Earth Hour 2009
on AsiaIsGreen
octopus @ terumbu raya
video clips on the sgbeachbum blog and banded frilly sea anemone
Of nesting shift duties and Coppersmith Barbets (Part 1)
on the Bird Ecology Study Group blog
Treehugger
on the annotated budak blog
Hazy sunrise over Sentosa
on the wonderful creation blog
Seen on STOMP: Beehives
on the Lazy Lizard's Tales blog and Bukit Batok hillside bush fire battle
A single abandoned fishing line can kill
on the wild shores of singapore blog
Channel NewsAsia 17 Feb 09;
JAKARTA: Thick haze from forest fires on Indonesia's Sumatra island blanketed the sky and disrupted air traffic in Riau province Tuesday, an airport official said.
"Four planes to (provincial capital) Pekanbaru airport have been diverted this morning to nearby airports on Sumatra due to the thick haze," airport manager Dedi Suryana told AFP.
He said the haze - a recurring problem that also affects neighbouring countries - had hampered visibility since early Tuesday.
"We closed the airport at 08:00 am (0100 GMT) as we only had visibility of about 500 metres (yards)," he said, adding that at least 1,000 metres of visibility was needed to safely run flights in and out of the airport.
An official at the forestry ministry who is monitoring the forest fires via satellite, Dedi Haryanto, told AFP 102 hotspots were detected on Monday compared with only 16 the day before.
He said most of the hotspots recorded were from slash-and-burn land clearing by local residents and the rest were from similar clearing for commercial plantations.
Heavy deforestation in Indonesia, including through forest burning, has helped make the country one of the world's largest greenhouse gas emitters.
Riau province in the centre of Sumatra island has massive but dwindling areas of peatland forest, which are deep swamps of semi-decomposed vegetation that are major stores of carbon and release massive amounts of greenhouse gases when burned or cleared.
- AFP/yb
Adianto P. Simamora, The Jakarta Post 17 Feb 09;
Indonesia’s outermost islands face the risk of disappearing altogether because of human-induced climate change, and will require special measures by the government to keep them firmly on the map.
Indonesian Institute of Science (LIPI) researcher Dewi Fortuna Anwar said the government should ensure the physical presence of its citizens on those islands and build a “high wall” to prevent the islands from succumbing to rising sea levels.
“The government should finalize maritime border negotiations with neighboring countries as soon as possible and ensure the outermost islands remain in place,” she said Monday after a seminar on developments on the country’s borders.
“The government could also reclaim land off low-lying islands.”
Global warming is widely blamed for causing rising sea levels, temperatures and acidity in Indonesia.
Maritime Affairs and Fisheries Minister Freddy Numberi said earlier that Indonesia had 17,504 small islands, of which 9,634 remained unnamed. The ministry is currently verifying 13,374 islands and drafting a profile of the 92 outermost islands.
He added Indonesia had already lost some islets to rising sea levels.
The government has warned that a 1-meter rise in sea levels could wash away 405,000 hectares of coastal areas and 2,000 islands. At present, the annual sea-level rise in Indonesia is 0.8 millimeters.
Tiny island nations, like the Maldives, have repeatedly called for assistance from the international community to protect their islands from rising seas.
Dewi warned that if the country’s outermost islands were lost, it would cause big problems, including on territorial borders and the economic exclusive zone (EEZ).
Indonesia has 108,000 kilometers of coastline and a total area, including the EEZ, of 5.8 million square kilometers.
Dewi said Indonesia was still negotiating its maritime borders with Malaysia, Singapore and Australia.
Indonesia shares land and maritime borders with 10 countries: India, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam, the Philippines, Papua New Guinea, Timor Leste and the Republic of Palau.
The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) defines how states may draw their territorial borders using baselines between the outermost points of the outermost islands.
The outermost islands also serve as the baseline to determine a country’s contiguous zones, EEZ and continental shelf.
Dewi said the government could build lighthouses on its border islands to herald the country’s presence there to the international community.
The National Coordinating Agency for Surveys and Mapping (Bakorsutanal) said Indonesia had finished determining its borders with neighboring countries.
Agency head Rudolf Matindas said there was no need too worry about climate change impacts on maritime borders.
“The rising sea levels will not occur overnight. There must be global solutions, because all countries stand to suffer from climate change impacts,” he said.
Corinne Callebaut and Ros Dina Cambodia Ka-Set 16 Feb 09;
Since Singapore was banned from mining sand in Indonesia, the city-state – which surface area covers less than 650 km2 – is struggling to find the sand it needs for its gigantic land reclamation and construction projects. As a result, it turned to a much less discriminating country, where the buying cost of sand remains quite inexpensive, Cambodia.
For the last year, the provinces of Koh Kong and Kandal have seen a heavy traffic of boats, which sometimes arrive in dozens to dredge the seabed or dig along the coasts to collect as much sand as possible and export it to Singapore. There, companies will sell it for as much as four times the initial price, according to environmentalist NGO Global Witness, who also points at the lack of transparency around this market.
Something that stirs greed but also worries marine conservation organisations, who fear the impact of the intensive exploitation. Justifiably so, as villagers have already complained with the authorities after the resulting collapse of their houses.
Dredgers lured by the sand
Koh Kong is known for its lush nature and hilly jungle, but the coastal province has also become a heaven... for dredgers, which are characterised by their imposing iron structure. For a few months, large boats coming to dredge the seabed have approached the shores of the province. Their goal: to fill up their barge with hundreds of tonnes of sand. Does the Cambodian rock dust possess any property ignored by all until recently? Actually, as Singapore has felt a little too cramped in its 647 km2 territory, it has urgently looked for great quantities of sand, an essential component of concrete.
Singapore stirs the sandmen
As the city-state had long exhausted its own supplies of sand, neighbouring Indonesia was its main supplier for many years. But in February 2007, the latter put an end to sand exports towards Singapore by imposing a ban that is still in force, as the relationship between Singapore and Indonesia remains conflicting. The reason: the intensive dredging by the smallest nation in Southeast Asia has reportedly resulted in the archipelago losing several islands, that were literally devoured by excavators. Authorities even expressed fear that the losses may jeopardise their territorial sovereignty. “Sand mining had caused very severe environmental damage in Indonesia, including in the islands of Sebayik and Nipah,” Desra Percaya, spokesperson of Indonesian Foreign Ministry, had then declared in Indonesian daily Jakarta Post .
Losing its main supplier, Singapore had worried about the higher cost of importing sand if it had to find other suppliers somewhere else and even forecast an increase by 3% of the price in relation to Indonesian sand. In their search for inexpensive sand, the barges of sand companies eventually dropped anchor off the coasts of Cambodia. The Kingdom offers not only unbeatable prices but also comparatively favourable conditions.
Shifting sands
In its report entiteld “Country for Sale ” made public on Thursday February 5th, Global Witness, an NGO specialised in monitoring natural resource management and campaigning on human rights, devotes three pages to the opacity which it says surrounds the trade of sand in Cambodia. Several witnesses interrogated by the organisation have thus reported that many ships belonging to Chinese, Korean or Taiwanese companies, came to purchase sand off the coasts of Koh Kong province, with the intention for all to export it to Singapore. The organisation spoke to workers who reportedly claimed that documents, contracts and payments were all directed to the office of Ly Yong Phat, a Senator affiliated with the ruling party CPP who dominates business enterprise in the province and is often criticised by human rights organisations for the forced evictions of residents from the many lands he has acquired.
“I completely refute the allegations from Global Witness,” Ly Yong Phat replied in a telephone interview to Ka-set. “The government has granted me this concession for sand mining, so it is normal that I am the referee. Besides, I am not the only one responsible, there is also another person. I am in charge of the area of Koh Pao and Svay Ambel rivers, and since I started to be in charge of the mining, floods have stopped happening. I even denied authorisation to a Thai company because there was not enough sand... I think exports in the province do not exceed 4,000 tonnes a month.”
Also contacted by Ka-set, Pech Siyon, head of the industry office in Koh Kong, estimates the quantity of sand dredged around Koh Kong province to be between 7,000 and 8,000 tonnes a week. “Three companies have been authorised to mine sand for about one year: Ly Yong Phat Group Company [owned by the above-mentioned Senator], Odom Cement Company Ltd and Dani Trading. Each exploits specific zones,” he explains. “Apart from these companies, no one else has the right to mine sand. Some do it but under the direction of the three companies who have received official approval.”
Global Witness estimates that nearly 15,000 tonnes of sand are exported each week... which would mean an annual revenue of 8.6 million dollars for the sand industry in Koh Kong province.
Environment: Danger warning?
In addition to the lack of transparency over this market, another source of concern exists: the risk that the intensive pumping might endanger deep-sea ecosystems. Following the example of the disappearance and collapse of islands in Indonesia, Cambodia unfortunately seems to also suffer from the intensive sand dredging.
For example, inland, despite the bans from the Ministry of Industry, Mines and Energy, many ships have come to extract sand in tributaries of the Tonle Bassac, in the area of Takhmau, in Kandal province. Yet, many villagers have complained with authorities that their house and land started to collapse, which had never happened before. According to a member of an NGO very active on environmental issues related to the Tonle Bassac, who prefers to speak anonymously, “the dredging has become intensive for some time. It is mobile dredging, boats are constantly moving from one place to another. It is completely illegal, but in spite of many promises, the government does not seem very active in fighting these activities.”
For his part, a worker of another environmental organisation, who also prefers to speak under anonymity, worries about the possible impact of intensive sand dredging on the seabed. “For now, we have not observed a direct impact on deep-sea ecosystems. However, we remain very concerned with the potential consequences it could have on the fragile marine life – on sea horses for example or on all the benthic species, like lichen or algae.” Echoing these words, the OSPAR Commission – in charge of implementing the current legal instrument guiding international cooperation on the protection of the marine environment of the North-East Atlantic – has precisely insisted in its recommendations on the potential impact of sand dredging in marine environment. “All dredged materials have a significant physical impact at the point of disposal. This impact includes covering of the seabed and local increases in suspended solids levels. (…) Biological consequences of these physical impacts include smothering of benthic organisms in the dumping area.”
Yet, the conservationist believes in a solution that would enable Cambodia to continue benefiting from sand extraction while protecting nature. “Every company involved in the extractive industry or likely to have an impact on environment should contribute a sum of money – some kind of tax – as compensation. Thanks to this tax, the government could fund marine conservation projects and help Cambodian people,” he argues. Utopian? Possibly, but at least, he is not lulled by the sandmen operating in Cambodia.
On the web:
- Note on the physical alterations and destruction of habitats of the Global Programme of Action for the protection of marine environment from land-based activities (GPA), which is part of the UNEP (United Nations Environment Programme).
See also Singapore's sandy footprint on the wild shores of singapore blog for more links
Oleh Melati Mohd Ariff, Bernama 17 Feb 09;
CAMERON HIGHLANDS, Feb 17 (Bernama) -- "Malaysia should learn from what had happened in Europe. For the people there, the realization came too late and everything was gone, the damage has been done."
Those were the words of Anthony Van der Ent, a biologist and environment scientist from Holland.
He said: "Most of the environment (in Europe) has been spoiled, polluted or degraded due to massive unsustainable development from the early 1950s. The people of Europe are trying to restore everything back.
"Needless to say it involves a lot of work and money. For instance, it would take thousands of years to restore pristine forests."
According to Van der Ent, Malaysia and other Asian countries are in the same situation to what Europe experienced during the 1950s in terms of economic growth and robust expansion of the industrial and agriculture sectors.
"There are still quite a lot of areas left in Malaysia that are worth conserving but at the pace things are going right now, I am very much concerned that there would not be anything left especially in Cameron Highlands," he said, adding that in the 20 years to come Malaysia would be in the same 'boat' as Europe was in 15 years ago.
CONCERN FOR CAMERON HIGHLANDS
The Dutchman chanced upon Cameron Highlands during a visit to Malaysia with his globe-trotting parents seven years ago and the highland has captivated him so much that he has been coming back for brief visits each year ever since.
In 2005 Van der Ent, then a student at Saxion University Deventer, Netherlands together with another student, Chantal Termeer carried out a study on the river water quality of the 'Upper Bertam' water catchment zone.
Sungai Bertam is the most important river flowing into the TNB Ringlet Reservoir.
The research project on the chemical and ecological water quality of the rivers of the Upper Bertam catchment was assigned to them by a community group of Cameron Highlands, Regional Environment Awareness Cameron Highlands or REACH.
The five months study showed serious pollution of organic compounds and silting being the two most significant causes for water quality deterioration of the Upper Bertam river catchment.
RIVERS IN CAMERON HIGHLANDS
Eight rivers drain Cameron Highlands with Sungai Bertam, Sungai Telom and Sungai Lemoi, being the main ones.
The three rivers have a total of more than 123 tributaries. As such they have a very substantial role in not only supplying water for consumption but also to cater for the needs of the agricultural sector.
Cameron Highlands is also significant because it forms the water catchment for two major rivers of the lowlands -- Sungai Pahang and Sungai Perak.
"A water catchment is the land area in the upper reaches of a river system, normally in the highlands and mainly forested. The highlands and particularly the montane ecosystem forms some of the most important water catchment areas in Peninsular Malaysia.
"The montane forests are water producers and the supply of this precious and most endangered and limited natural resource, both in terms of quantity and quality is very much dependent on forested water catchment areas in the highlands," explained Van der Ent.
He said that forest cover plays a vital role for a water catchment.
"Based on our study then, about 30 per cent of land cover in the Bertam catchment is used by agriculture and urban development", said Van der Ent.
WATER AS INDICATOR
Water quality is seen as the best indicator to benchmark the quality of an environment, as its deterioration can be a direct result of unsustainable development.
How has it been since the 2005 study or since the water crisis that hit Cameron Highlands in 1998?
REACH's president Ramakrishnan Ramasamy told Bernama the overall water situation in Cameron Highlands is not getting any better.
"We are very much concerned about this and a lot of our efforts are focused on these issues. REACH itself was formed because of water quality and quantity in Cameron Highlands.
"Even though it was only formalised in 2001, we had started to voice out our concern way back in 1998 when Cameron Highlands suffered a major water crisis," he said.
Ramakrishnan said as much as 80 per cent of available water resources in Cameron Highlands is being diverted for agriculture sector. He also estimated 80 per cent of the farms in Cameron Highlands are established on slopes higher than the 25-degree gradient permitted.
"Since 2000, we are facing 4.0 million litres shortage of water everyday for a population of 29,000. As of last year, the population has increased to more than 33,000.
"To overcome this shortage, a reservoir was planned at Sungai Terla. At the start of the project there were only six farms above the proposed reservoir and by the time the project took off and completed, the number of farms had grown to more than 60," he said.
CONTINUED CONTAMINATION
For Ramakrishnan, the growing number of farms only spells trouble for water supply in Cameron Highlands.
"Because there are too many farms in the area upstream the Sungai Terla reservoir, the water is contaminated, not only with agricultural wasteS but also with human wasteS as well. Most of the farms hire foreign workers and they do not have proper sanitation," he said.
A farm would have about 10 workers and most of them use chicken droppings as fertilizer.
"When we tested the water, we found E.coli bacteria and when the contaminated water is sent to the lab for further testing, it was found to contain human waste, " he said.
Ramakrishnan blames the local authorities for lack of enforcement and failing to control the opening of new farms located in the area upstream the reservoir.
He said there was a major landslide due to illegal land clearing causing the silting of Sungai Terla in 2008 and the reservoir had to be shut down.
"When there is a reservoir, there should not be any human activity including farming. Due to the lack of enforcement, these farmers are encroaching into water catchment areas, further contaminating the water source.
"The entire area of Cameron Highlands is a water catchment area and most of the forests here work like a sponge, they collect water and retain water. Streams flow from these forests. If you disturb the forests, it means you are cutting back on the water source," he explained.
According to Ramakrishnan, REACH conducts regular tests at least once in three months both for raw and treated water collected from all towns in Cameron Highlands.
"It was frightening, in treated water the presence of E.coli bacteria was too much to count," he said.
Ramakrishnan said last year, REACH collaborated with a group of researchers from Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) in Skudai, Johor to undertake a study on the water quality in Cameron Highlands.
"They did a test and they were shocked as well to see how contaminated our water was," he said.
WRATH OF MOTHER NATURE
There is one other issue that has got Ramakrishnan more than worried. He fears the wrath of Mother Nature on Cameron Highlands.
And it is happening.
He cited the many landslides that occurred especially end of last year were due to heavy rain.
"My biggest fear is that some of the landslides occurred on slopes that was free from human dealings," he said.
"In December last year, for just an hour's drive over for a stretch of less than 10 km around Pos Terisu (an Orang Asli settlement about 15 km from Kuala Terla) we lost count of the number of landslides that had occurred, big and small ones, " he said.
According to Ramakrishnan, at the rate the clearing of forests around Pos Terisu is being done, the agriculture activities there would surpass Bertam Valley in no time.
"The Orang Asli settlement is being surrounded by agricultural land now," he said.
Ramakrishnan recalled a major landslide in Habu in the late 1990s when a farmer built his own reservoir in the area above the reservoir constructed by the Water Works Department (JBA).
"The (farmer's) reservoir burst and swept down the JBA's tank. The massive landslide that it caused killed two passers-by," he said.
Ramakrishnan then cited the floods that hit Kampung Raja and according to him, floods have becoming more frequent in Kampung Raja for the past two years.
He also spoke on the flood that hit the big football field in Tanah Rata.
"The last time I remembered when the football field was flooded, it was in the 1980s. Last year it flooded again, one reason because of the severe silting in Sungai Bertam. The river could not cope and it was due to the rampant agricultural activities upstream of the river," he explained.
Ramakrishnan expressed his profound concern with the silting that is taking place especially in Sungai Bertam that flows into the Sultan Abu Bakar Dam.
The capacity of the dam is only to hold water and not silt. Ramakrishnan said he had highlighted this issue for the local authorities to check on activities at the upstream of Sungai Bertam.
He estimated that 600,00 cubic metres of silt is being swept into the dam every year.
"If you do not slow down the activities on the upstream and if the dam is to burst, everything here until Lipis would be gone and the survival chance is almost none.
"I feel very sad and worried with what is happening. I participated in a lot of relief work during natural disasters, both locally (floods in Segamat) and abroad (earthquakes in Iran and China, Acheh after the tsunami).
"I have seen the effect of all these disasters and I worry Cameron Highlands may suffer the same fate. This frustrates me more," said Ramakrishnan who is a member of the Malaysian Volunteers Fire and Rescue Association.
-- BERNAMA
Amresh Gunasingham, Straits Times 17 Feb 09;
Singapore has recorded the highest number of vegetation fires in decades due to the dry spell.
SMOKE haze is back and will probably stay till the end of the week.
This time, it is not caused by fires elsewhere. Instead, record numbers of bush fires have flared up here, fuelled by the soaring temperatures and dry weather, and with weak winds unable to blow the smoke particles away.
The weatherman said that the pollutants standards index (PSI), which hit its highest level in a year - 57 - on Sunday, will hover in the moderate range over the next few days.
Another record wilted that day, when temperatures reached a scorching 35 deg C, the highest ever recorded for the month of February.
According to the Meteorological Services Division of the National Environment Agency (NEA), the weather on most days this month has been dry and still, with the prevailing north-east monsoon in its dry phase.
Experts said that 'light wind conditions' since Friday have allowed the build-up of particles in the air.
The lack of rainfall and high temperatures have fuelled the 288 bush fires recorded by the Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF) since the year began. This is more than two-thirds the 426 cases recorded for the whole of last year.
SCDF's public affairs director, Lieutenant-Colonel N. Subhas, said the fires are probably started by cigarette butts thrown carelessly onto tinder-dry vegetation.
'The dumping of rubbish on vacant land acts as additional fuel to sustain the fires,' he said.
NEA has advised the public to be 'more vigilant' to minimise the incidence of such bush fires.
Though satellite pictures detected 47 hot spots in Sumatra yesterday, NEA said it is unlikely that the haze originated there as 'only localised thin plumes could be observed near the fires'.
The hot and hazy conditions are chasing people indoors. A check with 13 preschools found that five cut down outdoors play time, or moved it indoors completely yesterday.
The principal of Happy Talent Childcare Centre, Ms Jenny Seow, 39, told The Straits Times: 'Some children found it difficult to breathe after exerting themselves. We are especially monitoring children with a history of asthma.'
NEA said that the moderate air quality over the next few days is no cause for concern for the general population.
But those with asthma or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease could find their symptoms worsening, said Associate Professor Daniel Goh, head of the University Children's Medical Institute at the National University Hospital.
'These patients should look out for early signs and symptoms of their condition, such as cough and breathlessness; and make sure they take their regular medications properly and diligently,' he said.
There is respite on the horizon. NEA said the hazy conditions will improve once wind speeds pick up - as expected - later this week.
Additional reporting by Judith Tan and Jalelah Abu Baker
Hot, dry month
PSI
# Friday (Feb 13): 50
# Sat (Feb 14): 53
# Sun (Feb 15): 57
# Yesterday: 54
(Moderate PSI: 51 - 100)
RAINFALL
# For Feb till yesterday: 19mm
# Long term average for Feb: 162mm
# Highest rainfall this month: Northern areas around Sembawang and Lower Peirce Reservoir (60 to 75 mm)
# Lowest rainfall this month: Eastern and western parts around Changi and Tuas (less than 10 mm)
TEMPERATURE
# Highest till yesterday: 35 deg C on Feb 15
# Previous high: 34.7 deg C on Feb 19, 2005.
Record high of vegetation fires in Singapore
Today Online 17 Feb 09;
IT HAS been hazy, but be prepared for the haziness to linger, at least for the next two to three days.
That is what has been predicted as light wind conditions mean particles in the air are not dispersed. Smoke from vegetation fires have also contributed to thehaziness.
The dry weather has led to more frequent outbreaks of such fires, with the highest number of vegetation fires in decades, reported Channel NewsAsia. In the first two weeks of this month, 106 fires were recorded. This follows the record 182 last month, well above the average of 26 cases for the month over the past decade.
The Singapore Civil Defence Force described this as unprecedented and said it is installing dry hydrant systems to provide water supply in areas with dry vegetation.
The National Environment Agency (NEA) said forest fires have been spotted in Sumatra, especially in Riau. But it said that the current haze is not due to smoke from these.
NEA also said Singapore’s 24-hour Pollutant Standards Index (PSI) crept up to the moderate range (between 51 to 100) over the weekend, rising from “good” the week before. The PSI at 4 pm yesterday was 54, putting overall air quality in the low “moderate” range.
Dry spell causes bush fires to surge to record numbers
Cheryl Frois, Channel NewsAsia 17 Feb 09;
SINGAPORE: Singapore has recorded the highest number of vegetation fires in decades due to the dry spell.
In the first two weeks of this month, 106 fires have been recorded. This follows a record 182 in January, well above the average of 26 cases for the month over the past decade.
The Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF) has described this as unprecedented and said it is installing dry hydrant systems to provide water supply in areas with dry vegetation like Tampines and Fort Road.
Smoke from these vegetation fires has contributed to the particle build-up in the air, resulting in Singapore experiencing slightly hazy conditions since last Friday.
The weak winds have also contributed to the bleary conditions, as they are unable to blow the smoke particles away.
The National Environment Agency said Singapore's 24-hour Pollutant Standards Index (PSI) crept up to the "moderate" range of between 53 and 57 over the weekend, rising from the "good" range the week before.
The haze is leaving many Singaporeans hot under the collar.
"Even at night, it's really hot, even turning on the air-con doesn't help," said a member of the public.
"Exercise is out of the question, movements out in the open are restricted," said another.
"I couldn't breathe. I've been coughing, because I'm quite allergic to the haze," said a third.
"Even the poor doggies at home" are feeling the heat, said a fourth.
The haziness and hot weather is expected to persist over the next three days, as wind conditions continue to be light.
- CNA/ir
Institutional reform was key, says World Development Report
Chew Xian, Business Times 17 Feb 09;
(SINGAPORE) Singapore's development experience warranted a factbox in the recent World Development Report, published annually by the World Bank.
In the latest issue released last November, the authors charted the country's move from 'slums to world city'.
'Doing so is a tall order for any government, but Singapore shows it can be done,' the report says.
The World Bank noted that at independence in 1965, 70 per cent of Singapore's households lived in badly overcrowded conditions, and a third of its people squatted on the city fringes.
'Unemployment averaged 14 per cent, GDP (gross domestic product) per capita was less than US$2,700, and half of the population was illiterate. Falling mortality rates and migration from the Malay Peninsula implied rapid population growth, further increasing the pressure on both housing and employment: 600,000 additional units of housing were needed, and private supply was less than 60,000,' the report says.
However, the slums were cleared within a few decades and Singapore became one of the cleanest and most advanced cities in the world, says the World Bank. The secret was in institutional reforms that created a government renowned for its accountability, which became a major provider of infrastructure and services.
A housing authority was also created to clear slums, build houses and renew the urban landscape, says the report. 'At the height of the programme, HDB was building a new flat every eight minutes,' it notes.
The World Bank concludes that 'for a city-state in a poor region, it is not an exaggeration to assert that effective urbanisation was responsible for delivering growth rates that averaged 8 per cent a year throughout the 1970s and 1980s'.
'It required a combination of market institutions and social service provision, strategic investment in infrastructure, and improved housing for slum dwellers.'
However, it notes that Singapore's success was not easily replicated for any country that is not a city-state. 'Perhaps the most successful example of how slums can be eradicated, Singapore is to some extent an anomaly . . . Most countries will not be able to replicate Singapore's efforts - aligning priorities and the effort of central, state, and city governments is difficult for any country that is not a city-state,' the report concludes.
Other schemes that came in for praise were Singapore's pricing of vehicles to reduce congestion, which the World Bank calls 'extreme but effective'.
From slums to world-class city
World Bank holds Singapore up as model of development, pointing to its sound policies in urbanisation
Aaron Low, Straits Times 17 Feb 09;
THE World Bank has held Singapore up as a model of a country which managed to transform its slums and become a world-class city.
In its annual World Development Report 2009, the World Bank attributed this achievement to a government known for its accountability, meticulous planning and coordinated action.
The report discusses the relationship between geography and development and says that a key part of a country's success lies in implementing sound policies that develop economic activity.
It also observes that stopping people from rural areas migrating to cities can be counter productive as this can stifle innovation and growth.
But by instituting flexible regulations and versatile land use, policymakers can make urban areas attractive to firms and investors.
In illustrating these points, the 383-page report, published last November, highlighted the example of Singapore in one of its nine chapters.
When Singapore gained independence in 1965, the country was in dire straits as it faced massive overcrowding, a lack of public services and high unemployment, it noted.
Seven in 10 households were in badly overcrowded conditions, while a third of its people lived in squatter areas on the city's edges. An estimated 600,000 homes were needed, but only 60,000 were in private supply.
Unemployment was at a high of 14 per cent, gross domestic product (GDP) per capita was less than US$2,700 (S$4,000) and half the population was illiterate.
Mortality rates were rising rapidly while migration from Malaysia and the surrounding regions put increasing pressure on housing and employment.
Yet, just 40 years later, Singapore had overcome these and other problems to become 'one of the cleanest and most welcoming cities in the world'. It is also now one of the world's top centres of commerce.
With five million people packed into 700 sq km of space, Singapore's US$300 billion exports in 2006 was close to that of the Russian Federation, which is 16 million sq km, said the World Bank.
'Improving institutions and infrastructure and intervening at the same time is a tall order for any government, but Singapore shows how it can be done,' it said.
The secret of Singapore's success?
'First, institutional reforms made the Government known for its accountability. Then, the Government became a major provider of infrastructure and services,' the report said. 'Multi-year plans were produced, implemented and updated.'
The report highlighted the Housing Board's role in clearing slums, building public housing and renewing the urban landscape. At one point, the HDB was building a new flat every eight minutes.
As a result, nearly nine in 10 Singaporeans live in public housing, and most of them own their homes.
Through land acquisition laws, the Government acquired one-third of city land and slum dwellers were relocated to public housing.
'For a city-state in a poor region, it is also not an exaggeration to assert that effective urbanisation was responsible for delivering growth rates that averaged 8 per cent a year throughout 1970s and 1980s,' said the World Bank.
'It required a combination of market institutions and social service provision, strategic investment in infrastructure, and improved housing for slum dwellers.'
But the factors for its success also make Singapore an anomaly, as not all countries can have rapid economic growth and a 'focused government in power since 1965'.
Nor are many countries able to align priorities of country and city together, the way Singapore, as a city-state, can.
Singapore's transport policies were also cited by the World Bank.
It noted that cars cost four to five times as much as they do in the rest of the world because of the Certificate of Entitlement auction system and car taxes. This was an 'extreme but effective' way to optimise private car use.
Ronnie Lim, Business Times 17 Feb 09;
LAND-SCARCE Singapore's push to build floating structures for oil and petrochemical storage is becoming more pressing, with the government now identifying potential offshore sites.
The move will help address the urgent issue of no space being available on Jurong Island for activities such as oil storage - which has led international traders to set up terminal and blending facilities in neighbouring Johor.
In September last year, Europe's Vitol Group said it would spend RM1 billion (S$419 million) on the first phase of a 750,000 cubic metre terminal at Tanjung Bin to blend and store crude oil, petroleum and petrochemical products.
'Vitol wanted to build its facility here, but unfortunately we had no more space on Jurong Island,' an official told BT.
Other Singapore-based players that store oil in Johor include European trader Trafigura and Titan Petrochemicals.
Singapore - the world's third-largest refining and oil trading hub - is set to start building the Jurong Rock Cavern soon. But this will be more for strategic oil storage. The push to build offshore storage facilities will benefit international oil traders that want their own terminal facilities.
Signalling increased momentum, JTC Corporation is seeking a consultant to explore and identify sites for very large floating structures(VLFS) in Singapore waters. The tender closes this Friday, Feb 20.
The site study is part of a study that kicked off in November last year to assess the environmental impact of VLSFs.
This followed the completion of a study in late-2007 that showed such structures are technically feasible and comparable in cost to land-based oil storage.
In the site study, the consultant will conduct initial screening of available water space followed by detailed screening, ranking the sites based on usage constraints.
The study will cover anchorage and navigation areas, pipeline and cable routes, wave height, wind speed, coral reefs, mangrove stands, recreational areas and aquaculture facilities.
JTC wants the study completed in six weeks. So despite the economic slowdown, it clearly sees the need to beef up infrastructure to support the oil and gas industry.
Its earlier estimates show that even with 3.5 million cu m of new oil storage to be added to Singapore's existing 4.6 million cu m of capacity, there will still be a shortfall of at least 3 million cu m.
For VLFS to be viable, the minimum storage capacity should be 300,000 cu m - equivalent to that of a big tanker.
A VLFS would comprise two rectangular modules, each measuring 180 m by 80 m by 15 m and with 150,000 cu m of storage capacity. Preliminary cost estimates are at least $180 million, comparable to the cost of onshore storage.
See also Very Large Floating Oil Storage in Singapore on the wild shores of singapore blog for a summary of project details and more links
Patwant Singh, Channel NewsAsia 17 Feb 09;
SINGAPORE: The Singapore Sports Hub may be seeing a delay in construction due to financing problems caused by the global economic crisis. But the government is going ahead to call for tenders for the proposed Changi race track, saying there are interested parties.
In October 2007, the government announced that a plot of land in Changi will be the site for a permanent race track. Since then, fans and other parties have been waiting for tenders to be called.
Not designed for F1, the Grade 2 track will pose a challenge, due to the compact 20-hectare plot allocated. Now, the Singapore Sports Council has taken the feedback of interested bidders and may set aside more land for the track.
This will allow the staging of world class events like the Moto GP, which requires at least a 3.5-kilometre track.
Technical director of the Red Rooster Racing Team, Andrew Morrice, said: "If you have space, then you will be able to have more facilities like paddocks, workshops, other things. The track itself, (if it is) 3.5 km, you will be able to have higher speed corners, you will be able to have more technical corners and all that."
Besides the Moto GP, which media reports claim has already signed a deal for a race in Singapore, other events that may be staged include the A1 and the Japan GT.
Interested bidders Channel NewsAsia spoke to said the project may cost anything from S$100,000 to S$300,000. But based on the current global recession, financing it may be a problem.
On the bright side, construction costs may be lower, thus the bidders are hoping the project can be fast-tracked.
The Sports Council does not want to say when exactly tenders will be called, saying it will be soon.
- CNA/yt
See also Changi Race Track - more land may be set aside on the wild shores of singapore blog for more links and details
Dan Laffoley and Sylvia Earle, Business Times 14 Feb 09;
COULD the oceans become the place where humanity finally gets its act together, or will we become the victim of many environmental threats coming together at the same time? Already over-fished and used as a garbage dump, the oceans now face the risks posed by climate change - rising levels, coral bleaching and ocean acidification, to name a few.
If the oceans were a human patient, we'd be saying that it is suffering from a severe burn-out. The critical question now lies in whether we believe we have enough information to act.
As a species, we have a seemingly endless quest for knowledge, which builds generation upon generation. Yet we appear at times to be incapable of acting on that information.
There are exceptions to this, but too few of them. In 2004, an expedition of the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to the Marianas region in the Pacific Ocean used a robotic system to bring pictures of amazing undersea volcanoes and smoking chimneys rising out of the inky depths.
Unknown at that time, this work contributed data that resulted a few weeks ago in the new marine monument declaration by outgoing President George W Bush, pushing the scale of maritime protection up a notch.
It is still striking, though, that after so many decades of effort to protect the seas, the area under protection rose from just 0.65 per cent to 0.80 per cent of the total ocean area.
Future action will depend on how, and how quickly, we use the information we have about our seas to good effect.
Despite hundreds of years of map-making and more recent advances - increasingly good acoustic mapping at affordable prices, for example - which have improved our knowledge of the oceans, today the ocean area mapped by humans still stands at only about 5 per cent of the total.
Protecting our ocean world for the future requires a rapid evolution in thinking and action. Three years ago, almost 200 countries made a commitment to increase the protected area of the oceans by 700 per cent by 2012. That would cover 10 per cent of all ocean areas under national jurisdiction.
The protection has increased since then, but at a fraction of the pace needed if we are to meet this target. Since the end of 2005, the total global marine protected area has increased from 2.2 to 2.9 million square kilometres - a huge achievement, representing a 30 per cent increase, but simply not enough. More than 99 per cent of the world's oceans are completely unprotected.
If we act only where we have ample data, the action will always be too little, too late when viewed against the vastness of the ocean realm and the consequences of human use. Countless species and habitats will be lost before they are even discovered and described.
Our future strategy must play to current strengths, but also protect us from our ignorance. As we consider how to increase the protection of our oceans, we need to move beyond individual habitats and species to ecosystem and marine 'landscape' scale actions.
While we do have more than 4,500 individual marine protected areas across our oceans, it is striking that 10 of these cover 74 per cent of the total area of protected ocean.
The US declaration on marine national monuments is a significant step in the right direction, yet, another 28 countries need to do the same in the next three years if we are to meet our modest target of protecting 10 per cent of ocean areas under national jurisdiction.
The American initiative encapsulates the approach developing in several areas around the globe. 'Going large,' either through very large individual marine protected areas or through networks of smaller ones, is the most efficient way to secure the wildlife and a renewed stream of benefits that we can use - be it tourism or sustaining local communities and industries.
In short, the network of marine protected areas - both large and small - needs to grow, and it needs to grow fast.
A renewed interest in large-scale marine mapping and making the most of new technologies is one of the best ways to help us decide where and what to protect, especially the areas of ocean outside the jurisdiction of any individual country - the High Seas.
We also need expeditions to study and document new habitats and species. We need initiatives to complement the mapping to make oceans more 'visible' to the public. More and better information about our oceans can only help make better decisions about their future.
The recent launch of Ocean in Google Earth is a major step in this direction as it provides a highly accessible, visual and user-friendly source of information on how we have used and abused the seas, and how we can better manage and protect them.
The use of new communication technology illustrates how our impact on our oceans is reaching a tipping point, at which the conditions that nurtured and supported life on Earth over the millennia change to something far less desirable.
Now is the time to implement large-scale protection that many countries have already agreed to and should be delivering by 2012.
However disconnected you may feel from the oceans, remember that every breath you take, every sip of water you drink and even the very balance of salt in your blood ties you and every one of us to the fate of our oceans and seas. -- IHT
Dan Laffoley is marine vice-chairman of IUCN's World Commission on Protected Areas and one of the advisers for Ocean in Google Earth.
Sylvia Earle is explorer-in-residence at the National Geographical Society, founder of the Deep Search Foundation and lead adviser for Ocean in Google Earth.
It will have enough for 1.3m people; those at high risk, kids to get priority
Salma Khalik, Straits Times 17 Feb 09;
SINGAPORE is stepping up its defences against a possible bird flu pandemic with the purchase of enough vaccines for 1.3 million people.
Vaccines give the best protection against the flu, but the one for H5N1 or bird flu became available only in 2007.
The original defence against a bird flu pandemic was to give the more than 50,000 'essential' people, such as doctors and policemen, six weeks' supply of Tamiflu, an antiviral drug that reduces the effects of the illness by preventing the bug from multiplying.
But there has been growing resistance to the drug recently, which could mean it might be less effective in the event of a bird flu pandemic.
This past winter, the northern hemisphere has thrown up a 15 per cent resistance to the medicine in another flu strain - the H1N1 - up from 1 per cent the previous winter.
The vaccine Singapore will be spending tens of millions of dollars to buy is targeted at the H5N1 or bird flu virus. It is not effective against other strains of flu. So if the next pandemic is not the H5N1, the vaccines would be useless.
This is why Singapore is also increasing its stockpile of Tamiflu, an antiviral drug that works for all flu strains.
By the end of this year, Singapore will have 1.7 million courses, up from the original 1.05 million courses. Each course consists of 10 capsules which are taken over five days. It also has 50,000 courses of Relenza, another antiviral.
The United States has stockpiled about 26 million doses of the H5N1 vaccine. Countries like Switzerland and Ireland have enough for their entire population. Singapore expects to get its 2.6 million doses within six months.
For the vaccine to be effective, people need to get two doses three weeks apart.
The plan is to start vaccinating the moment the World Health Organisation declares an increase in human-to-human transmission.
For the moment, these transmissions remain rare.
A Ministry of Health spokesman said the vaccines will be given to essential staff, as well as children and people at high risk, such as transplant patients.
She added: 'A person who is vaccinated may still suffer from flu-like illness as the vaccine is not 100 per cent protective. Such a person will then be given Tamiflu as treatment.'
Infectious disease experts say it is just a matter of time before another deadly influenza or flu pandemic sweeps the world. More than 40 million people died in the Spanish flu pandemic in 1918.
The pandemics of 1957 and 1968 spanned the globe in just six months, killing two million and over one million people respectively.
Should the next pandemic be caused by the H5N1 or bird flu virus, the results could be lethal.
More than half the 407 people who have been hit by bird flu so far have died of it.
salma@sph.com.sg
Should the next pandemic be caused by the H5N1 or bird flu virus, the results could be lethal. More than half the 407 people who have been hit by bird flu so far have died of it.
# The vaccine Singapore is stockpiling is targeted at the H5N1 or bird flu virus.
# For it to be effective, people need two doses three weeks apart.
Jaswinder Kaur New Straits Times 17 Feb 09;
Pulau Sipadan is one of 261 nominees in the New7Wonders of Nature online campaign, alongside Ko Phi Phi in Thailand, the Maldives, the Grand Canyon and Niagara Falls on the Canada-United States border and Australia's Great Barrier Reef. A panel of experts will reduce the list to 21 on July 21. To vote for Sipadan, log on to www.new7wonders.com/nature
A QUARTER of a century ago, Pulau Sipadan was a sleepy island shaded by coconut trees. Very few divers had ventured into its blue-green waters in the Celebes Sea to discover the wonders of its marine life.
Sipadan found itself on the world stage when renowned ocean adventurer Jacques Cousteau showcased what it had to offer in a film entitled Ghost of the Sea Turtles, describing it as an "untouched piece of art".
By 1990, small wooden resorts began appearing on the beaches of Sipadan, which is about the size of 30 football fields.
Just a 90-minute speedboat ride from Sabah's east coast town of Semporna, divers found themselves swimming with fish in almost every imaginable colour, and exploring a diversity of corals only seen at top dive sites.
Stories started appearing in special interest magazines around the world, highlighting another interesting fact -- shaped something like a mushroom, Sipadan is an oceanic island formed by corals that grew on top of an extinct undersea volcano rising 600 metres from the sea bed.
Gazetted as a bird sanctuary under the Land Ordinance during British rule in 1933, it was pushed once again into the world's focus nine years ago. But this time for the wrong reasons.
Gunmen kidnapped 21 people, Malaysians and foreign tourists, and took them to the southern Philippines. All were released in stages within a year.
Despite the setback, divers continued to come and Sabah received the best news ever two years later when the International Court of Justice at the Hague ruled that Sipadan and nearby Ligitan belonged to Malaysia, in a 16-1 majority verdict over Indonesia.
By September 2003, a joint state and federal committee on the management and supervision of Sipadan and Ligitan was established. This was followed with a directive to the five dive operators to vacate the island by Dec 31, 2004.
The move was made not only for security reasons, but also to protect the island's barracudas, large schools of trevally, turtles, coral gardens and macro-life such as mantis shrimps.
In the last four years, a maximum of 120 day-trippers have been allowed to dive at Sipadan each day.
Almost three years ago, a barge laden with construction material scraped a portion of corals, leading to a huge outcry in the diving fraternity.
Though the headlines then were alarming, with one screaming "Sipadan reefs probably lost forever", scientist Dr Elizabeth Wood, who first visited the island in its pre-diving era, said Storm Greg in 1996 damaged some shallow water reefs while the increase in water temperature had contributed to coral bleaching.
An officer from the British-based Marine Conservation Society said reefs close to the jetty had suffered from years of pressure from divers and boats, while Marine Research Foundation director Dr Nicolas Pilcher said reports on the "barge incident" were exaggerated, pointing out that schools of bumphead parrotfish that roam over reefs do similar damage.
Despite some bumps on the road, Sipadan is today still on the "must-do" list for divers.
FAO 16 Feb 09;
Overfishing, bycatch and discards need to be urgently addressed - FAO calls for more comprehensive management of fisheries
16 February 2009, Rome - Reducing fishing capacity and limiting access to shrimp fisheries, is likely to mitigate overfishing, bycatch and seabed destruction, some of the major economic and environmental side-effects of shrimp fishing, according to a new report FAO published today.
The Global study of shrimp fisheries reviews current problems and solutions of shrimp fishing in ten selected countries: Australia, Cambodia, Indonesia, Kuwait, Madagascar, Mexico, Nigeria, Norway, Trinidad and Tobago and the United States.
"For millions of poor vulnerable households, shrimp fishing is an important source of cash and employment," said Jeremy Turner, Chief of the FAO Fishing Technology Service.
"But shrimp fishing is also associated with overfishing, capture of juveniles of ecologically important and economically valuable species, coastal habitat degradation, illegal trawling, the destruction of seagrass beds and conflicts between artisanal and industrial fisheries," Turner said.
"With a precautionary and ecosystem approach, many of the problems caused by shrimp fishing can be mitigated - shrimp fishing, including shrimp trawling, is certainly manageable. Promoting sustainable shrimp fishing management schemes, reducing fishing capacity and addressing the issue of open access are crucial to offer shrimp fisheries a secure future. In restricted access regimes with secure tenure, there is a long-term relationship between fishers and the fishery resource, hence a powerful incentive for conserving shrimp resources for the future."
The report cites Australia's prawn fisheries and some cold-water shrimp fisheries as some of the best managed fisheries in the world, based on fishers' participation, managed bycatch, reduced discards and the use of property rights in management.
Shrimp fishing
Shrimps and prawns are one of the most important internationally traded fishery products, with a value of $10 billion, or 16 percent of global fishery exports. Shrimp fisheries generate substantial economic benefits, especially for many developing countries.
But the economic importance of shrimp needs to be reconciled with the considerable concern about the environmental impacts of shrimp fishing, the report stresses. Overfishing, for example, is rampant, although resources have not yet collapsed despite heavy fishing pressure.
Bycatch
Shrimp fishing, especially trawling in tropical regions, produces large amounts of bycatch that is either discarded or kept on board. Bycatch can become a serious problem when living resources are wasted, populations of endangered and rare species are threatened and fish stocks that are already heavily exploited are further impacted. Bycatch often includes the catch of juveniles of important commercial fish species (cod, rockfish, red snapper, croaker, king mackerel, Spanish mackerel and weakfish) as well as sea turtles.
FAO estimates that shrimp trawl fisheries are the single greatest source of discards.
While reducing bycatch in small-scale shrimp fisheries is extremely difficult, future bycatch reduction should focus largely on medium and large-scale shrimp fisheries, where some remarkable reductions have already been achieved, applying modifications to fishing gear, catch quotas, discard bans and improvements in bycatch handling and marketing, the report says.
Fisheries management
In many countries, weak agencies dealing with fisheries, lack of political will and an inadequate legal foundation cause failures in management, the report says. "These factors, which can be encountered in all fisheries across the world, are largely responsible for the lack of success, rather than any inherent unmanageable qualities of shrimp fishing gear or practices."
The report urges countries to make agencies more effective and provide legislation to support rights-based and dedicated access-systems.
The upcoming edition of FAO's biennial report The State of World Fisheries and Aquaculture, set to be released on 2 March 2009, contains a special chapter that looks at shrimp fisheries
WWF 16 Feb 09;
Vancouver, Canada - More than 40 per cent of world fish production is unsustainable according to a new study, which finds that the 53 countries that account for 96 per cent of the global catch are evading the international fishing code to some degree.
The report, carried out by WWF in conjunction with the University of British Columbia, Canada, and the Federal University of Rio Grande, Brazil, found that 28 of those countries accounting for 40 per cent of the global catch completely fail to follow the United Nations Code of Conduct for Responsible Fisheries.
The code is a non-binding scheme developed in 1995 to fight the intensive exploitation of fish resources. Among the recommendations of the new report is to transform this voluntary code into a new international legal regulation covering all aspects of fisheries management.
The report evaluated intentions to comply with the code as well as the effectiveness of day-to-day compliance. No country achieved a “good” score. The best compliance of 60 per cent was found in Norway, followed closely by the United States, Canada, Australia and Iceland. North Korea was ranked lowest, complying with just 10 per cent of the code.
The questions on which countries scored worst concerned introducing ecosystem-based management, controlling illegal fishing, reducing excess fishing capacity and minimizing by-catch and destructive fishing practices.
Although Europe had some of the highest scores, disappointing scores from some European Union nations with the undoubted resources and know-how to implement the code reinforced the impression of a low priority given to improving fisheries management.
Compliance scores from developed nations were on average twice as high as those from developing nations, although some developing countries such as Malaysia and Namibia did score well. Another of the report’s recommendations is to provide aid for developing countries to address specific problems.
Alister Doyle, PlanetArk 17 Feb 09;
OSLO - The United States and five other nations have called on Iceland's new government to drop a plan to step up whale hunts that whalers say would create jobs in the shattered economy, diplomats said on Monday.
The letter expressed "extreme disappointment" in a decision by the former government, which quit down last month over the island's financial collapse, to permit annual catches of 150 fin and 100 minke whales.
"We call on Iceland to reconsider this decision and focus on the advancement of the (International Whaling) Commission, and the long-term rather than the short-term interests of the whaling industry," it said.
The letter, seen by Reuters, was signed in Reykjavik, by senior diplomats of the United States, Germany, Britain, France, Finland and Sweden. An international moratorium on whaling has been in force since 1986.
The new government of Prime Minister Johanna Sigurdardottir, which took office this month, has said it will review the decision to resume whaling.
Iceland ended a 20-year ban on commercial whaling in August 2006, issuing quotas that ran through August 2007. After a temporary halt, the country resumed whaling in May last year, despite protests by environmentalists.
As one of its last acts before it resigned over the economic crisis, the centre-right administration of Prime Minister Geir Haarde announced in January that Reykjavik would set five-year quotas for fin and minke whales.
Whalers have placed advertisements in Icelandic newspapers this year saying the hunts could bolster the economy by creating jobs for exporting whale meat to Japan.
"Whaling belongs to the past," said Martin Norman of environmental group Greenpeace. "There's no real market for the meat in Japan. This won't create jobs."
Fin whales are rated as endangered by the international Union for Conservation of Nature, which groups governments, scientists and conservation groups. Minkes are not among threatened species and are plentiful in the Atlantic.
(Editing by Jon Boyle)
Seven countries urge Iceland to reconsider whaling quota
Yahoo News 17 Feb 09;
REYKJAVIK (AFP) – Seven countries including Britain, Germany and the United States have urged Iceland to reconsider a decision to increase its whaling quota sixfold, a copy of a letter obtained by AFP Tuesday showed.
Iceland's former government announced the increase in late January as one of its last moves, but a new left-wing interim government that came to power just days later said it would reconsider the increase.
"We are writing to you today to express our governments' extreme disappointment in the decision of your predecessor to issue a quota for 150 fin and 100 minke whales to be harvested in Icelandic waters," ambassadors and charge d'affaires from the seven countries wrote in the letter to Icelandic Fisheries Minister Steingrimur Sigfusson.
"We applaud your interest in re-evaluating this decision," they said in the letter dated February 12, adding: "We call on Iceland to reconsider this decision."
The other countries that signed the letter were Finland, France, the Netherlands and Sweden.
Prior to the recent announcement, Iceland, which pulled out of an international whaling moratorium in 2006 after 16 years, had a quota of just nine fin whales and 40 minke whales per year.
"It is critical that the continuation or expansion of Iceland's commercial harvest or international trade in whale meat does not undermine goodwill or hamper progress in resolving issues pending before the (International Whaling) Commission," the letter said.
Iceland and Norway are the only two countries in the world that authorise commercial whaling. Japan officially hunts whales for scientific purposes, although the whale meat is sold for consumption.
Debora MacKenzie, New Scientist 16 Feb 09;
THE world's honeybees appear to be dying off in horrifying numbers, and now consensus is starting to emerge on the reason why: it seems there is no one cause. Infections, lack of food, pesticides and breeding - none catastrophic on their own - are having a synergistic effect, pushing bee survival to a lethal tipping point. A somewhat anti-climactic conclusion it may be, but appreciating this complexity - and realising there will be no magic bullet - may be the key to saving the insects.
A third of our food relies on bees for pollination. Both the US and UK report losing a third of their bees last year. Other European countries have seen major die-offs too: Italy, for example, said it lost nearly half its bees last year. The deaths are now spreading to Asia, with reports in India and suspected cases in China.
But while individual "sub-lethal stresses" such as infections are implicated, we know little about how they add together. The situation should become clearer in the next few years as the US government, the EU and others are pouring money into bee research. The UK, for example, has doubled its annual research budget, allocating £400,000 a year for the next five years.
On top of that, the UK National Bee Unit will get £2.3 million to map the problem. This money is urgently needed, says Peter Neumann of the Swiss Bee Research Centre in Berne, who runs COLLOSS, a network of researchers studying colony loss in 36 countries. "We don't have the data to assess the situation in Europe, never mind the world," he says.
The main stress facing bees is the varroa mite, a parasite from Siberia that has now spread everywhere but Australia. Mite infestations steeply reduce bees' resistance to viral infection. Worryingly, the mites are developing resistance to the pesticides used to control them, forcing beekeepers to use methods that are often less effective.
French and German beekeepers blame their losses on insecticides called neonicotinoids - but France banned them 10 years ago and its bees are still dying. Neumann suspects a wider problem, citing experiments showing that agricultural chemicals that are safe for bees when used alone are lethal in combination. "Farmers increasingly combine sprays," he says. They also leave few flowering weeds, depriving bees of essential nutrients from different kinds of pollen, he adds.
Meanwhile viruses may cause a syndrome dubbed colony collapse disorder (CCD) in the US, in which adult bees abandon their hive, leaving the healthy queen and young bees to die. Diana Cox-Foster of Penn State University in University Park, where the syndrome was first identified, says viruses, including one called IAPV, duplicate the symptoms of CCD in her greenhouse studies. There is no IAPV or CCD in the UK, says Mike Brown of the National Bee Unit, yet bees are still dying.
At the root of the vulnerability to these stresses could be the way breeding has affected the bees' genetic make-up. By being highly selected for calmness and honey production, honeybees have lost other useful characteristics, says Francis Ratnieks of the University of Sussex, UK. In research to be published in the journal Heredity, he describes a way to breed for "hygienic" bees that, unlike most commercial bees, clear out infected young and can resist varroa mites.
Ker Than, National Geographic News 16 Feb 09;
Jaguars and other big cats can protect humans from the rise of future pandemics akin to HIV and bird flu.
That's the message freshly trained "doctor conservationists" will be taking into the field as part of a new collaboration between a wildlife-protection nonprofit and a teaching hospital.
In Central and South America, jaguars are often labeled as "cattle killers" and are slaughtered on sight. The species is also at risk of declining genetic health as its habitat contracts and populations are cut off from each other.
"If the animals are forced to stay instead of travel, that can lead to a loss of fitness and create a cascade down the health ladder," said Alan Rabinowitz, president and CEO of the big-cat conservation group Panthera.
"Once that cascade has been set off, it has been shown through data to directly link to increases in disease among neighboring human populations."
Curing and Educating
A decline in top-level predators such as the jaguar can lead to a boom in prey populations that encourages the spread of disease.
Some of those diseases can then become zoonotic, jumping from animals to humans. (Read related news about decoding deadly variants of the bird flu virus.)
HIV, West Nile virus, and avian influenza, for example, are "reemerging diseases which have always been in the environment, but [until recently] they've been kept in check and didn't bleed over into human populations," Rabinowitz said.
As part of its broader efforts to protect big cats, New York-based Panthera has partnered with the Mount Sinai Medical Center to train doctors in the human-health benefits of saving the animals.
"The program is being formulated now, but we have high hopes for it," said Paul Klotman, chair of Mount Sinai's Samuel Bronfman Department of Medicine.
Cat experts from Panthera will teach at the hospital, and medical students will have opportunities to administer health care in parts of the world where humans and wildlife often live under an uneasy truce.
A major goal of the new program is to give students a deeper understanding about the links between animal and human diseases, said Mary Klotman, director of Mount Sinais Global Health and Emerging Pathogens Institute.
"I think what we're doing is to try and introduce the concept more broadly into medical education," Klotman said, "so that it's not just the high-level investigators that understand this interaction."
Jaguar Network
Armed with this unique training, the program's doctor-conservationists will be providing an incentive for local people to tolerate jaguars, Panthera's Rabinowitz said.
"Almost all of the local communities that we interview and ask, What do you need?, two of the top answers have been, Better education for my children and better health for my family," he said.
"The affiliation with Mount Sinai helps with the health part."
The work should boost efforts to establish so-called genetic corridors, paths of sheltered habitat that cross through human-populated areas to connect existing wildlife preserves. (Read more about creating safe passage for jaguars in National Geographic magazine.)
Panthera's Jaguar Corridor Initiative would link approximately 90 distinct jaguar populations through a network of paths in Central and South America.
The organizations Tiger Corridor Initiative will attempt to do the same thing in Southeast Asia.
"A genetic corridor can look like a complete human landscape," Rabinowitz said.
"But if one jaguar or tiger can make it through that landscape to the next viable population, that single animal is enough to maintain the genetic diversity of the species as a whole."
At AAAS, a researcher describes how treating more people for the mosquito-borne parasite could lead to more resistance to drugs
Andrew McGlashen, Scientific American 16 Feb 09;
CHICAGO – Warmer temperatures are at least partly to blame for a surge in malaria in East Africa and the increase in drug-resistant strains of the disease, according to a University of Michigan researcher.
The malaria parasite is highly sensitive to changes in temperature, and even subtle warming can dramatically increase populations of the mosquitoes that transmit the disease, said ecologist Mercedes Pascual.
Some scientists have argued that climate is not involved in the increasing highland epidemics. Instead, they say, adaptations in the parasite that make it resistant to anti-malarial drugs are the key drivers.
But Pascual said that this "either-or" view is misguided and improperly lets global warming off the hook.
"I think that’s a useless discussion," she said.
More likely, Pascual said, the two work in tandem to an effect greater than the sum of their parts, with rising temperatures leading to faster development of drug resistance.
"The literature has this controversy of 'Is it climate or is it drug resistance?' and drug resistance is taken as evidence that we don’t need to invoke climate change," she added.
No research has shown this synergy, but Pascual said it makes theoretical sense.
By making conditions favorable for mosquitoes, "warmer temperatures increase transmission, so you’re going to increase the number of people you treat," she said. And past research has shown a threshold at which treating more cases leads to a higher incidence of drug resistance, making the disease difficult to treat and contain.
Malaria kills 3,000 people each day in Africa, and outbreaks on the continent aren't limited to the eastern highlands. Climate change will cause the disease to migrate away from low latitudes, scientists say. That could rid some areas of outbreaks, but could cause others in regions whose inhabitants haven't developed any immunity.
The specifics of how malaria's climate-forced migration will affect outbreaks are largely unknown, but it's already underway, said Christopher Thomas of Aberystwyth University in the U.K.
"It’s now," he said. "The change isn’t coming at the end of the century – it's happening right now."
Douglas Fischer is editor of the Daily Climate. This article originally appeared at The Daily Climate, the climate change news source published by Environmental Health Sciences, a nonprofit media company.
Fidelis E. Satriastanti, Jakarta Globe 17 Feb 09;
The State Ministry for the Environment said on Monday that it still had no suspects in connection with the fires that have ravaged forests in Riau Province, despite allegations that the fires were deliberately set by private forestry firms.
Massive forest fires have been burning in industrial timber estates in the districts of Indragiri Hulu, Indragiri Hilir, Siak and Pelalawan since January, and the local government’s efforts to contain the flames have so far failed.
“We are still questioning a number of people,” said Ilyas Asaad, the deputy minister for environmental compliance. “But we do not have any suspects yet.”
Ilyas refused to name the people being questioned, but claimed that investigations were on the right track.
“We have been conducting field investigations and we have come to the conclusion that the fires were caused by human activities,” he said.
Local forestry firms are known to use fires to reduce forest cover in order to expand the area available for palm oil, wood pulp and rubber plantations.
According to the 1997 Law on Environmental Management, a party that deliberately causes environmental damage could face a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison and a Rp 500 million ($42,500) fine.
However, Johny Mundung, executive director of the Riau branch of the Indonesian Forum for the Environment, or Walhi, said that the government had never been serious about dealing with the annual forest fires that cause heavy smoke pollution on Sumatra Island and in neighboring Malaysia and Singapore.
“The truth is the local government has not taken any significant legal approach to settle this matter once and for all,” he said.
Johny also criticized the local government for setting aside part of its yearly budget to combat the fires.
“It is ridiculous that they even allocate a budget for that every year,” he said. “That means they see the forest fires as some sort of annual project that they can look forward to.”
Johny said that more than 42,000 hectares of land, mostly peatland and rubber plantations, were affected by the fires this week, up from 32,000 hectares last week.
“The districts are affected by forest fires every year because they are dominated by peatland and rubber plantation areas,” he said.
“The investigators should investigate the companies that manage the land if they want to learn who started the fires.”
Johny also refuted a district head’s claim that the fires were not man-made.
“There is no way that the fires were induced by natural causes,” he said.
He said the haze from the forest fires was causing health problems among residents, many of whom have complained of vision-related problems and breathing difficulties.
According to the Pekanbaru office of the Meteorology and Geophysics Agency, or BMG, 29 areas in Riau Province are at risk of being overrun by the flames.
The at-risk areas are also known as “hot spots.”
Meanwhile, the state-run Antara news agency reported that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration satellite showed that there were 34 hot spots in the province.
PlanetArk 17 Feb 09;
JAKARTA - Indonesia will open up peatland forests for plantation crops such as palm oil after freezing new permits for more than a year, an agriculture ministry official said on Monday, in a move that has alarmed green groups.
Achmad Mangga Barani, director general for plantations at the ministry, said that the government was lifting the moratorium brought in December, 2007, after a study in order to boost the welfare of local people.
"In principle, we will allow the use of peatlands for plantations under a stricter criteria and a very limited scale," he said.
Green groups had urged the government to maintain a freeze of oil palm plantations in peatlands to combat climate change.
Indonesia's remaining peatland forests are one of the world's largest stores of carbon, holding around 37.8 billion tonnes, according to Greenpeace.
A report sponsored by the World Bank and Britain's Department for International Development says up to 84 percent of Indonesia's carbon emissions come from deforestation, forest fires and peatland degradation.
Barani said the government had discussed the new decree with environmental groups.
"We think it is a crazy proposal," Martin Baker, communications manager at Greenpeace International in Asia, said.
Bustar Maitar, forest campaigner for Greenpeace, said the decree appeared to be setting stricter criteria after the study, but he said the results had not been shared with the group.
"We understand that there was a study and the government promised to discuss with us the result of the study but we have never seen the result," said Maitar.
Barani said details of the new ministerial decree were due to be released on Tuesday.
Indonesia, the world's biggest producer of crude palm oil, expects palm oil output to rise about 5 percent to 19.7 million tonnes this year, against 18.7 million tonnes in 2008.
(Reporting by Aloysius Bhui; Editing by Ed Davies)
Govt to allow peatland plantations
Adianto P. Simamora Jakarta Post 13 Feb 09;
The Agriculture Ministry will issue a decree to allow businesses to dig up the country’s millions of hectares of peatland for oil palm plantations.
Gatot Irianto, the ministry’s head of research and development, said his office was currently drafting a ministerial decree that would explain in detail the mechanism to turn the peatland areas into oil palm plantations, a move that many say will further damage the country’s environment.
“We still need land for oil palm plantations. We must be honest: the sector has been the main driver for the people’s economy,” he said Thursday on the sidelines of a discussion about adaptation in agriculture, organized by the National Commission on Climate Change.
The draft decree is expected to go into force this year.
“We’ve discussed the draft with stakeholders, including hard-line activists, to convince them that converting peatland is safe,” he said.
“We promise to promote eco-friendly management to ward off complaints from overseas buyers and international communities.”
Indonesia is currently the world’s largest crude palm oil (CPO) producer, and is expected to produce about 19.5 million tons this year.
Overseas buyers, however, have complained about Indonesia’s CPO products, saying they are produced at the expense of the environment.
Activists point to the massive expansions of plantations, including in peatlands, for the deaths of large numbers of orangutans in Kalimantan and Sumatra and for releasing huge amounts of carbon emissions into the atmosphere.
Indonesia has about 20 million hectares of dense, black tropical peat swamps — formed when vegetation rots — that are natural carbon storage sinks.
A hectare of peatland can store between 3,400 and 4,000 tons of carbon dioxide (CO2), but emits a much larger amount when burned.
Asked about the contribution to global warming, Gatot said trees planted in peatlands would absorb greenhouse gas emissions.
“The peatland will produce emissions only in the opening of the land, but this will be reabsorbed after new trees are planted,” he said.
However, a World Bank report from 2007 showed Indonesia was the world’s third biggest carbon emitter after the US and China, thanks mainly to the burning of peatlands.
A Wetlands International report from 2006 said Indonesia’s peatlands emitted around 2 billion
tons of CO2 a year, far higher than the country’s emissions from energy, agriculture and waste,
which together amount to only 451 million tons.
The country would have ranked 20th in the global carbon emitter list if emissions from peatlands were not counted.
The ministerial decree is being drafted at a time when President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono is still preparing a decree on peatland management in an effort to help combat global warming.
The draft of the presidential decree, drawn up in 2007, calls for tightened supervision on the use of peatlands across the country.
Activists denounce plan to allow palm oil firms in peatlands
Adianto P. Simamora, The Jakarta Post 16 Feb 09;
Environmental activists have mounted a challenge against the government’s plan to allow palm oil companies to set up plantations in the country’s remaining peatlands.
Greenpeace Southeast Asia says the plan runs counter to President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s promise to halve emissions from the forestry sector by 2009. The President made the pledge during the climate change conference in Bali in 2007 and at the G7 summit in Hokkaido, Japan, last year.
“Opening up peatlands would cause huge carbon emissions into the atmosphere that can’t be compensated for, including by oil palm trees,” Greenpeace forest campaigner Yuyun Indradi told The Jakarta Post on Sunday.
He called on Yudhoyono to take action to halt the conversion of peatlands, or risk the failure of efforts to tackle climate change.
“The government needs to protect the remaining peatlands and forests if we are to slow down climate change and protect the livelihoods of forest-dependent communities and biodiversity,” he said.
The government has promised to cut emissions, including from the forestry sector, by 50 percent in 2009, 75 percent in 2012, and 95 percent in 2025.
The National Action Plan on mitigation and adaptation on climate change revealed the country’s agriculture sector contributed up to 96.42 million tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions in 2005.
The Agriculture Ministry said it would issue a decree this year allowing businesses to open up peatlands for oil palm plantations, as part of efforts to boost the country’s crude palm oil (CPO) production.
Ecosys, a European-based institute dealing with energy, carbon and biofuel issues, estimates that peatlands planted with oil palms would emit about 0.46 kilograms of CO2 per megajoule (MJ).
Indonesia has about 20 million hectares of dense, black tropical peat swamps that are natural carbon storage sinks.
Fitrian Ardiansyah, head of WWF Indonesia’s climate change and energy program, said the government should prioritize exploiting millions of hectares of idle land if it wanted to expand the CPO business.
“We currently have more than 7 million hectares of idle land. Why does the government not utilize this before opening up forests or peatlands?” he said.
Demand for CPO has risen globally, spurred on by the development of the biofuel industry.
However, scientists warn the use of crop-based biofuels could speed up rather than slow down global warming, by fueling the destruction of rainforests.
Once heralded as the answer to oil, biofuels have become increasingly controversial because of their impact on food prices and the amount of energy it takes to produce them.
They may also be responsible for pumping far more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere than they could possibly save as a replacement for fossil fuels, according to a study released Saturday.
“If we run our cars on biofuels produced in the tropics, chances will be good that we are effectively burning rainforests in our gas tanks,” Holly Gibbs, of Stanford’s Woods Institute for the Environment, was quoted as saying by AFP.
Gibbs studied satellite photos of the tropics from 1980 to 2000, and found that half of new farmland came from intact rainforests, with another 30 percent from disturbed forests.
“When trees are cut down to make room for new farmland, they are usually burned, sending their stored carbon into the atmosphere as CO2,” Gibbs said.
For high-yield crops like sugarcane, it would take 40 to 120 years to pay back this carbon debt.
For lower yield crops like corn or soybeans, it would take 300 to 1,500 years, she told reporters at a meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
“Biofuels have caused alarm because of how quickly production has been growing: global ethanol production increased by four times and biodiesel by 10 times between 2000 and 2007,” she said.
“Moreover, agricultural subsidies in Indonesia and in the United States are providing added incentives to increase production of these crops.”
Gibbs estimated that anywhere from a third to two-thirds of recent deforestation could be as a result of the increased demand for biofuels, but added an increased demand for food and feed also played a major role.
Much of the expansion of cropland in response to growing demand and rising prices is occurring in the tropics, where there is an abundance of arable land and an ideal growing climate for biofuel crops like sugarcane, soybeans and oil palms.
IUCN website 13 Feb 09;
It is tempting to jump to the conclusion that the disastrous fires are linked to climate change.
IUCN extends its sympathies to those who have suffered from the extreme fires in south-eastern Australia, especially to those who have lost family, friends and their homes.
South-eastern Australia ranks with southern France and southern California (USA) as being the areas most prone areas to severe risk of harmful fires. Fires are part of the Australian environment and have been a key factor in forming many of the unique ecosystems of the country. At the same time, fires that occur during periods of extreme weather can have devastating impact on human communities, such as those witnessed in Victoria in the past few days.
The death toll of the fires in Victoria, Australia is expected to exceed 200. More than 3,000 km2 has been burnt and over 900 houses destroyed. Immense damage to farmland and natural areas will escalate the damage bill and take years to restore. Fires are part of the Australian landscape and Victoria has one of the world’s best organized and equipped fire fighting forces. The long period of exceptionally high temperatures and wind combine to create conditions where extreme fires overwhelm fire-fighting capacity.
Understanding the direct and underlying causes of fires, their relationship to how ecosystems are managed and their associated societal and economic costs is essential to addressing fire risks in a systematic fashion.
It is tempting to jump to the conclusion that the disastrous fires are linked to climate change. Recent reports from the Australian Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) suggest that global warming is likely to increase the frequency and intensity of fire-weather, which in turn would alter the distribution and composition of ecosystems, change water yields from catchments, increase damage to property and the risk of injury and death to humans, amongst other impacts. However, whether or not climate change is a factor in the recent fires is less important than supporting the efforts of the government and local communities to manage local ecosystems and plan land use and fire management in a way that anticipates severe fires as a fact of life.
IUCN encourages its members and Commission members to support the efforts of the Victorian government to assist the communities devastated by the fires to rebuild their lives and restore damaged property and ecosystems.
Raymond Colitt, PlanetArk 17 Feb 09;
CORUMBA - Jaguars still roam the world's largest wetland and endangered Hyacinth Macaws nest in its trees but advancing farms and industries are destroying Brazil's Pantanal region at an alarming rate.
The degradation of the landlocked river delta on the upper Paraguay River which straddles Brazil's borders with Bolivia and Paraguay is a reminder of how economic progress can cause large-scale environmental damage.
"It's a type of Noah's Ark but it risks running aground," biologist and tourist guide Elder Brandao de Oliveira says of the Pantanal.
Brazil's exports of beef, iron and to a lesser extent soy -- the main products from the Pantanal -- have rocketed in recent years, driven largely by global demand.
Less well-known than the Amazon rain forest, the Pantanal is larger than England and harbors a huge fresh water reserve and extraordinary wildlife, ranging from 220-pound (100-kg) jaguars to giant otters that mingle in water holes packed with nine-foot (3-metre) caimans.
The world's largest freshwater wetland, it is almost 10 times the size of Florida's Everglades.
Of the Pantanal's 650 bird species, the largest has a wingspan of nearly 3 metres and the smallest weighs only 2 grams (0.07 ounce).
During the rainy season the water level rises by as much as five metres, creating a mosaic of dark-brown swamps with islands of shrubs and tall standing tropical trees. When the water first hits dry soil it loses oxygen and kills schools of fish as part of a nose-wrenching natural life cycle.
A melting pot for various ecosystems, the Pantanal has the greatest concentration of fauna in the Americas, according to The Nature Conservancy, a global environmental advocacy group.
But some species are in danger of disappearing, including the long-snouted giant anteater, which claws into anthills and flicks its two-foot tongue up to 160 times per minute to quickly gobble up stinging ants.
The giant armadillo and maned wolf are also on the list of endangered species because of their falling numbers.
Visitors to the Pantanal marvel at the idyllic scenery and the proximity and abundance of wildlife.
"I hadn't heard about it before, it's a bird-lovers' paradise," said Alkis Ieromonachou, a Cypriot tourist, eyeing a group of giant Jabiru storks from the deck of a bungalow.
The impact of modern farming is obvious even in the tourist resort, however, as a large herd of cattle wanders through the swamp, squashing floating lily pads.
Cattle ranchers cut trees on higher elevations and sow pasture in the lowlands, which are flooded for months. Many say they have been here for decades and can't be expected to abandon the land and their livelihood.
"True, deforestation is a problem but 50 years ago when it began nobody thought of these things," said Ademar Silva, head of the local association of farmers and cattle ranchers. "The government needs not only to punish bad behaviour but promote new technology with financial incentives."
ECONOMIC PRESSURES
Brazil's beef exports have more than tripled in five years to $5 billion in 2008, with pasture often replacing forests. Experts say improving productivity, from currently around one head of cattle per hectare (2.5 acres), could prevent much deforestation.
"We're using our natural resources fast and inefficiently," said environmental economist Andre Carvalho at the Getulio Vargas Foundation, or FGV.
The environmental group Conservation International says 63 percent of the forest in elevated regions of the Pantanal and 17 percent in lowland regions have been destroyed.
Under a federal law dating back to 1965, ranchers can clear up to 80 percent of the forest on their property. Parks and protected areas make up only a small fraction of the Pantanal, and the rest is largely unprotected.
Demand for charcoal from Brazilian pig iron smelters has accelerated deforestation, environmentalists say.
"We set up shop precisely to use wood from the advancing agricultural frontier," said Vitor Feitosa, operations director for MMX, a smelter located in the Pantanal town Corumba and owned by Brazilian billionaire Ike Batista.
Brazil's pig iron exports have grown sixfold to $3.14 billion since 2003. Around 1.5 million hectares (3.7 million acres) of native forest are lost annually in Mato Grosso do Sul state, home to much of the Pantanal, an FGV study showed.
Marcos Brito, head of a charcoal manufacturers group with 15,000 employees in the state, claims most producers use wood cut and discarded by ranchers. But Alessandro Menezes, an activist with the environmental group ECOA, says they clear forests in exchange for the wood.
After being fined several times, MMX agreed not to buy Pantanal charcoal, but most smelters in the state still do.
Erosion resulting from deforestation has created large sandbanks on tributaries to the Paraguay river, such as the Taquari and Rio Negro, making them partially unnavigable.
"Rivers will change course, lakes appear or disappear -- the size and shape of the Pantanal will change," said Sandro Menezes, manager of Conservation International's Pantanal project. "It's very probable that local flora and fauna will become extinct."
Already, there are signs that runoff water from nearby farms is altering the ecosystem's delicate balance.
"We see trees flower and birds breed earlier -- we believe it's because of fertilizers in the water," said de Oliveira.
The global financial crisis has hit demand for steel and beef and temporarily eased pressure on the Pantanal as smelters and farmers put expansion plans on halt. But most environmentalists agree the next commodity boom could cause irreversible damage.
"Now is the time for stricter laws, environmental education and corporate citizenship," said Ricardo Melo, environmental public prosecutor in Corumba. "Economic development here is inevitable; we need to make it sustainable."
(Editing by Kieran Murray and Alan Elsner)
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