely on septic tanks that easily overflow and pollute the waters.
“The septic tank has to be built well, has the right capacity, and is well maintained and cleaned out regularly,” adds Hyde. “I don’t think this is happening in Perhentian. The state government should also study the feasibility of constructing centralised sewage treatment plants.”
Dr Mark Hampton of University of Kent in the UK and Dr Amran Hamzah of University Teknologi Malaysia have been doing research on island tourism, including on Perhentian.
“Perhentian, at the moment, is a good example of locally-led tourism development in small islands. Backpacker lodging, such as chalets or small beach restaurants, are usually locally owned and operated so they have strong economic linkages to the local economy,” says Hampton via an e-mail interview.
“And small-scale tourism such as backpacker chalets generally have less negative environmental impacts than larger developments, requiring less land, less building materials, less energy supplies, less water, etc, and usually generate less sewage and garbage.”
Long-term studies of the islands, including Perhentian, since the 1990s show that small-scale tourism is generally far more sustainable than large-scale, up-market type developments, Hampton writes.
Pearl Forss, Channel NewsAsia 26 Dec 08;
SINGAPORE : The Indian Ocean tsunami killed more than 220,000 people four years ago on Boxing Day.
And the United Nations said the number of fatalities could have been considerably reduced if disaster prevention practices had been implemented.
Millions of people were left homeless by the tsunami, and scientists believe another massive earthquake could strike Indonesia again within the next 30 years.
Internationally, the number of natural events related to the weather has also increased five-fold between 1975 and 2005 due to climate change, and this number is expected to continue to climb.
Substantial sums have been spent on reconstruction efforts in tsunami-affected areas.
Questions have been asked if enough funds have been spent on other measures, such as the implementation of early warning systems and the use of quake-resistant construction methods.
Salvano Briceno, director, United Nations, International Strategy for Disaster Reduction, said: "The major hurdle in the Asia Pacific region remains giving higher priority to reducing risk and vulnerability to disasters. In other words, to focus more on disaster risk management, how to manage the risk and reduce it rather than just getting prepared to respond to the disaster. That shift has not yet occurred completely."
The United Nations estimates that every US$1 spent on reducing the risk of disaster, saves some US$7 in losses.
Yet, many local governments running a tight budget have been slow to respond to the call for disaster reduction.
Dr Bhichit Rattakul, executive director, Asian Disaster Preparedness Centre, said: "We have to make sure that members of the communities are aware that this is a fact of life and they have to live with disaster. It does not occasionally come once in a while, it can come anytime, any day. In other words, we have to build a culture of preparedness."
An important partner in preventive measures are non-government organisations.
Christopher Chua, secretary general, Singapore Red Cross, said: "We did not want to just build buildings that would collapse in the next disaster, so a lot of consideration was given into making earthquake-resistant housing and buildings."
Singaporeans donated US$57 million to tsunami relief efforts in 2004.
The Singapore Red Cross has used the donations to fund 72 projects in three countries, and these projects are expected to be completed by June 2009.
To date, almost all tsunami victims in Indonesia have been housed except about 1,000 people.
While in Sri Lanka, an estimated 10,000 people still live in temporary camps as the civil war delayed reconstruction efforts there.
Earlier this month, governments in the region pledged to apportion 10 per cent of humanitarian assistance funding for disaster reduction methods by 2010.
With preventive measures in place, the hope is that communities will be better prepared when the next natural calamity strikes. - CNA/ms
Thousands gather to remember victims of killer waves
Straits Times 27 Dec 08;
BANDA ACEH (INDONESIA): From India to Indonesia, communal prayers, shared meals and candlelight vigils were held yesterday to honour victims of the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami.
For many survivors, the modest ceremonies were a time to reflect on their lives and weigh progress in rebuilding homes and communities wiped out by the killer waves that struck a dozen nations.
Mr Ibrahim Musa, a 42-year-old civil servant in the worst-hit Aceh province of Indonesia, said it felt like yesterday that his family was taken by the sea.
'Even after four years, I cannot forget how I lost hold of my wife and baby,' he said. 'I have tried in vain to look for them for three years. Now, I have no choice but to accept their departure as destiny.'
Mr Musa gathered with thousands of others along the Aceh coast, where a massive 9.2-magnitude tremor triggered the tsunami that killed around 230,000 people - more than half of them in Indonesia. The epicentre was located 9.6km under the Indian Ocean, south-east of Banda Aceh, Sumatra.
Ms Siti Hasnaini, 40, who still lives with her two sons and husband in a temporary shelter, prayed 'for my daughter who was washed away with my house'.
Homes for Ms Hasnaini and nearly 900 other families are scheduled to be completed by February, a month before the Indonesian government winds up its reconstruction mandate, said government spokesman Juanda Djamal.
Total spending has reached US$5.48 billion (S$7.9 billion). Seventy per cent has been paid out of foreign donations, and more than 124,000 houses have been built, he added.
However, many survivors still remain without homes. Some 50 of them chanted and waved placards after an Islamic prayer ceremony yesterday, demanding housing and accusing authorities of failing to look after victims.
Indonesia is also marking the anniversary with tsunami drills over the weekend at the northern end of the sprawling island of Sulawesi and on Java island, local media reported.
In Sri Lanka, the country that suffered the second-highest death toll from the tsunami, the government asked people to observe two minutes of silence in memory of the victims.
Religious services were held across the island's coastline for the estimated 31,000 people who perished there in the disaster.
Officials said the government's newly set up disaster management authority had by yesterday commissioned 25 out of 50 tsunami early warning towers planned after the disaster.
In Thailand, where an estimated 5,400 people were killed, half of them foreign tourists, hundreds of people gathered along the country's south-west coast to place wreaths, float lanterns and release over 150 sea turtles to commemorate the disaster.
In the tourist hot spot of Phuket, around 1,000 residents and tourists gathered on the main Patong Beach, with three other events held elsewhere on the island.
Thousands of candles were lit and placed in coconut shells along a 3km stretch of Kamala Beach, south of Patong, in a ceremony attended by Foreign Minister Kasit Piromya, a provincial official said.
Mrs Paulette Wyngaard and her husband, Bauke, a Dutch couple who return to Patong Beach every year to visit the spot where they survived the deadly surge, were among them.
'We were lucky to survive. Others were not as lucky,' said Mrs Wyngaard, who was pulled from the raging water by a hotel worker.
A total of 388 bodies of tsunami victims remained unidentified after four years, the Thai Tsunami Victim Identification and Repatriation Centre said on Wednesday.
In India, where thousands also perished, inter-faith prayers and a moment of silence will be held.
Meanwhile, an Australian report said the Asia-Pacific faces an era of large-scale natural disasters that could kill up to a million people at a time, with Indonesia, the Philippines and China most at risk.
The Sydney Morning Herald yesterday cited a scientific report that said the impact of natural events such as earthquakes and tsunamis would, in the coming years, be amplified by rising populations and climate change.
ASSOCIATED PRESS, AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE, XINHUA
Yahoo News 26 Dec 08;
SYDNEY (AFP) – The Asia-Pacific faces an era of large-scale natural disasters which could kill up to one million people at a time, with Indonesia, the Philippines and China most at risk, according to an Australian report.
The Sydney Morning Herald cited a scientific report which found that the impact of natural events such as earthquakes and tsunamis would in coming years be amplified by rising populations and climate change.
The paper said the report, by government body Geoscience Australia, had prompted Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono to create a joint disaster training and research centre.
Geoscience Australia could not be reached for comment Friday.
The Herald said the Australian scientists had analysed the likelihood of earthquakes, cyclones, tsunamis and volcanoes occurring in the region and then estimated the likely casualty toll.
The study found that cities in the Himalayan belt, China, Indonesia and the Philippines could experience earthquakes where the death toll could top one million.
Indonesia and the Philippines were was also at risk of volcanoes which could affect hundreds of thousands of people while a low-lying country like Bangladesh could be ravaged by tsunamis, floods and cyclones.
The study, part of an assessment by Australia and Indonesia on humanitarian crises, said catastrophes which killed more than 10,000 people were likely to occur several times each decade and there was the potential for events to affect more than one million people.
The paper said that rising populations, climate change and food shortages could exacerbate natural events.
Geoscience Australia scientist Alanna Simpson said the analysis looked at the data of natural events from the past 400 years to predict the likelihood of future events.
"Whilst the incidence of natural hazards themselves -- earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and the like -- hasn't really changed, the sheer number of people living in the Asia-Pacific region means any earthquake has the potential to affect hundreds of thousands, if not millions," Simpson said.
"If we worked out that parts of Alaska, for instance, are likely to have a volcanic eruption every 100 years, the impact of those events would be pretty low because there is no one living in those parts of Alaska, whereas the same frequency in Java will have a huge impact."
Sam Bateman, Straits Times 27 Dec 08;
MOHAMED 'Anni' Nasheed, the new President of the Maldives, has said his government will start saving to buy a new homeland in case global warming and sea level rise cause the Maldives to disappear. The small Indian Ocean country comprises numerous atolls and small islands, which on average are only about 1.5m above sea level. If the predictions of the Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) are correct and sea levels rise by up to 58cm by 2100, significant parts of the Maldives could be submerged.
International lawyers are now consumed by the legal implications of a sovereign state disappearing beneath the sea. Not everyone agrees with the IPCC's predictions, but if it is correct, will the affected country be gone for good? Can it - and how would it - go about securing another homeland? Can it retain statehood? And what would be the legal status of the submerged reefs remaining after land areas of the Maldives disappear?
Similar problems could confront low-lying atoll countries elsewhere, including Kiribati, Tuvalu and the Marshall Islands in the Pacific.
The Maldives is an archipelagic state. Its large exclusive economic zone (EEZ) is rich in marine resources. Apart from fish, tourism is the major income earner for the Maldives. Even if its land area were to disappear, large areas of submerged reefs would remain that would still have potential for resource exploitation and tourism. Under international law, sovereignty over land is necessary to generate sovereign rights at sea. The legal dictum is that 'the land dominates the sea'.
If it does occur, sea level rise will proceed progressively. Some of the outermost islands and reefs now used as base points for the Maldives' archipelagic baselines might disappear. Should that happen, the Maldives would either have to redraw its baselines - and thus lose some of its EEZ - or build up key islands with reclamation works and other structures. While it is not acceptable in international law to turn a 'rock' into an 'island' with man-made structures, it is a different situation if the structures are built to maintain or protect an existing island.
By 2100, if the IPCC's predictions were correct, some of the present land area of the Maldives would indeed be submerged. However, it might still be possible to preserve most, if not all, of the Maldives' present archipelagic nature by judicious use of reclamation works and other man-made structures. The country would still have sovereign rights over its rich EEZ, although it would be more vulnerable to storms and tsunamis.
In the longer term, if sea level rise continued past 2100, or if the rise were greater than the IPCC predicts, all present land areas of the Maldives might disappear. However, there could still be a large EEZ, with the Maldives retaining sovereign rights by reclaiming numerous islands and building structures on them, including possibly port facilities and tourist resorts. As Hollywood might have it, we could have a form of Waterworld.
It may be difficult over the longer term to support the current population of the Maldives of nearly 400,000. The people would still have income from the EEZ and tourism, but many would have to live elsewhere. President Nasheed did not speculate on the status of the land his fund might buy to provide an alternative home for his people, but he cannot expect sovereignty. No other country is likely to cede any territorial sovereignty over land purchased by the Maldives.
Australia is often mentioned as a country where the Maldives might purchase land. However, while Australia might grant civil title over land, this would not be sovereignty. Special joint citizenship arrangements would need to be developed for the Maldivians. Their situation might be similar to the Cocos and Norfolk islanders, both of whom have a degree of independence as residents of self-governing territories of Australia. The Maldivians might be able to have dual nationality while living within the community of the host state.
The problems involved in relocating some of the current population of the Maldives are not impossible to solve. And they might not have difficulty in retaining statehood even over the longer term. The greatest problem will be finding a suitable tract of land in Australia or elsewhere; but if President Nasheed's fund grows large enough, even that might not be insurmountable.
In the longer term, sea level rise might become a security threat, though at present it has low priority. Other non-traditional security threats, such as food security, disease, loss of fish stocks, energy security, natural disasters and poverty, are clear and present dangers that rate more highly and require more urgent attention.
The adverse consequences of sea level rise will emerge slowly. Even with the IPCC's worst-case scenario, much of the land area of the Maldives will still be above water in 2100. There is time, therefore, for effective policies to be developed to manage the phenomenon. It will not occur overnight with massive disruption of population and mass flows of people from the affected areas to elsewhere.
Meanwhile, many PhDs in international law will be written on the legal implications of sea level rise.
The writer is a Senior Fellow with the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, Nanyang Technological University.
Report Projects 4-Foot Rise in Global Sea Level by End of Century
Nitya Venkataraman ABC News 26 Dec 08;
An Iditarod without snow, Florida's coastal towns lost forever to the Gulf of Mexico, wheat farmers in Kansas without crops.
What sounds like the climatic end of days could be coming a lot sooner than previously anticipated.
A recent report released by the U.S. Geological Survey paints abrupt climactic shifts, including a more rapid climate change with global sea level increases of up to four feet by the year 2100 and arid climatic shifts in the North American Southwest by mid-century.
Previous estimates anticipated a global sea level rise of 1.5 feet by the end of the century. The current survey, commissioned by the U.S. Climate Change Science Program, estimated that the compounding effects of the loss of Arctic Sea ice will more than double previous projections by the end of the century.
"The Arctic is a regulator of Earth's climate," Martin Sommerkorn, a senior adviser on climate change to the World Wildlife Federation, cautioned in a statement. "We are seeing troubling signs that the dramatic changes in that region threaten the rest of the planet."
The National Resources Defense Council describes the Arctic as "global warming's canary in the coal mine." Arctic ice melt, the NRDC warns, will have devastating effects beyond the polar region and well into the American heartland.
Warmer Climate Hits Alaska
The rising temperatures are already being felt across Alaska's geographic landscape. On the Kenai Peninsula, scientists believe that the warmer weather has allowed spruce bark beetles to mature and reproduce more quickly. Able to complete a two-year life cycle in only a year, the insects have eaten almost 4 million acres of forest.
In Fairbanks, a city built on top of a permafrost layer, a foundation thought to be permanently frozen, is thawing, resulting in buckling highways and sinking homes.
And the Iditarod dog sled race was forced to move its traditional starting point from Wasilla, the once-home of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, farther north to a location that wasn't affected by warmer temperatures and lack of snowfall.
Rising Waters to Flood Coasts
Farther south, the EPA projected that a 3-foot rise in sea level by 2100 would deluge more than 22,000 miles along the Atlantic and Gulf coasts, in regions of Louisiana, Texas, Florida and North Carolina.
In Florida, the coastal towns along the Gulf of Mexico face the reality of rising sea levels, one that could come sooner than anticipated, according to a report by the Charlotte Sun.
The town of Punta Gorda, Fla., is working with Charlotte Harbor National Estuary Program to create a model for coastal communities in the Sunshine State in the event of a worst-case scenario, mapping out shoreline changes and the inward relocation of residents and habitat.
Beyond rising sea levels, a loss of ice cover and warmer climates in the Arctic have a direct impact on weather patterns and farming.
In October, ABC News reported that Arctic sea ice had shrunk to a record low since satellite measurements began in 1979.
In 2006, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change predicted an ice-free Arctic by the end of the century; the panel's prediction could now take place by the end of the decade.
"The Arctic is fundamentally changing in character, and we're going to continue this downward trend and eventually reach the point when we have entire sea-ice melts during the summertime," said Walt Meier, a research scientist at the National Snow and Ice Data Center.
His organization warned that the global consequences for a planet without sea ice were major, explaining that the Arctic region "acts as a giant air conditioner for the planet, helping stabilize global temperature and weather patterns in lower latitudes, like the jet stream."
Using a NASA computer model, the NRDC links Arctic melts to wheat farming in Kansas, projecting that without ice covers, the state would be 4 degrees warmer in the winter, which would hurt wheat farmers who rely on freezing temperatures to grow their crops. Kansas summers would face drier crop soil sapped of 10 percent of its moisture.
"These findings offer a startling view of climate change in the Arctic and the profound impact it may already be having on the future of the entire planet," said Richard Moss, vice president for WWF's Climate Change Program and previously head of the CCSP coordination office, in a statement.
Moss continued, "World governments just concluded two weeks of climate treaty negotiations in Poland with a disappointing lack of progress. As negotiations continue over the course of the coming year, this report should provide a much-needed sense of urgency to help reach agreement next December in Copenhagen.
ABC News Clayton Sandell and Angus Hines contributed to the reporting in this report.
Agencies' report warns of faster climate change
Juliet Eilperin, LA Times 26 Dec 08;
Reporting from Washington -- The United States faces the possibility of much more rapid climate change by the end of the century than previous studies have suggested, according to a report led by the U.S. Geological Survey.
The study, which was commissioned by the U.S. Climate Change Science Program and issued this month, expands on the 2007 findings of the United Nations Intergovernment Panel on Climate Change. Looking at factors such as rapid sea ice loss in the Arctic and prolonged drought in the Southwest, the new assessment suggests that earlier projections may have underestimated the climatic shifts that could take place by 2100.
However, the assessment also suggests that some other feared effects of global warming are not likely to occur by the end of the century, such as an abrupt release of methane from the seabed and permafrost or a shutdown of the Atlantic Ocean circulation system that brings warm water north and colder water south. But the report projects an amount of potential sea level rise during that period that may be greater than what other researchers have anticipated, as well as a shift to a more arid climate pattern in the Southwest by midcentury.
Thirty-two scientists from federal and nonfederal institutions contributed to the report, which took nearly two years to complete. The Climate Change Science Program, which was established in 1990, coordinates the climate research of 13 federal agencies.
Tom Armstrong, senior advisor for global change programs at the U.S. Geological Survey, said the report "shows how quickly the information is advancing" on potential climate shifts. The prospect of abrupt climate change, he said, "is one of those things that keeps people up at night, because it's a low-probability but high-risk scenario. It's unlikely to happen in our lifetimes, but if it were to occur, it would be life-changing."
In one of the report's most worrisome findings, the agency estimates that in light of recent ice sheet melting, global sea levels could rise as much as 4 feet by 2100. The intergovernment panel had projected a rise of no more than 1.5 feet by that time, but satellite data over the last two years show the world's major ice sheets are melting much more rapidly than previously thought. The Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets are losing an average of 48 cubic miles of ice a year, equivalent to twice the amount of ice in the Alps.
Konrad Steffen, who directs the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences at the University of Colorado at Boulder and was lead author on the report's chapter on ice sheets, said the models the intergovernment panel used did not factor in some of the dynamics that scientists now understand about ice sheet melting. Steffen and his collaborators have identified, among other things, a process of "lubrication," in which warmer ocean water gets underneath coastal ice sheets and accelerates melting.
"This has to be put into models," said Steffen, who organized a conference during the summer in St. Petersburg, Russia, as part of an effort to develop more sophisticated ice sheet models. "What we predicted is sea level rise will be higher, but I have to be honest, we cannot model it for 2100 yet."
Still, Armstrong said, the report "does take a step forward from where the [intergovernment panel] was," especially in terms of ice sheet melting.
Scientists also looked at the prospect of prolonged drought over the next 100 years. They said it was impossible to determine yet whether human activity is responsible for the drought the Southwestern United States has experienced over the last decade, but every indication suggests the region will become consistently drier in the next several decades. Richard Seager, a senior research scientist at Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, said that nearly all of the 24 computer models the group surveyed projected the same climatic conditions for the North American Southwest, which includes Mexico.
"If the models are correct, it will transition in the coming years and decades to a more arid climate, and that transition is already underway," Seager said, adding that such conditions would probably include prolonged droughts lasting more than a decade.
The current models cover broad swaths of landscape, and Seager said scientists needed to work on developing versions that can make projections on a much smaller scale.
Armstrong said the need for "downscaled models" was one of the challenges facing the federal government. When it comes to abrupt climate shifts, he said, "we need to be prepared to deal with it in terms of policymaking. . . . There are really no policies in place to deal with abrupt climate change."
Richard Moss, who worked for the Climate Change Science Program from 2000 to 2006 and now serves as vice president and managing director for climate change at the World Wildlife Fund-U.S., welcomed the report but called it "way overdue."
"There is finally a greater flow of climate science from the administration," Moss said, noting that the report was originally scheduled to come out in 2007. "It really is showing the potential for abrupt climate change is real."
The report is reassuring, however, on the prospects for some potentially drastic effects, such as a huge release of methane, a potent heat-trapping gas, that is now locked deep in the seabed and underneath the Arctic permafrost. That is unlikely to occur in the near future, the scientists said.
"It's unlikely that we're going to see an abrupt change in methane over the next hundred years, but we should worry about it over a longer time frame," said Ed Brook, the lead author of the methane chapter and a geosciences professor at Oregon State University. "All of these places where methane is stored are vulnerable to leaking."
By the end the century, Brook said, the amount of methane escaping from natural sources such as the Arctic tundra and waterlogged soils in warmer regions "could possibly double," but that would still be less than the current level of human-generated methane emissions. Over the course of the next thousand years, he added, methane hydrates stored deep in the seabed could be released.
"Once you start melting there, you can't really take it back," he said.
Eilperin writes for the Washington Post.
Sam Taylor Yahoo News 25 Dec 08;
KYANGJIN GOMPA, Nepal (AFP) – Standing in the Himalayan valley of Langtang, Rinjin Dorje Lama remembers where he used to play as a child in the 1960s.
"When I was a kid, it was a lot longer," said Lama, pointing at the Lirung glacier surrounded by snowy peaks on Nepal's northern border with Tibet.
"We used to play on the glacier, and it came right down to the monastery, but now it's about two kilometres (1.2 miles) further back."
Temperatures in the Himalayas are rising by around 0.06 degrees Celsius (0.108 Fahrenheit) annually, according to a long-term study by the Nepalese department of hydrology.
The rate is far above the global average given last year by the UN's senior scientists, who said surface temperatures have risen by a total of 0.74 degrees C over the past 100 years.
"I don't really understand why the glacier has gone so far back, but I am told it's due to global warming," said Lama, whose weather-beaten face makes him look older than his 57 years.
Lama has witnessed other changes in the roadless valley, 60 kilometres (40 miles) northwest of Kathmandu, where sure-footed ponies remain the quickest form of transport.
"I feel that the sun is getting stronger, and in the past there used to be a lot more snow in winter. We used to get up to two metres in the winter, and it would stay for weeks. Last winter we only had two centimetres."
On top of unpredictable weather, other dangers are increasing in Nepal's mountains because of climate change.
As the meltwater flows off the glacier, lakes begin to form and grow.
When the pressure becomes too great, the lake walls burst and release millions of cubic tonnes of water that can wash away people, villages and arable land.
Researchers at the Nepal-based International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD) have said five major glacial lake floods have hit Nepal since 1970, as well as at least two in Tibet and one in Bhutan.
Ang Tsering Sherpa, who grew up in Nepal's Everest region, has observed the growth of one glacial lake with growing concern.
"A small pond first appeared close to the Imja glacier in about 1962," said Sherpa, who owns a trekking and expedition company in Kathmandu.
Last year, a research team from Japan measured the Imja lake as being 1.7 kilometres long, 900 metres wide and 92 metres deep.
"If that lake bursts, it will be like a tsunami," said Sherpa, who estimates that the Imja glacier has been retreating at a rate of 60 metres per year.
"Imagine the damage that will be caused by a lake emptying within minutes into a well-inhabited valley. The loss of life will be huge."
The World Wildlife Fund (WWF) calculates there are 2,000 glacial lakes forming in Nepal and around 20 are in danger of bursting.
Mountain dwellers are seeing at first hand the effects of global warming, but the changing climate will eventually have dire consequences for a much wider section of Asia's population.
Himalayan snow and ice is a massive freshwater reserve that feeds nine of Asia's major waterways, including the Indus, Ganges and Yellow rivers.
"In the long term, water scarcity will become a big problem," said Sandeep Chamling Rai, WWF climate change officer.
"There will eventually be a tipping point where the amount of water from the glaciers is hugely reduced, which will result in loss of water resources for people downstream who rely on these Himalayan-fed rivers."
The ICIMOD said in August that climate change posed a serious threat to essential water resources in the Himalayans, putting the livelihoods of 1.3 billion people at risk.
Studies say much of the blame is due to the "Asia brown cloud" spewed from tailpipes, factory chimneys and power plants -- as well as forests and fields that are burned for agriculture, and wood and dung burned for fuel.
Back in the Langtang Valley, where around 700 people and 4,000 yaks live, Lama can only watch as the ice and snow retreat from around his home.
"I am very worried, but what can we do. We are not contributing to global warming but we feel its effects. I am scared there will be no snow and ice in these mountains within the next 15 years."
Bruce Gale, Straits Times 27 Dec 08;
'JAKARTA may be an interesting and exciting place to visit,' notes one website dedicated to providing travel tips to foreigners. 'But please do not be too adventurous with your water and food.' Tap water, the website warns, is not fit for drinking.
Yet there are millions of people all over Indonesia who would be only too happy to drink tap water - if they could get it. According to the Public Works Ministry, piped water coverage reaches only 45 per cent of households in urban areas, and barely 10 per cent of rural areas. Most Indonesians get their drinking water from polluted wells and rivers.
Jakarta - home to more than eight million people - has one of South-east Asia's least developed piped water networks. As a result, large numbers of residents have been forced to join shopping complexes, hotels and skyscrapers in using increasingly contaminated groundwater. Unlike these latter consumers, however, most residents lack access to sophisticated water treatment equipment.
Clean water is becoming a scarce and increasingly expensive commodity in Indonesia.
A 2007 report by the Environment Ministry found that the water in rivers and lakes across the country had been severely contaminated by domestic and industrial waste. Jakarta, for example, is criss-crossed by 13 rivers, all of which are heavily polluted. Officials blame riverbank dwellers, while residents - familiar with the sight of dead fish floating in local rivers - accuse manufacturers of dumping hazardous waste.
Attempts to clean up the mess are complicated by political factors. Evicting thousands of illegal squatters along riverbanks to improve water catchment areas, for example, would almost certainly trigger protests from human rights activists. Jakarta's urban sprawl has also meant that the city has become heavily dependent upon limited supplies from neighbouring provinces for almost all of its piped water. The natural environment in upstream areas, such as in Bogor and Depok, is the responsibility of other administrations, which tend to see riverside areas as potential sources of income.
Yet Jakarta administration officials cannot avoid some of the blame. Areas once declared to be water catchments, such as Pasar Minggu and Bintaro in South Jakarta, have somehow lost this status over the years under successive Jakarta governors, with many being developed into residential or commercial areas.
Jakarta has a high annual rainfall, but the lack of water catchments has disrupted the natural groundwater cycle, with the remaining land unable to absorb water during the rainy season.
This development, together with the apparent inability of local officials to clear waterways of rubbish, has resulted in paralysing floods. Two-fifths of Jakarta is prone to flooding during the rainy season, which typically lasts several months.
Meanwhile, rising pollution levels have forced the city's two main water supply companies to step up their investments in treatment plants, resulting in a higher water tariff, which in turn encourages consumers to use more groundwater.
The hydrology department at the Ministry of Resettlement and Regional Infrastructure says that about 70 per cent of Jakarta's water needs are now met by groundwater. The over-exploitation of this resource has accelerated land subsidence, particularly in high-rise business districts. It has also lowered the water table, allowing salt water to intrude on a resource already contaminated by leaking septic tanks.
Most Indonesians respond to suspicions about the safety of local supplies by boiling their drinking water. However, at a national conference on sanitation in August, Health Ministry officials warned that this approach was not always effective. Tests had shown that boiled water could still contain harmful E. coli bacteria. Suggested alternatives included chlorination, solar disinfection and filtration. But after touting these techniques at the conference as being cheaper than buying bottled drinking water, officials have done little since to inform the public.
Attempts to expand the piped network are not merely limited by supply constraints. There are also other hurdles to overcome. The poor can't afford the fee for connection, which usually involves laying new pipes. Water theft, which is endemic in many areas, as well as the illegal status of many squatter dwellings, act as further disincentives to water companies.
One of Indonesia's development goals is to halve the number of people without access to safe drinking water by 2015. Microcredit financing schemes and community-based pipe networks have been introduced in poor areas to improve access to clean drinking water. And in an effort to conserve the water table, the Jakarta municipal administration has implemented regulations designed to encourage local industries to recycle the groundwater they use.
Much, however, remains to be done, including finding more efficient ways of collecting local rainwater.
Meanwhile, those depending on bottled mineral water need to exercise caution. The travel website suggests that visitors purchase their supplies from supermarkets and large retailers rather than street vendors. The latter, it warns, sell bottles that are often contaminated.
That's good advice for foreigners, but hardly practicable for the majority of Jakartans.
Peter Garrett's promise has failed but the fight is not over, writes Rick Feneley.
The Sydney Morning Herald 26 Dec 08;
A plastic bag dances skittishly on the wind in the defining scene of the film American Beauty. It inhales, glides and pirouettes, then exhales and fades as if to die, but draws breath and takes flight again - over and over. It is a mesmerising metaphor for our human frailty but also for our will to live, for our craving to dance on, to find some meaning, some beauty. So we cheer for that little plastic bag.
Australians, it seems, will continue to cheer the plastic bag. Billions of them, in fact.
It is barely a year since the Environment Minister, Peter Garrett, made the rather inflated pronouncement that Australia would ban the plastic shopping bag by the end of this year.
Guess what? It is the end of 2008. And the federation of Australia is doing nothing of the sort.
When it came to the crunch, in April and again in November, the states could not agree on how to wean the nation off this addiction: about 4 billion plastic bags a year. Most end up in landfill. Some masquerade as jellyfish and cause marine predators choke and die.
In five days, the South Australian Government - fed up with waiting for the rest of Australia and determined to hold its "head high" - will take unilateral action and ban the thin, lightweight, polyethylene shopping bag.
Overseas, China announced a ban in June and Los Angeles City Council will ban plastic shopping bags from July 2010. There, shoppers will have to pay 25 US cents (36 cents) for a paper or biodegradable bag.
Back home, more customers of Bunnings, Ikea, Officeworks and Aldi carry reusable bags because these retailers have charged 10 to 15 cents for every plastic bag. So successful was the charge at Bunnings and Ikea that they now carry no plastic bags, joining McDonald's.
At least three NSW towns - Kangaroo Valley, Huskisson and Mogo - have imposed voluntary bans for four or five years and say they have suffered no inconvenience or backlash. Ballina Shire Council may soon follow.
From January 1, South Australia will start banning retailers from giving away single-use plastic bags, although they will have four months to comply, after which they will face on-the-spot fines.
Compostable, biodegradable plastic bags will be allowed, but retailers will most likely have to charge for them to absorb the cost. Target will charge 10 cents a bag.
When Victoria conducted a four-week trial of a 10-cent charge at 16 supermarkets this year, it cut plastic bag use by 79 per cent. Within weeks of Ireland imposing a plastic bag tax in 2002, it boasted a 94 per cent drop in plastic bag use.
In November, Victoria failed to win national support for a bag levy. Only the three smallest players - Tasmania, the ACT and the Northern Territory - agreed to a joint approach, so this group will develop yet another proposal to take to all Australian state and territory ministers in April.
"It was a failure of political leadership," says Jon Dee, national chairman of the Do Something campaign and a co-founder of Planet Ark. "If they can't do anything about plastic bags, how will they ever address climate change?"
It was in March 2004 that the then NSW premier, Bob Carr, said he would force supermarkets to charge for plastic bags or ban them. The federal Labor leader of the day, Mark Latham, made similar commitments.
But after a meeting of state and federal ministers in April this year, it was Peter Garrett who baulked at a national levy on bags because he did not want to impose burden on families already struggling with rising living costs. Dee wonders about this. Aldi supermarkets, a big attraction for low-income families, have always charged for plastic bags.
The office of the NSW Environment Minister, Carmel Tebbutt, says the State Government prefers a "national approach", although it will watch what happens in South Australia. NSW wants more research on biodegradable plastic bags.
The Productivity Commission urged the Federal Government to abandon its ambition to eliminate plastic bags by the end of this year, saying it could not be justified on a cost-benefit basis. It reported that plastic bags accounted for less than 2 per cent of landfill, only 0.8 per cent of the bags became litter and that these accounted for just 2 per cent of all litter items (by number). The commission acknowledged some risks for wildlife but said these had been overstated.
This month, an endangered hawksbill turtle was put down after it swallowed plastic and was found sick on a beach at Tomakin, south of Batemans Bay. And when Wighty the crocodile died after its capture off Magnetic Island last month, wildlife authorities found it had ingested 25 plastic shopping and garbage bags, a plastic wine cooler bag and a rubber float. They prevented Wighty digesting his food so he died of starvation.
And yet, perhaps it is the plastic bag that will become the endangered species.
Last year, Australians used 3.9 billion thin plastic bags. In 2002, it was 5.9 billion, although bag use rose 650 million in 2006-07, which Dee says confirms that the retail industry's self-regulation is not working.
About 250,000 of that overall reduction might be thanks to the small NSW South Coast town of Mogo. Coles Bay in Tasmania, a small town on the whale migration route, was the first Australian town to ban plastic bags five years ago. It has used 1.75 million fewer bags since then and is the inspiration for a ban in Modbury, Devon, hailed by the British Prime Minister, Gordon Brown.
At the Kangaroo Valley general store, they pack groceries in paper bags, for which they impose no charge.
"People come in and say, 'Oh, wow, you see these in the movies,' " the shop's co-owner, Andrea Neill, says. No one is ever stroppy to be told plastic is not an option, she says.
But are paper bags any better than plastic? Much has been written about the energy and water required to make a paper bag being far greater than that for its plastic competitor. Dee argues this ignores the long-term environmental effect of plastic, its failure to break down for as long as 1000 years, and that billions of the bags are imported to Australia from China, consuming more energy.
He says it also ignores that paper is a biodegradable, renewable, recyclable resource, and it takes no account of the trouble that a single plastic bag can create when it contaminates a recycle bin. It can shut down machinery at a recycling plant and be a nightmare for sorting staff to untangle. Only about 5 per cent of Australia's plastic bags are recycled, despite recycling bins in supermarkets.
At Bangalow, in northern NSW, women have joined almost 700 morsbags groups worldwide, which work in sewing bees to make reusable shopping bags from second-hand fabrics: old sheets, curtains, whatever. They give the bags to shoppers free.
But South Australia will be the real test case. It expects its ban could result in 400 million fewer plastic bags - or 1600 tonnes of plastic - becoming litter or landfill every year.
In the land of the Tidy Town, will South Australia be crowned the Tidy State? If there is ever an Australian Beauty, might it be shot in South Australia - without a plastic bag? Or, perhaps, a biodegradable, compostable plastic bag?
Marcus Leroux, The Times 26 Dec 08;
The credit crunch has helped to change the attitude of some parents towards Christmas, a poll for The Times suggests. They have increasingly come to believe that undisciplined consumption, often a feature of the festive season, can damage the environment and that they should take into account ethical sourcing and sustainability when choosing presents.
The Populus survey of ethically and environmentally aware parents - concerned consumers - also found a slight reversal of the trend towards believing that the festival has lost its Christian significance and become over-commercialised.
About 17 per cent of concerned consumers said that they would take into account the ethical and environmental provenance of a present “to a great extent” - an increase of 6 per cent over last December.
The number of respondents who agreed that Christmas damages the environment also rose by 6 per cent to 53 per cent of concerned consumers. Fewer now believe that the religious message of Christmas is lost: 83 per cent believe so, down from 88 per cent last year. About 89 per cent of respondents continue to believe that Christmas is too commercial, and although they remain in a huge majority, their number has shrunk from the 93 per cent figure recorded a year ago.
David Lourie, an analyst for Good Business, the ethical consultancy, believes that the economic downturn has shifted the attitude of concerned consumers to Christmas.
“Very noticeably, we are seeing people now, as their hand is forced, spending more time doing family things, perhaps not spending as much money on as many things as before,” Mr Lourie said.
“And that has led people to consider what Christmas is about. People now just think a bit more about their personal impact on the environment; a little bit more about the environmental impact of the toys and presents and the general excess.”
This reappraisal has also led to a swing back towards traditional presents for children, such as board games and Lego. Nearly 80 per cent of concerned consumers said that decisions by manufacturers to make more traditional games was a positive development.
This is perhaps an understandable response as parents seek cheaper forms of entertainment and revert to pastimes that they enjoyed in their youth, Mr Lourie said.
HobbyCraft, the arts and crafts superstore chain, is one of the businesses that has been able to benefit from the trend with its children's craft section. Chris Crombie, chief executive of HobbyCraft, said: “We see it as a real antidote to computer games or sitting in front of the television.”
John Lewis, the retail chain, said recently that sales of Scrabble were 23 times higher than last year - albeit boosted by a re-issue - while sales of Trivial Pursuit had tripled. Monopoly sales are up 13 per cent on last year, perhaps ironically, since the boost has come in the midst of a prolonged property slump. Scalextric sales have risen by 53 per cent on last year.
The general perception by concerned consumers of a toy company's environmental and social standard depends heavily on how wholesome its toys are perceived to be, Mr Lourie says.
As a result, Lego and Early Learning Centre, now owned by Mothercare, were the two businesses most highly rated by parents in terms of social and environmental performance. Hasbro, the maker of X-Men and Action Man toys, finished at the foot of the table, despite showing the best improvement.
Mattel has climbed to the middle of the table, perhaps surprising in the wake of last year's lead-paint recall, after suppliers in China were found to have used coatings with high levels of lead. The Barbie maker also featured in the news this year by winning a case brought against MGA, the maker of Bratz dolls. The designer of Bratz was found to have worked on the design while employed by Mattel. The unladylike spat does not seem to have dented Mattel's credibility.
Yet the safety of toys made in the developing world remains the top concern for parents. “These are the same concerns as in other sectors, but with toys they are heightened because children are involved,” Mr Lourie said.
The sharp increase - from 30 per cent to 37 per cent - in consumers who want to see toy companies move production to their home countries reflects these worries. The second concern is the way that toys are advertised to children, but the findings show that concerned consumers are against a blanket ban, such as that proposed for under-fives by the National Family and Parenting Institute.
About 97 per cent of concerned consumers agreed that advertisements for toys encouraged children to press their parents to buy the items, but 61 per cent saw nothing wrong in this.
Mr Lourie said: “This may be read as parents saying that children are fair game to advertisers, but I think their understanding is that, at the end of the day, they have the responsibility to say ‘no'.”
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