18 Aug (Tue): Prof. Leo Tan on "Confessions of a Nature Addict" from wild shores of singapore
Mangroves in the Mizzle: Pasir Ris
from wild shores of singapore
Guided walk at Sensory Trail
from Urban Forest
Common Kingfisher bashing fish
from Bird Ecology Study Group
Crimson Sunbird stealing nectar from flowers
from Bird Ecology Study Group
Neither capitalism nor communism seems to have got it right, economically speaking. It's time for a new tack
Teh Hooi Ling, Business Times 11 Aug 09;
ADAM Smith (1723-1790) saw the market economy as a near-ideal system. Karl Marx (1818-1883), on the other hand, saw capitalism as a way for the rich to oppress the poor, and hence denounced it as an unpleasant interval on the inevitable path to socialism.
In the last 30 years or so, capitalism has been winning converts, and has been almost universally accepted as the best system available for a country to achieve economic progress. But the recent global financial crisis has exposed the failings of the capitalist system as we know it.
As noted by Tony Tan, deputy chairman and executive director of the Government of Singapore Investment Corporation (GIC), in his speech at the Economic Society of Singapore's annual dinner this week, the major challenge ahead is the uncertainty raised by the apparent failure of Western or American models, and the 'serious unanswered questions on the role of markets and the state, including the appropriate level of regulation and state intervention'.
Many of the world's leading thinkers are now cracking their heads trying to come up with improvements for the current systems. Some answers may well be found in the book The Real Wealth of Nations - Creating a Caring Economics by Riane Eisler. She points out the fundamental flaws in our current system, which range from how the economy is being measured, the way we accord value to different types of activities, and the policies put in place by governments the world over to pursue so-called economic growth. She proposes a way forward - through 'caring economics'.
The flaws
First, let's start with what's wrong with current economic rules and practices. For one, they do not adequately value the most essential human work: the work of caring for ourselves, others and Mother Earth.
The work of housewives is not captured in the measurement of economic prosperity, be it national gross product or national income. But the fact is, housewives perform one of the most important economic functions. Household is the production unit of the most valuable economic resource today: human capital.
And because of how economic prosperity is measured and compared, economic policies are geared towards improving these numbers. As a result, it is more rewarding money-wise to pursue careers in the outside world. The caring and nurturing of the young, sadly in many newly developed countries, is being delegated to foreign domestic helpers.
Here's another insanity, noted Ms Eisler: Economic indicators like GDP and GNP (gross national product) put many of the costs of uncaring business practices on the plus side, rather than on the minus side, of productivity calculations. For example, rather than listing the clean-up costs from negligent oil spills as an economic liability, GNP and GDP include them as part of national productivity. So the billion-dollar cost of the 1989 Exxon-Valdez spill was included in the US GNP. But the reality is, the oil spill killed millions of wild creatures and ruined the livelihood of local people for years and damaged their health. The effects are still being felt today.
Exxon, instead of coming forward to pay for the damage, spent millions of dollars on lawyers - expenses that were included in US GNP. Also included were court costs, cost of the expert witnesses and the 14 million documents they filed.
The enormous economic cost of wars is another example of how the real costs of uncaring economic policies and practices are hidden by current measurements. Again, these costs are put on the plus side. For example, the billions of tax dollars the US government paid to contractors, soldiers and others involved in the Iraq War have been included in GNP, along with the medical costs of all the soldiers maimed in the war and the funeral costs of the thousands killed in it. On top of that, the reconstruction costs of Iraq after the invasion - including fees to large US corporations - are also on the plus side of US GNP.
World War II was credited as the event which pulled the US out of the Great Depression. A few months back, when the recent financial crisis was in its darkest hours, some economists ventured that perhaps only a war could pull the world out of the impending depression!
A large part of how the economic indicators were developed stems from our deep- rooted cultural beliefs and value systems on what is valuable and what is not. These beliefs, Ms Eisler says, can be traced back to earlier times when anything associated with the female half of humanity - such as caring and caregiving - was devalued.
This 'systemic devaluation of the activities that contribute the most to human welfare and development' lies behind some of the economic insanities mentioned above. The bulk of the caring work is not included in GNP and GDP calculations. Caregiving is given little economic policy support. And in the market economy, work that entails caregiving is paid sub-standard wages.
Nurses, kindergarten teachers, child and elderly care service providers don't make big bucks. In the US, plumbers are paid US$50-60 an hour. But childcare workers, people whom we entrust our children to, are paid an average US$10 an hour, according to the US Department of Labor.
In addition, the current US-style capitalist system - to a large extent - is based on domination, as opposed to partnership. In the domination system, one is either the dominator or the dominated. Managements of large corporations are dominators. They control those below them. Economic policies and practices in this system (influenced by powerful lobbies and political campaign contributions) are designed to benefit those on top, at the expense of those at the bottom. Among the assumptions of a domination system are:
# the main motivation for work are fear of pain and scarcity;
# caring and caregiving are impediments to productivity, or at best irrelevant to economics;
# selfishness will lead to the greater good.
The remedy
A much more sensible and realistic economic system, argues Ms Eisler, is one which accords greater value to things and activities that support and advance human survival and human development.
Hence, a caring orientation - concern for the welfare and development of ourselves, others and our natural environment - should be highly valued. Such caring orientation should be fostered in homes, businesses, communities and governments. While not all caring and care- giving activities can be paid for in money, there is a large body of evidence to show that caring policies, be they in a corporation or in a country, do yield significant returns on investment.
For example, Chase Manhattan's investment in back-up childcare services for employees yielded a 115 per cent return on investment (ROI), saving the company 6,900 workdays in just one year. First Tennessee National Corporation found that by transforming its corporate culture into a truly caring one - really putting the interests of employees first - it became the most profitable in its class, by a factor of two. It is consistently the most profitable bank. The bank retains 97 per cent of customers, who are better served by long-term employees who feel valued.
The return on public investment in good childcare is also substantial. A study in 1998 showed that the cost for all Canadian children to participate in high-quality childcare and pre-school programmes would be about C$5.3 billion (S$7.1 billion) per year. But the economic value of additional benefits to children and parents would be C$10.6 billion - a 200 per cent ROI. The authors of the study urged the Canadian government to make high quality childcare and pre-school education a top priority. The collective benefits to society and the workforce of the future would be immense, they said. Elsewhere, the Nordic nations, which orient more closely to the partnership system premised on mutually respectful and caring relations, enjoy a higher quality of life.
Ms Eisler suggests six foundations required for a caring economic system. Among them are a full-spectrum economic map including the household economy, unpaid community economy, market economy, illegal economy, government economy, and natural economy. Two, beliefs and institutions should orient to the partnership system rather than the domination system. There should be more equitable and participatory structures supporting relations rather than the concentration of economic assets and power at the top. Three, government and business rules, policies and practices should encourage and reward caring and caregiving. The rules, policies and practices should meet human needs for materials and for development. Effects of policies and technological breakthroughs on future generations should be considered.
Conclusion
The fact is neither capitalist nor communist systems have been able to solve chronic problems such as environmental degradation, poverty, the violence of war and terrorism that divert and destroy economic resources and blight so many lives. In fact, many of these problems have been the result of both capitalist and communist economic policies, argues Ms Eisler.
As Einstein remarked, we cannot solve problems with the same thinking that created them. Hence a whole new way of looking at economic systems should be considered. There is no better time to start the ball rolling on the movement towards caring economics than now. Perhaps one country which is in a good place to attempt that move is China, given that it is still an economy in transition. Someone noted:
1949 - Only socialism can save China
1979 - Only capitalism can save China
1989 - Only China can save socialism
2009 - Only China can save capitalism.
But is capitalism as we know it worth saving? Perhaps China can evolve its own brand of economics - one that is caring.
# The writer is a CFA charterholder
Philip Merry, Straits Times 11 Aug 09;
I AM British. I have lived in Singapore for 20 years and I think Singapore is one of the best places on earth to live.
Yet, when in conversation with Singaporean friends about what can be improved here, I am often told: 'Well, if you don't like it you can leave!'
I usually retort: 'I love Singapore. I have lived longer here than I have lived anywhere in my 59 years. But that doesn't mean I have to forget my critical faculty.'
This is similar to the reaction of Singaporeans to the recent praise from Canadian Eric Brooks, telling him : 'Well, if you like it so much why don't you become a citizen.'
What is it about Singaporeans that causes such black and white thinking? To me the sign of a great nation - and a great citizen - is pride in the country coupled with the ability to recognise what needs to be improved.
I am proud to be a British citizen but that does not blind me to my country's many faults. Both go hand in hand - it's not an 'either/or' matter.
Too often the debate in Singapore forces people into 'hate it' or 'love it' camps. That gets us nowhere. In fact, I would argue that my love of Singapore (or Britain) requires that I be critical of aspects of the country that I find difficult.
Having spent the last 20 years here teaching cross-cultural understanding to Singaporeans as they strive to work with other cultures, I feel I have a certain licence to speak - as a permanent resident and a friend, if not as a citizen.
My key message to Singaporeans is this: Look at what you love about Singapore and more often than not you will find that there is a shadow side to each one of its strengths. Above is my list of Singapore's pros and cons. What is yours?
Is Singapore a wonderful place to live? Yes, no doubt. Has it one of the best physical, social and cultural environments in the world? Yes, certainly.
But please Singaporeans, for the sake of the future of your great nation, don't lose the critical factor.
It is never 'either/or'.
The writer is CEO of the Global Leadership Academy.
Lynda Hong, Channel NewsAsia 10 Aug 09;
SINGAPORE: Not many people know much about Singapore's countryside. To change that, Singapore's farmers have come up with a new campaign.
14 farms in the Kranji and Choa Chu Kang areas have started a farm-pass for visitors. The pass will be stamped after every farm visit.
Every 7th and 14th stamp gives a visitor a chance at a lucky dip. Prizes include free lodging at farm resorts.
During weekends, there are also free shuttle buses to ferry visitors from the Yew Tee and Kranji MRT stations to the farms.
In less than two weeks, the campaign has led to a 30 percent increase in the number of visitors, to nearly 10,000.- CNA/ir
Victoria Vaughan, Straits Times 11 Aug 09;
A SINGAPORE-based aquaculture company has netted an endorsement from the China government to supply disease-resistant baby shrimp to farms across the country.
T-Tech International Singapore, set up last year, will supply first-generation shrimp fries from its farm in Fengxian district, Shanghai municipality.
This agreement gives it a foothold in China, which provides 65 per cent of the world's shrimp supply.
'It gives us credibility as there are firms claiming to be providing first-generation shrimp but they may be taking short cuts and mixing first and second generations,' said executive director Alex Chin, 49.
A spokesman from the Agri-Food and Veterinary Authority said this is the first local firm it knew of that had cracked China in this way.
'Using good quality shrimp fry that are selectively bred for fast growth and certified disease-free against certain diseases is a positive step towards minimising the risk of disease outbreaks and getting a more predictable yield in shrimp farming,' he said.
First-generation shrimp are from parent shrimp which have been genetically selected to ensure their offspring are disease resistant.
T-Tech buys genetically selected parent shrimp from Shrimp Improvement Systems, a United States company with a presence in Singapore.
It breeds them in seawater in its Hainan hatchery before transporting the fries by sea and air to its Fengxian farm to sell. The process, from hatching to selling, takes about 15 days.
The majority of shrimp farms in China use second- and third-generation shrimp, which are 30 per cent to 40 per cent more susceptible to disease, especially white spot - the main killer of shrimp, explained Mr Chin.
Currently, only 3 per cent of all shrimp fries bred and sold in China are first generation - which are usually resistant to white spot.
According to Mr Chin, there are currently six to eight companies which provide first-generation shrimp fries in China, all with foreign components.
The company aims to set up farms in Fujian and Jiangsu provinces.
So far this year, T-Tech has sold 1.2 billion shrimp fries in China, and hopes to up this to five billion next year.
Slamet Susanto, The Jakarta Post 11 Aug 09;
That mangrove trees can flourish in Tirtohargo village, even as plants in nearby areas fail to develop, is a tribute to the determination of Warsono.
A few years ago, the 71-year-old farmer, who is also known as Mbah Petruk, decided to do something to improve the environment in his remote village in Bantul regency, Yogyakarta, where he has lived for decades.
Thanks to the concerns of this grandfather of six, dozens of hectares of mangrove plants in Tirtohargo have taken root and are flourishing. As a demonstration of his characteristic creativity, resourcefulness and determination, Mbah Petruk is willing to protect the mangrove seedlings for no payment.
And there are plenty of predators he must protect them from.
The first hazard, he told The Jakarta Post, were the buffalo. Many residents of the area run their herds of buffalo in the areas where mangrove seedlings were planted. Thousands of seedlings have already been lost to the beasts, whether because they were gobbled up or trampled underfoot.
Instead of losing his temper on seeing his seedlings thus demolished, Mbah Petruk requested a gathering of all the buffalo herdsmen. After a series of discussions, an agreement was reached: If a buffalo should trample or eat a mangrove seedling, the owner of that buffalo would be required to pay a fine.
“My idea of imposing a fine came after almost one year of friendly approaches to the buffalo herdsmen,” Mbah Petruk said. “If a buffalo comes along and eats the mangrove seedlings, we just count how many plants have been destroyed and we charge a fine of Rp 5,000 per plant.”
But even after the buffalo had been dealt with, many of the seedlings kept dying. Closer examination revealed that the plants’ growth was being hampered by the presence of waste – such as dung and plastic waste – and fungal growths.
Tidying up was required. So, to make sure the plants stayed alive, every morning before 6 o’clock Mbah Petruk made time to walk around the mangrove plantation areas, an area that stretches 4 kilometers along the edge of the beach, clearing away any rubbish clinging to the mangrove seedlings or lurking in the area.
He would take a rest every one to two hours, and conducted his routine in conjunction with his farm work. In the afternoon while he was looking for grass to feed his three cows, Mbah Petruk walked around again to clean up any rubbish that had gathered during the day. To make it easier to look after the mangroves, he sometimes kept his cows near the beach, not far from the mangrove plantation area.
“For almost one year, every day I walked around to clean up the rubbish. Well, every day I walked seven kilometers around the mangrove area,” he said. “I didn’t get any payment, but I’m just happy to see the area become green so the crops can grow well, as they do now.”
As part of his work looking after the trees, Mbah Petruk occasionally spreads fertilizer and sprays them to stimulate growth. All the fertilizers and sprays he uses are organic.
Moreover, said Mbah Petruk, “I live in an area near the beach.” Which means that if something happens, such as a tsunami, he and his neighbors will be the first victims. So, he insists, there needs to be a natural barrier in the form of mangrove trees.
Through Mbah Petruk’s hard work, more than 30,000 mangrove trees are now thriving in the area, with the forests having really started to take off in 2006. As well as protecting agricultural crops from the wind, the establishment of the mangrove forests has increased the number of fish.
“The fish get more plentiful because they like a place to lay their eggs which is calm, and that’s around mangrove trees,” he said.
But Mbah Petruk will be the first to admit there was a time he didn’t see the value or significance of mangrove forests.
It was only when he received some training in 2003 and was invited to see mangrove forests in other regions that Mbah Petruk fell in love with the idea and became fiercely determined to ensure his own land and village were thick and green with mangroves.
As a volunteer and conservation motivator, in 2003 Mbah Petruk was paid a salary of Rp 500,000 (US$50) per month by an NGO called Relung.
“For one year I was paid to look after the mangroves,” said Mbah Petruk, indicating the his area of
responsibility, which is now thick with trees.
But since 2004, Mbah Petruk has been employed in a volunteer capacity only. Even without being paid, however, he continues to guard the mangroves to this day.
One achievement that Mbah Petruk is proud of is that other communities, having seen the effects, have started supporting the preservation and development of mangrove forests.
“The community here is committed to being involved in the conservation,” he said. “A long time ago, I was the lone guard of the mangroves, but now I have many supporters. If there are people from outside the area who destroy the trees and one of the community members sees what’s happening, they will certainly immediately come and warn someone.”
Minderjeet Kaur, New Straits Times 11 Aug 09;
KUALA LUMPUR: The government said yesterday that open burning in Sabah and Sarawak will be banned till the end of the year, but an environmental watchdog wants it to be stopped permanently.
The Centre for Environment, Technology and Development (CETD) also urged the government to play a bigger role to stop the use of open burning to clear forests in Indonesia.
Natural Resources and Environment Minister Datuk Douglas Uggah Embas said open burning was only allowed in Sabah and Sarawak, but the authorities have stopped issuing permits for such activities until the end of the year.
"We are now also looking at managing peat fires.
"If we do not control it, the haze will get worse," he said after launching the 8th International Symposium and Exhibition on Geoinformation here yesterday.
In the long term, he said he would discuss with the authorities to ban open burning during dry spells.
He said that they may not be able to stop open burning but they could at least allow it to take place at certain months of the year and thereby minimise its impact on the haze.
The government would also attend a haze control meeting this month to discuss long-term solutions to manage peat fires, he said.
This is to implement various measures between Asean countries that could help deal with the haze problem, he added.
Meanwhile, CETD chairman Gurmit Singh felt that open burning should be disallowed. Otherwise, the haze problem would continue to surface every year.
Haze blankets Trans-Kalimantan highway
The Jakarta Post 10 Aug 09;
Smoldering haze from bush and peat land fires in Central Kalimantan has covered the Trans-Kalimantan highway, Antara news agency reported.
"Over the past week, haze has disrupted traffic on the Trans-Kalimantan highway connecting Palangkaraya and Banjarmasin ," Ahmat Baderi, a driver, said Monday.
The haze has reduced visibility and caused respiratory problems in the area, he added.
The Palangkaraya Health Agency reported that a total of 1,882 people had suffered from respiratory problems due to the haze in the first week of August. Local residents have been forced to wear masks because of the smoke.
Fires have become more frequent and widespread especially in Sumatra and Kalimantan due to human-induced changes in the forest ecosystem.
The fires have also sparked complaints about the export of the haze from neighboring Malaysia and Singapore.
Industry mulls EU plan to make planes pay for climate change impact
Karamjit Kaur, Straits Times 11 Aug 09;
AIRPORT tax, security tax, insurance and a fuel levy - these all add to the total fare an air traveller pays before even boarding his flight.
Pretty soon, one more could be added to the list - an emissions charge.
The European Union (EU) has declared that from 2012, Singapore Airlines, Malaysia Airlines, Emirates and all other carriers that fly to Europe will have to keep to a stipulated amount of carbon emissions, or pay extra.
This is expected to cost the industry about US$3.4 billion (S$4.9 billion) when the scheme takes off.
Will consumers have to pay?
Etihad Airways and Delta Air Lines-Northwest Airlines both said that in a competitive industry, it will be tough to pass the costs on to travellers.
Singapore Airlines said its fares are based on market demand, while a spokesman for Malaysia Airlines said that in the end, it will be up to travellers to decide if the total cost of travel is reasonable.
Aviation adviser Paul Ng, of Singapore-based international transport law firm Stephenson Harwood, said it is likely that consumers will bear the extra levies: 'At the end of the day, airlines will have to find a way of mitigating the cost.'
While 2012 is still some years away, airlines have until the end of this month to submit clear plans on how they intend to monitor their load - a measure of the total weight carried over the entire distance travelled - and carbon emissions. If they miss the deadline, they risk losing free carbon allowances and could end up paying for all their emissions from 2012.
Other countries such as Australia and the United States are also considering carbon emissions and trading schemes.
This worries the International Air Transport Association (Iata) because a patchwork of different schemes and charges is inefficient and will put significant cost pressures on the industry, said Mr Paul Steele, its environmental head.
But there is hope yet and all eyes are now on the United Nations' civil aviation arm - the International Civil Aviation Organisation (Icao).
Its president Roberto Kobeh Gonzalez, interviewed by The Straits Times during his four-day visit to Singapore last week, is well aware of the situation.
He is confident that a members' meeting in October will end with a consensus on how the industry intends to tackle environmental issues like carbon emissions.
The EU plan is not the way to go, said the head of the 190-member grouping:'Emissions is a global problem that requires a global solution. This is what Icao is about. It is a global organisation.'
Iata, which represents 230 airlines, is fully behind Icao. Speaking to The Straits Times, Mr Steele said of the EU plan: 'Quite frankly, it is all a bit of a mess.'
Even within the group, member states who each have a list of airlines they are supposed to be monitoring, are unclear about what they have to do. Now, there is talk that some countries may extend the Aug 31 deadline that has been set for affected carriers to file their plans.
Critics have pointed out other flaws in the proposal.
Said Mr Ng: 'It is a seemingly unfair situation for long-haul carriers especially. If you fly from Singapore for example, you are not in the EU's airspace for the entire flight, yet you have to be accountable to the EU for the full 12 or 13 hours.'
Etihad's chief executive officer James Hogan said: 'The concern is that the regulation is not necessarily fair, and as such, we are wasting precious resources on a scheme which we hope will be replaced by something global and which takes account of our industry operations.'
A Delta spokesman suggested that the EU does not have the legal right to enforce its current scheme.
The issue remains unclear at this stage, said Mr Ng.
Despite the industry turbulence, Icao understands that there is significant public pressure on the EU, as well as other governments and organisations, to take action to manage climate change.
That is why it is important for Icao member states to agree on an action plan when they next meet in October, Mr Kobeh said. 'I am confident that if we have a global solution, maybe Europe and all the international community will join a global effort to tackle the challenge.'
An Icao environment task force set up in 2007 has suggested among other measures, that the industry cut fuel consumption by 2 per cent every year until 2050 - using 2005 as a benchmark.
Also up for discussion at the October meeting are economic measures like a carbon trading scheme put forth by the EU.
Meanwhile, Iata will continue to work with the civil aviation and air navigation communities, and aircraft makers, to push for more fuel efficiency and lower consumption, Mr Steele said.
New planes like the Airbus A-380 superjumbo are over 20 per cent more efficient than aircraft that came before them.
The Iata board has also approved a plan to improve fuel efficiency by 1.5 per cent every year, and to stop growing carbon emissions after 2020. Any excess will be offset by purchasing carbon credits.
Alternative fuel is another important area, said Mr Steele: 'Two years ago people thought this was just a vision - a pie in the sky.'
But tests have shown that existing jet fuel and aviation biofuel can be mixed with no impact on operations or safety.
Biofuel, which could emit up to 80 per cent less carbon, should find its way into aircraft fuel tanks by 2012 or 2013.
Even as airlines and Icao work towards lower emissions, both Mr Steele and Mr Kobeh pointed out that aviation accounts for just 2 per cent of global man-made carbon dioxide emissions.
Still, the industry will do its part, Mr Steele said. 'If aviation continues to grow and we believe it will, it means emissions are set to grow. In today's world where everybody is focused on climate change, that is not really an acceptable profile to have.'
Greener flights, bluer skies, cleaner air
THE EU's PLAN
# To include aviation in the EU Emissions Trading Scheme in 2012.
# To cap carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from aircraft operators in 2012, to 97 per cent of average 2004-2006 levels. This will be further cut to 95 per cent for the 2013-2020 period.
# Of the emissions granted, 85 per cent will be for free. Airlines will pay for the remaining 15 per cent. Like other commodities, the cost of carbon depends on market demand and supply.
# It will be a cap and trade scheme, so airlines that do not use all of the emission allowances granted to them can sell the excess. Those who are short, will have to pay for the extra they need.
WHAT THE INDUSTRY HAS DONE
# Technology: New planes like the A-380 use at least 20 per cent less fuel than older aircraft. New wing designs that reduce drag are also more fuel-efficient.
# Operations: International Air Transport Association (Iata) teams have visited about 100 airlines so far, to suggest ways to cut fuel use, such as shedding weight and flying more optimally, for example when taking off and landing.
The association, working with air navigation service providers, has also worked out more than 200 more direct routings so that flight times are reduced.
Last year, such efforts saved 15 million tonnes of carbon emissions. The target this year is to cut another 10 million tonnes.
Carol Kaesuk Yoon, The New York Times 10 Aug 09;
One spring when I was a graduate student, I would go each Monday down into the bowels of the entomology building. There I would meet Prof. Jack Franclemont, an elderly gentleman always with little dog in tow, to be tutored in the ordering and naming of life — the science of taxonomy.
Professor Franclemont, a famed moth specialist, was perfectly old school, wearing coat and tie to give the day’s lecture even though I was the only member of the audience. Quaintly distracted, he never quite got my name right, sometimes calling me Miss Loon or Miss Voon. After the talk, I would identify moths using a guide written in 1923, in silence or listening to stories of his dog’s latest antics. I enjoyed the meditative pleasure of those hours, despite the fact that as the lone (and not terribly proficient) student of an aging teacher, I could not help feeling that taxonomy might be dying, which, in fact, it is.
Despite the field’s now blatant modernity, with practitioners using DNA sequences, sophisticated evolutionary theory and supercomputers to order and name all of life, jobs for taxonomists continue to be in steady decline. The natural history collections crucial to the work are closeted or tossed.
Outside taxonomy, no one is much up in arms about this, but perhaps we should be, because the ordering and naming of life is no esoteric science. The past few decades have seen a stream of studies that show that sorting and naming the natural world is a universal, deep-seated and fundamental human activity, one we cannot afford to lose because it is essential to understanding the living world, and our place in it.
Anthropologists were the first to recognize that taxonomy might be more than the science officially founded by Carl Linnaeus, the Swedish botanist, in the 1700s. Studying how nonscientists order and name life, creating what are called folk taxonomies, anthropologists began to realize that when people across the globe were creating ordered groups and giving names to what lived around them, they followed highly stereotyped patterns, appearing unconsciously to follow a set of unwritten rules. Not that conformity to rules was at first obvious to anthropologists who were instead understandably dazzled by the variety in folk taxonomies. The Ilongots, for example, a people of the Philippines, name gorgeous wild orchids after human body parts. There bloom the thighs, there fingernails, yonder elbows and thumbs. The Rofaifo people of New Guinea, excellent natural historians, classify the cassowary, a giant bird complete with requisite feathers and beak, as a mammal. In fact, there seemed, at first glance, to be little room even for agreement among people, let alone a set of universally followed rules. More recently, however, deep underlying similarities have begun to become apparent.
Cecil Brown, an anthropologist at Northern Illinois University who has studied folk taxonomies in 188 languages, has found that people recognize the same basic categories repeatedly, including fish, birds, snakes, mammals, “wugs” (meaning worms and insects, or what we might call creepy-crawlies), trees, vines, herbs and bushes.
Dr. Brown’s finding would be considerably less interesting if these categories were clear-cut depictions of reality that must inevitably be recognized. But tree and bush are hardly that, since there is no way to define a tree versus a bush. The two categories grade insensibly into one another. Wugs, likewise, are neither an evolutionarily nor ecologically nor otherwise cohesive group. Still, people repeatedly recognize and name these oddities.
Likewise, people consistently use two-word epithets to designate specific organisms within a larger group of organisms, despite there being an infinitude of potentially more logical methods. It is so familiar that it is hard to notice. In English, among the oaks, we distinguish the pin oak, among bears, grizzly bears. When Mayan Indians, familiar with the wild piglike creature known as peccaries, encountered Spaniards’ pigs, they dubbed them “village peccaries.” We use two-part names for ourselves as well: Sally Smith or Li Wen. Even scientists are bound by this practice, insisting on Latin binomials for species.
There appears to be such profound unconscious agreement that people will even concur on which exact words make the best names for particular organisms. Brent Berlin, an ethnobiologist at the University of Georgia, discovered this when he read 50 pairs of names, each consisting of one bird and one fish name, to a group of 100 undergraduates, and asked them to identify which was which. The names had been randomly chosen from the language of Peru’s Huambisa people, to which the students had had no previous exposure. With such a large sample size — there were 5,000 choices being made — the students should have scored 50 percent or very close to it if they were blindly guessing. Instead, they identified the bird and fish names correctly 58 percent of the time, significantly more often than expected for random guessing. Somehow they were often able to intuit the names’ birdiness or fishiness.
The most surprising evidence for the deep-seatedness of taxonomy comes from patients who have, through accident or disease, suffered traumas of the brain. Consider the case of the university student whom British researchers refer to simply as J.B.R. Doctors found that upon recovering from swelling of the brain caused by herpes, J.B.R. could no longer recognize living things.
He could still recognize nonliving objects, like a flashlight, a compass, a kettle or a canoe. But the young man was unable to recognize a kangaroo, a mushroom or a buttercup. He could not say what a parrot or even the unmistakable ostrich was. And J.B.R. is far from alone; doctors around the world have found patients with the same difficulty. Most recently, scientists studying these patients’ brains have reported repeatedly finding damage — a deadening of activity or actual lesions — in a region of the temporal lobe, leading some researchers to hypothesize that there might be a specific part of the brain that is devoted to the doing of taxonomy. As curious as they are, these patients and their woes would be of little relevance to our own lives, if they had merely lost some dispensable librarianlike ability to classify living things. As it turns out, their situation is much worse. These are people completely at sea. Without the power to order and name life, a person simply does not know how to live in the world, how to understand it. How to tell the carrot from the cat — which to grate and which to pet? They are utterly lost, anchorless in a strange and confusing world. Because to order and name life is to have a sense of the world around, and, as a result, what one’s place is in it.
Today few people are proficient in the ordering and naming of life. There are the dwindling professional taxonomists, and fast-declining peoples like the Tzeltal Maya of Mexico, among whom a 2-year-old can name more than 30 different plants and whose 4-year-olds can recognize nearly 100. Things were different once. In Linnaeus’s day, it was a matter of aristocratic pride to have a wonderful and wonderfully curated collection of wild organisms, both dead and alive. Darwin (who gained fame first as the world’s foremost barnacle taxonomist) might have expected any dinner-party conversation to turn taxonomic, after an afternoon of beetle-hunting or wildflower study. Most of us claim and enjoy no such expertise.
We are, all of us, abandoning taxonomy, the ordering and naming of life. We are willfully becoming poor J.B.R., losing the ability to order and name and therefore losing a connection to and a place in the living world.
No wonder so few of us can really see what is out there. Even when scads of insistent wildlife appear with a flourish right in front of us, and there is such life always — hawks migrating over the parking lot, great colorful moths banging up against the window at night — we barely seem to notice. We are so disconnected from the living world that we can live in the midst of a mass extinction, of the rapid invasion everywhere of new and noxious species, entirely unaware that anything is happening. Happily, changing all this turns out to be easy. Just find an organism, any organism, small, large, gaudy, subtle — anywhere, and they are everywhere — and get a sense of it, its shape, color, size, feel, smell, sound. Give a nod to Professor Franclemont and meditate, luxuriate in its beetle-ness, its daffodility. Then find a name for it. Learn science’s name, one of countless folk names, or make up your own. To do so is to change everything, including yourself. Because once you start noticing organisms, once you have a name for particular beasts, birds and flowers, you can’t help seeing life and the order in it, just where it has always been, all around you.
Adapted from “Naming Nature: The Clash Between Instinct and Science” by Carol Kaesuk Yoon.
WWF 10 Aug 09;
Kathmandu, Nepal - Over 350 new species including the world’s smallest deer, a “flying frog” and a 100 million-year old gecko have been discovered in the Eastern Himalayas, a biological treasure trove now threatened by climate change.
A decade of research carried out by scientists in remote mountain areas endangered by rising global temperatures brought exciting discoveries such as a bright green frog (Rhacophorus suffry) which uses its red and long webbed feet to glide in the air.
One of the most significant findings was not exactly “new” in the classic sense. A 100-million year-old gecko, the oldest fossil gecko species known to science, was discovered in an amber mine in the Hukawng Valley in Himalayan regions of far northern Myanmar.
The WWF report The Eastern Himalayas – Where Worlds Collide details discoveries made by scientists from various organizations between 1998 and 2008 in a region reaching across Bhutan and north-east India to the far north of Myanmar as well as Nepal and southern parts of Tibet Autonomus Region (China).
“This enormous cultural and biological diversity underscores the fragile nature of an environment which risks being lost forever unless the impacts of climate change are reversed,” said Tariq Aziz, the leader of WWF's Living Himalayas Initiative.
“People and wildlife form a rich mosaic of life across this rugged and remarkable landscape, making it among the biologically richest areas on Earth. But the Himalayas are also among the most vulnerable to global climate change.”
In December world leaders will gather in Copenhagen to reach an agreement on a new climate deal, which will replace the existing Kyoto Protocol.
“Only an ambitious and fair deal based on an agreement between rich and poor countries can save the planet and its treasures such as the Himalayas from devastating climate change,” said Kim Carstensen, the Leader of the WWF’s Global Climate Initiative.
The Eastern Himalayas report also mentions the miniature muntjac, also called the “leaf deer” (Muntiacus putaoensis) which is the world’s oldest and smallest deer species.
Scientists initially believed the small creature found in the world’s largest mountain range was a juvenile of another species but DNA tests confirmed the light brown animal with innocent dark eyes was a distinct and new species.
The Eastern Himalayas are now known to harbour a staggering 10,000 plant species, 300 mammal species, 977 bird species, 176 reptiles, 105 amphibians and 269 types of freshwater fish. The region also has the highest density of the Bengal tiger and is the last bastion of the charismatic greater one-horned rhino.
WWF aims to conserve the habitat of endangered species such as the majestic snow leopard, Bengal tigers, Asian elephants, red pandas, takins, golden langurs, rare Gangetic dolphins and one-horned rhinos as well as thousands of plant and animal species left to discover in the Eastern Himalayas region.
Eastern Himalayas- Where Worlds Collide describes more than 350 new species discovered - including 244 plants, 16 amphibians, 16 reptiles, 14 fish, 2 birds, 2 mammals and at least 60 new invertebrates.
Historically, the rugged and largely inaccessible landscape of the Eastern Himalayas has made biological surveys in the region extremely difficult. As a result, wildlife has remained poorly surveyed and there are large areas that are still biologically unexplored.
Today further species continue to be unearthed and many more species of amphibians, reptiles and fish are currently in the process of being officially named by scientists. The Eastern Himalayas is certainly one of the last biological frontiers of Asia with many new discoveries waiting to be made.
Flying frogs and the world's oldest mushroom: a decade of Himalayan discovery
The 350 new species found over past 10 years under pressure from demand for land and climate change, warns the WWF
Felicity Carus, The Guardian 10 Aug 09;
A pretty ultramarine blue flower which changes colour in response to temperature, a flying frog and the world's oldest mushroom preserved in amber are among the 350 new species discovered in the Eastern Himalayas over the past 10 years. But experts warn the new discoveries are under pressure from demand for land and climate change.
A report published today by the WWF, The Eastern Himalayas – Where Worlds Collide, lists 242 new types of plants, 16 amphibians, 16 reptiles, 14 fish, two birds and two mammals and 61 new invertebrates. The cache, quality and diversity of species newly discovered between 1998 and 2008 make the mountainous region one of the world's most important biological hotspots.
The WWF is asking the governments of Bhutan, India and Nepal to commit to cooperate on conservation efforts in the geographic region that transcends the borders of the three countries to protect the landscape and the livelihoods of people living in the Eastern Himalayas.
Population growth, deforestation, overgrazing, poaching, the wildlife trade, mining, pollution, and hydropower development have all contributed to the pressures on the fragile ecosystems in the region, the report says. Only 25% of the original habitats in the region remain intact and 163 species that live in the Eastern Himalayas are considered globally threatened.
Because the region sits at the biogeographical crossroads of two continental plates, it contains a wide range of biodiversity and landscapes from both worlds. The Indo-Malayan lowlands are home to Asian elephants, clouded leopards, wild water buffalo, gaur, hornbills, cobras and geckos. The elevated Palearctic to the north is home to snow leopards, red pandas, black bears, and wolves.
The world's highest mountains sit in close proximity to some of the world's deepest gorges in a region that also contains the world's most northerly tropical jungles, temperate forests, tall grasslands, savannas and rich alpine meadows. A great deal of the rugged region, which also includes small areas of China and Burma, is difficult to access and has made biological surveys extremely difficult and left large areas biologically unexplored. But the intrepid are richly rewarded with new discoveries.
Impatiens namchabarwensis, or the blue diamond impatiens, is one of the 242 new plant species to have been discovered in the past 10 years. The highly endemic ultramarine blue flower was discovered during an epic expedition undertaken by Chinese botanists who trekked 60 miles from the nearest road and descended into the Namcha Barwa canyon, a gorge measuring almost 402 miles long and, in places, twice as deep as the Grand Canyon, which can reach depths of up to 6,000 feet. The rare plant can grow as tall as 60cm and flowers all year round.
The flower is perhaps the best symbol of the effects of climate change in the region as its colour changes according to temperature and exposure. In a cool climate, its appears pure blue, but darkens to a purple when the temperature rises.
A bright green, red-footed tree frog was described in 2007, and called a "flying frog" because its long, webbed feet allow it to glide when falling.
An amber mine in far north Burma has also thrown up some important new discoveries: a 100m-year-old gecko, the oldest-known mushroom and fern have all been unearthed preserved in amber.
Mark Wright, WWF's conservation science adviser said: "These exciting finds reinforce just how little we now about the world around us. In the Eastern Himalayas we have a region of extraordinary beauty and with some of the most biologically rich areas on the planet. Ironically, it is also one of the regions most at risk from climate change, as evidenced by the rapid retreat of the glaciers, and only time will tell how well species will be able to adapt – if at all."
Flying frog among 353 new Himalayan species: WWF
Claire Cozens Yahoo News 10 Aug 09;
KATHMANDU (AFP) – A flying frog, the world's smallest deer and the first new monkey to be found in over a century are among 350 new species discovered in the eastern Himalayas in the past decade, the WWF said Monday.
But the environmental group said the vital habitats of the mountain range were facing growing pressures from unsustainable development in the region, which spans Nepal, China, India, Bhutan and Myanmar.
In a report released here, it said climate change, deforestation, overgrazing by domestic livestock and illegal poaching and wildlife trading threatened one of the biologically richest areas of the planet.
"In the last half-century, this area of South Asia has faced a wave of pressures as a result of population growth and the increasing demand for commodities," said the report, "The Eastern Himalayas -- Where Worlds Collide."
"Only 25 percent of the original habitats in the region remain intact. For the unique species of the Eastern Himalayas, this means that today 163 are considered globally threatened," it said.
The WWF said 353 new species were discovered in the region between 1998 and 2008, among them a red-footed tree frog known as a "flying frog" because its large webbed feet allow it to glide when falling.
Another new species was a kind of caecilian, a limbless amphibian that resembles a giant earthworm and lives underground -- a significant discovery because caecilians are among the planet's least-studied creatures.
Other highlights were the world's smallest deer -- a miniature muntjac standing just 60-80 centimetres (25-30 inches) tall that was found in northern Myanmar -- and the first new monkey species to be discovered in over a century.
The WWF said the new species of macaque was one of the highest-dwelling monkeys in the world, living in India's Arunachal Pradesh state at between 1,600 and 3,500 metres (5,000 and 11,500 feet) above sea level.
Among the 242 new plant varieties discovered was an ultramarine blue flower found by two intrepid Chinese botanists who descended into a gorge in Tibet that is twice as deep as the Grand Canyon in places.
The WWF described the rare bloom as "dramatic in both colour and form" and said its colour changed with the temperature, making it particularly remarkable.
The eastern Himalayas is home to 10,000 plant species, 300 mammal species and nearly 1,000 bird species, and is the last place on earth where the greater one-horned rhino can still be found.
"This enormous cultural and biological diversity underscores the fragile nature of an environment which risks being lost forever unless the impacts of climate change are reversed," said Tariq Aziz, leader of the WWF's Living Himalayas initiative.
The report's findings come as world leaders prepare to gather in Copenhagen in December to reach agreement on a new climate deal to replace the Kyoto Protocol.
Photos of the discoveries on National Geographic
Patrick Walters, National Geographic Magazine 10 Aug 09;
But dolphin hunting is a complex issue, and focusing solely on ending it leaves some important questions unanswered: How widespread is dolphin hunting? When and why did it start, and why does it persist? And what effect, if any, is the hunt having on the health of dolphins globally?
Every year on the first of September, in a small town called Taiji on the southeast coast of Japan's Honshu Island, a new fishing season begins: the dolphin season.
Twenty-six fishermen in 13 boats corral a few dozen dolphins into a small cove, where they kill the animals by stabbing them repeatedly with long harpoons and knives. The 50-square-foot (4.6-square-meter) inlet turns crimson, as if filled only with blood.
In the course of a six-month season, fishermen kill roughly 2,000 dolphins and sell the meat to local supermarkets for about U.S. $500 a dolphin. The fishermen supplement their income by taking about a hundred dolphins alive and selling them for tens of thousands of dollars each to aquariums in Japan, China, South Korea, Iran, and Dubai in the United Arab Emirates.
(Related: "Captured Dolphin With Four Fins Spotlights Controversial Hunt.")
International media have not been kind to Taiji in the past, and the documentary The Cove, a Sundance Film Festival award winner released nationwide in the United States on August 7, is reopening old wounds. The film follows an international team of photographers, divers, and activists on their mission to document the dolphin hunt, facing opposition from Taiji town officials, police, and fishermen.
(Read an interview with The Cove's director from Adventure magazine.)
The activists are led by Ric O'Barry, who trained the bottlenose dolphins featured in the popular 1960s TV series Flipper. After the show ended in 1967, O'Barry became one of the world's most radical activists against keeping dolphins in captivity. For the past several years he's been trying to stop the hunt in Taiji, one of Japan's iconic whaling towns.
Others have also been outspoken: Blue Voice, a collaboration between filmmaker Hardy Jones and actor Ted Danson, has opposed the Taiji hunt for years. So has a Japanese environmental organization, Elsa Nature Conservancy. Heroes star Hayden Panettiere protested in the Taiji cove in 2007.
Many scientists are also opposed to the hunt. Since 2005, Hunter College animal behaviorist Diana Reiss—famous for discovering that dolphins can recognize themselves in mirrors—has been collecting signatures from hundreds of scientists around the world for a petition she plans to present to U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton next month.
(Read a National Geographic magazine article on animal intelligence.)
"This [hunt] is an extreme case of animal cruelty," said Reiss, who receives funding from National Geographic's < ahref="http://www.nationalgeographic.com/field/grants-programs/cre.html">Committee for Research and Exploration. (The National Geographic Society owns National Geographic News.)
Reiss, The Cove's filmmakers, and other activists working in Taiji all have a clear mission: Stop this dolphin hunt. But dolphin hunting is a complex issue, and focusing solely on ending it leaves some important questions unanswered: How widespread is dolphin hunting? When and why did it start, and why does it persist? And what effect, if any, is the hunt having on the health of dolphins globally?
An Age-Old Local Tradition
People in Japan have hunted dolphins and their larger cetacean relatives, whales, for hundreds if not thousands of years. Glacial melting made Japan an island chain 10,000 years ago, and as its population grew, the country became highly dependent on the sea.
"Pretty much any edible sea creature has been exploited for food," said Harvard University anthropologist and Japanese fishing-culture expert Theodore Bestor. Whales and dolphins became ingrained in Japanese food, culture, and religion. The animals were the subjects of celebrations, rituals, and art. Ancient tombs and memorials for whales and dolphins can be found across the country.
Unlike whaling—which became a large-scale commercial industry in the 20th century, before a 1986 international moratorium —dolphin hunting has always been primarily a local activity, said University of Oslo anthropologist Arne Kalland. Traditionally dolphin hunts have been isolated to a handful of small fishing towns, where dolphin meat is well liked.
Ironically, a Japanese town where dolphin wasn't popular became the first to draw international attention to drive hunting, the practice of corralling the dolphins into a cove. In the late 1970s fishermen in Iki, a small town on an island west of Taiji, had come to believe that dolphins were depleting stocks of a popular fish called yellowtail, though there's no data to suggest dolphins have ever significantly reduced yellowtail stocks. In April 1979 National Geographic magazine published a picture of Iki's bloody cove, showing bottlenose dolphins strewn on the beach.
The following year Hardy Jones visited Iki and filmed the slaughter. He sent his tape to CBS, and after the network ran the footage, more than 200 reporters from all over the world showed up to cover the story. Iki hasn't had a dolphin hunt since.
By the mid-1980s, Jones said, most other towns with drive hunts also gave up the practice. Some stopped because they ran out of dolphins, which were overfished, scared off, or both—but most were driven to quit by all the negative attention. The drive hunts weren't worth the trouble.
Still, Taiji refused to stop: In 1980, fishermen killed 11,017 dolphins in drive hunts.
Dolphin Hunts Persist Outside Japan
Over the past 25 years, Taiji (population 3,600) has become a flashpoint for animal-rights activists. But it's not the only place where fishermen kill dolphins. It's not even the only place with a blood-drenched cove.
Every year, fishermen in the Faroe Islands, an autonomous province of Denmark, also corral and kill hundreds of dolphins in small coves. Just as in Taiji, the water runs red.
So why hasn't the Faroese hunt attracted the same kind of negative international attention? For starters, it's only half the size of Taiji's and sometimes smaller. In addition, the fishermen kill pilot whales, which are technically dolphins but aren't as recognizable as their bottlenose cousins. The hunt is also less commercial. The meat is divided evenly among local families instead of being sold to supermarkets, and no animals are sold to aquariums.
What's more, the Faroe Islands respect a worldwide commercial whaling ban, though Denmark wants it lifted. So does Japan, and Tokyo's outspoken opposition to the ban has made Japan a lightning rod for anti-whaling activists —and, by extension, dolphin activists.
Even within Japan, the Taiji hunt is small compared to one that happens in the north, where harpooners kill more than 10,000 Dall's porpoises every year for food—five times the recent annual take in Taiji. But because the hunt happens out at sea, it's hard to photograph and has received far less attention than Taiji's bloody cove.
Dolphin hunts also take place at a small subsistence level in the Caribbean and the Arctic. Fishermen kill dolphins frequently in Peru—where it's illegal—but data on how many are killed are hard to come by.
Solomon Islands Hunt "Completely Unsustainable"
In the Solomon Islands, dolphins are regularly killed for their meat and their teeth, which are used decoratively. As in Taiji, fishermen sell a small number of dolphins to aquariums.
The Solomon Islands hunt is one of the smallest in the world —less than a hundred are killed every year, and about a dozen are sold into captivity —but it presents an urgent problem for conservationists since the local dolphin population may number only in the hundreds.
"It's completely unsustainable," said Natural Resources Defense Council staff attorney Taryn Kiekow. Former Flipper trainer Ric O'Barry and the Earth Island Institute have lobbied officials in the Solomon Islands to end the hunt.
Globally, most dolphin populations are safe. Dall's porpoises may number more than a million, and according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature, there are likely more than six million dolphins worldwide. A few species are at risk of extinction, but most number in the hundreds of thousands, if not millions.
"Anybody who tells you these animals are going to go extinct because of these hunts, there's no data to support that," said NRDC marine mammal scientist Liz Alter. Still, she cautions that it's possible that the Dall's porpoise hunt in Japan may harm subpopulations of that animal.
"We Never Say 'Don't Eat a Cheeseburger'"
Shigeki Takaya, assistant director of the Far Seas Fisheries Division of Japan's Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries in Tokyo, which oversees dolphin hunting, said he hasn't seen The Cove yet — just the trailer. But Takaya knows what the filmmakers want, and he says they should give up.
"What difference is there between a cow, a pig, and a dolphin?" he said. "There's no difference. There is a market for dolphin in Japan. It's not a major market, but it's a market. Dolphin is a resource, and people have to respect each other's cultures. In other countries they eat cow. But we never say to Americans, 'Don't eat a cheeseburger.' We never, ever say that."
Hunter College's Reiss counters that the Taiji hunt must stop simply because it's inhumane. Dolphins are extremely intelligent creatures that experience pain and suffering, she emphasizes. She has listened to underwater recordings from the Taiji drive hunt and says the dolphins issue sophisticated distress calls.
"Science has got to transcend cultural borders," she said.
The Switzerland-based World Association of Zoos and Aquariums (WAZA) has forbidden its members from taking dolphins from the Taiji hunt. The Japanese Association of Zoos and Aquariums is a WAZA member, but most Japanese aquariums don't belong to the national association.
WAZA director Gerald Dick has visited several Japanese aquarium directors and said it's hard to convince them to stop buying dolphins from Taiji when doing so costs so much less than breeding them in captivity.
"They don't regard [the hunt] as particularly cruel," he said. "They've been doing it for years."
The makers of The Cove argue that if Japanese aquarium-goers knew where the aquariums were getting their dolphins, people might stop visiting. The Taiji drive hunt is not widely publicized in Japan, the filmmakers say, but they are seeking a Japanese distributor for the documentary.
Could Mercury Fears End the Hunt?
Like most forms of fishing, dolphin hunting isn't regulated by any international organization.
The International Whaling Commission has for years debated whether it should limit the hunting of small cetaceans like dolphins, but it's been deadlocked. The commission was created in 1946 to control the market for whale oil and later took on the duty of protecting whales from being hunted to extinction. But global dolphin populations are healthy.
In the end, it might be Japanese consumers who stop the Taiji hunt. Activists, scientists, and the Japanese press have documented high levels of mercury contamination in Japan's dolphins. The Cove features Oregon State University marine biologist Scott Baker, a past National Geographic Society grantee who tested Japanese striped dolphin meat and reported in 2005 it had nearly a hundred times the amount of mercury permitted by Japanese regulations.
But mercury poisoning doesn't show its effects immediately, and although the Japanese government has warned pregnant women to limit their consumption of dolphin meat, it would probably take awhile for people to give up completely a food tied so closely to their history and culture.
So far, Japan—home to the world's largest dolphin hunt—has done nothing to suggest it will stop this age-old practice.
Science Alert 6 Aug 09;
ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies
Leading Australian scientists today released the following call for action to save the world’s coral reefs, at a scientific symposium in Brisbane:
• Coral reefs are irreplaceable and far too valuable for human societies to allow their continued destruction. It is a moral imperative that coral reefs are not simply abandoned as an overly fragile casualty of the world’s appetite for coal and oil. Reefs are threatened, not doomed - if we can take steps to avoid extreme climate change. We know what to do to maintain healthy reefs, and we should get on with it.
• Because of their sensitivity to temperature and acidification of oceans, coral reefs are in the front line of the effects of climate change. For reefs, climate change is not some distant threat that might come to pass in the future – scientists and reef managers have already clearly documented the impacts of accelerating climate change on the Great Barrier Reef and elsewhere around the world. The evidence is irrefutable.
• Without targeted reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, the ongoing damage to coral reefs from global warming will soon be irreversible. Substantial global reductions in greenhouse gas emissions must be initiated immediately, not in 10 or 20 years.
• Substantial reductions in greenhouse gas emissions are consistently with steadily growing improving standards in both developed and developing countries. The best estimate of the change in the rate of economic growth associated with a program to hold the change in global temperature below 2 degrees C over the next century is less than 0.1 percentage points.
• The coral reef crisis represents a policy and governance failure. Improved outcomes for reefs will require unprecedented coordination and integration across jurisdictions. People from developing countries who are highly dependent on reefs for their livelihood are the most vulnerable to change. Australia’s support for the Coral Triangle Initiative and for Pacific Nations, represents a sound approach that combines conservation objectives with sustainable development. These efforts need to be much better supported by all governments.
• In many places, we need to move beyond the usual measures to involve communities in conservation- things like consultation, participation, and compensation. We need to understand the social, cultural, political and economic conditions the same way we understand ecological conditions such as the types of corals and fish in a park. In some areas, the capacity of communities to cope with change will have to be built up, which will require donors and governments to make real and meaningful investments in poverty alleviation, education, and reducing dependence on coral reef resources.
• Development aid, particularly for education, capacity-building and alternative livelihoods will increase the capacity coral-reef nations to adapt to climate change. The higher the level of education and the broader the range of economic prospects available to people, the greater the appeal of long-term management for sustainability, as opposed to extraction of resources to meet immediate demands for survival.
• The world has a narrow window of opportunity to save coral reefs from the destruction of extreme climate change. Local action can help to re-build the resilience of reefs, and promote their recovery from coral bleaching. It is critically important to prevent the replacement of corals by algal blooms, by reducing runoff from land and by protecting stocks of herbivorous fishes. However, reefs cannot be “climate-proofed” except via reduced emissions of greenhouse gasses
John Tierney, The New York Times 10 Aug 09;
President Obama and the rest of the Group of 8 leaders decreed last month that the planet’s average temperature shall not rise more than 2 degrees Fahrenheit above today’s level. But what if Mother Earth didn’t get the memo? How do we stay cool in the future?
Two options:
Plan A. Keep talking about the weather. This has been the preferred approach for the past two decades in Western Europe, where leaders like to promise one another that they will keep the globe cool by drastically reducing carbon emissions. Then, when their countries’ emissions keep rising anyway, they convene to make new promises and swear that they really, really mean it this time.
Plan B. Do something about the weather. Originally called geoengineering, this approach used to be dismissed as science fiction fantasies: cooling the planet with sun-blocking particles or shades; tinkering with clouds to make them more reflective; removing vast quantities of carbon from the atmosphere.
Today this approach goes by the slightly less grandiose name of climate engineering, and it is looking more practical. Several recent reviews of these ideas conclude that cooling the planet would be technically feasible and economically affordable.
There are still plenty of skeptics, but even they have started calling for more research into climate engineering. The skeptics understandably fear the unintended consequences of tampering with the planet’s thermostat, but they also fear the possibility — which I’d call a near certainty — that political leaders will not seriously reduce carbon emissions anytime soon.
The National Academy of Sciences and Britain’s Royal Society are preparing reports on climate engineering, and the Obama administration has promised to consider it. But so far there has been virtually no government support for research and development — certainly nothing like the tens of billions of dollars allotted to green energy and other programs whose effects on the climate would not be felt for decades.
For perhaps $100 million, climate engineers could begin field tests within five years, says Ken Caldeira of the Carnegie Institution for Science. Dr. Caldeira is a member of a climate-engineering study group that met last year at the Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics under the leadership of Steven E. Koonin, who has since become the under secretary for science at the United States Department of Energy. The group has just issued a report, published by the Novim research organization, analyzing the use of aerosol particles to reflect shortwave solar radiation back into space.
These particles could be lofted into the stratosphere to reproduce the effects of sulfate aerosols from volcanic eruptions like that of Mount Pinatubo in 1991, which was followed by a global cooling of nearly 1 degree Fahrenheit. Just as occurred after that eruption, the effects would wane as the particles fell back to Earth. Keeping the planet cooled steadily (at least until carbon emissions declined) might cost $30 billion per year if the particles were fired from military artillery, or $8 billion annually if delivered by aircraft, according to the Novim report.
The idea of even testing such a system scares many people, and some scientists argue that climate-engineering research should remain theoretical. But Dr. Caldeira says that small-scale testing — perhaps an experiment intended to slightly cool the Arctic — could be safer than the alternative.
“The worst-case scenario,” he says, “is one in which you have an untested system that you need to deploy quickly at large scale in a desperate attempt to ward off some sort of climate crisis. It could be much better to start testing soon at small scale and to observe what happens as the system is deployed.” The sooner we start, he reasons, the more delicately we can proceed.
“Because of natural variability in weather and climate, the smaller the experiment, the longer it needs to be observed for the signal to rise out of the noise,” Dr. Caldeira says. “With short testing periods, you would need to hit the system with a hammer.”
Another way to cool the globe would be to spray seawater mist from ships up toward low-lying clouds, which would become brighter and reflect more sunlight away from Earth. (For details, see nytimes.com/tierneylab.)
This cloud-brightening technology might counteract a century’s worth of global warming for $9 billion, according to J. Eric Bickel and Lee Lane. They identified it as the most promising form of climate engineering in a report published Friday by the Copenhagen Consensus Center, which is sponsoring cost-benefit analyses of strategies for dealing with climate change.
Other researchers say that it is impossible to do a cost-benefit analysis of these engineering proposals because the potential downside is so uncertain — and large. Injecting aerosols into the stratosphere or brightening clouds would do more than just cool the planet. In a paper in the current Science, Gabriele C. Hegerl and Susan Solomon point to a drop in global precipitation after the eruption of Mount Pinatubo, and warn that climate engineering could lead to dangerous droughts.
A less risky form of climate engineering would be to gradually remove enough carbon dioxide from the atmosphere to keep the planet cool. Some experts argue that the technology already exists to make this “air-capture” method reasonably economical, and that its political advantages make it the most realistic long-term strategy. What politician wants to tamper directly with the climate and risk getting blamed for the next hurricane or drought?
But if the climate does become dangerously warm, there could be enormous political pressure to do something quickly. And while it wouldn’t be easy reaching international agreement on how to reset the planet’s thermostat, in some ways it is less daunting than trying to negotiate a global carbon treaty.
If rich European countries with strong green constituencies cannot live up to their own promises to cut carbon, how much hope is there of permanently enforcing tough restrictions in the United States, much less in poor countries like India and China? If even a few nations demur or cheat, the whole system can break down.
By contrast, climate engineering does not require unanimous agreement or steadfast enforcement throughout the world. Instead of relying on politicians’ promises, we might find it simpler to deal directly with Mother Earth’s hot air.
All aspects of food – production, processing, distribution, retail, consumption and waste – must be addressed, says Hilary Ben
Martin Wainwright, guardian.co.uk 10 Aug 09;
Fewer cut-price supermarket gimmicks and other measures to help target food waste are central to a new government food security strategy to maintain UK food supplies for the next 40 years.
The strategy is highly critical of bogof - "buy one get one free" - offers and heavily reduced "loss leader" lines that encourage shoppers to buy food they don't need which eventually ends up in the bin. And it calculates that reducing food waste has the potential to cut carbon emissions equal to taking a fifth of the country's traffic off the roads. It also promotes leaner and healthier diets, along with higher crop yields and a move towards accepting genetically modified crops.
The series of reports called Food 2030 had been expected last month but was delayed by internal disagreement within the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and foot-dragging over measures that would potentially be unpopular with voters.
Launching the strategy the environment secretary Hilary Benn said: "Last year the world had a wake-up call with the sudden oil and food price rises, but the full environmental costs and the costs to our health remain significant and hidden. We need to tackle diet-related ill health that already costs the NHS and the wider economy billions of pounds each year.
"We need everyone in the food system to get involved — from farmers and retailers to the health service, schools and consumers. Our strategy needs to cover all aspects of our food — production, processing, distribution, retail, consumption and disposal."
It was welcomed by some food specialists who argue that government must provide a brake to consumer-driven market forces. But there was criticism that action with real bite, including curbs on the power of supermarkets over suppliers, and carbon emissions from farming, remained too vague.
There was also frustration that the government was still producing policy strategies and consultations a year on from a major report commissioned at the height of global food price rises from the Cabinet Office called Food Matters. Many felt the new strategy did not include enough substantial changes.
Meredith Alexander, head of food policy at the charity ActionAid UK, said: "The government launched an inquiry into ways supermarkets abuse their market power in May 2006. Three years later, they are only now considering whether or not to actually do something about these bullying practices that contribute to poverty wages overseas."
Professor Tim Lang of City University, a specialist on food policy and member of the Sustainable Development Commission, said: "The issue is how radical or slight will changes for consumers be, and how soft or hard will the policy changes be?
"It's good to see Defra at last championing the view that the UK's food system needs to become very different. But I predict that some very uncomfortable and unpopular decisions will lie ahead for governments in coming years.
"The dominant policy language of recent years has centred on markets, choice and consumer sovereignty. These are too simplistic now. Politics needs to move fast."
Apart from targeting wasteful supermarket offers the reports also promise further action on reducing "tempting" packaging and encouraging restaurants to highlight calorie counts. Food waste in the UK is currently running at average of £420-worth per household, rising to £610 in families with children.
Benn also said that food producers in Britain would have to adapt to climate change, and perhaps grow crops in different areas where they were previously difficult to grow. The report warns that the face of the countryside will have to continue to change to guarantee food security, with GM crop experiments part of the strategy.
"We need to think about the way in which we produce our food, the way we use water and fertiliser," Benn said. "We will need science and we will need more people to come into farming because it has a bright future." He added that global food production had to increase by 70% to feed a world population of 9bn in 2050.
The National Farmers' Union welcomed the strategy's 'joined-up' approach, involving all government departments linked to food production, including the Treasury. NFU president Peter Kendall called for a similar improvement in co-ordinating food research, as well as monitoring GM's effect on the animal feed market as well as pig and poultry production.
He also appealed for a level playing field on sustainability, with strict measures applying to imports as well as home-grown food. He said: "It would make no sense to insist that our production was sustainable but increasingly rely on imports that are not."
Dr Tom MacMillan, executive director of the Food Ethics Council, complimented Defra on "taking a systematic approach to assessing food security" and getting on with the job. But he questioned whether the department had enough clout to tackle wider issues involved in food waste and poor diet.
"For instance, a big factor in food insecurity is income inequality, and you can't crack that by fiddling about with food prices. It calls for better social protection in the UK and internationally," he said. "Another big question mark is over climate change. One of government's most important commitments in Food Matters [a government report published in July 2008] was to push for European climate agreements to take account of methane and nitrous oxide from farming, yet so far all that's happened is a seminar with the French.
"To achieve its aims, the department needs a stronger mandate from the government."
David Adam
Hilary Benn yesterday reignited the debate on growing GM crops in Britain when he suggested the controversial plants could contribute to increased food security. He said: "If GM can make a contribution then we have a choice as a society and as a world about whether to make use of that technology."
GM: feeding the world with science
No GM crops are grown commercially in Britain, although several varieties are farmed extensively in mainland Europe, the United States and elsewhere. This is less down to UK government policy than a reluctance among seed companies to apply for the relevant permits, given the high-profile backlash in Britain against GM food a decade or so ago.
Ministers have never ruled out GM in the UK and a series of comments from inside Whitehall in recent years have prompted speculation that a new industry charm-initiative is preparing to sprout.
In 2008, then environment minister Phil Woolas, said Britain was rethinking its position on GM due to a "growing question" of whether it could help feed the developing world.
Industry bodies have also used the recent food crisis as leverage, though Martin Taylor, head of GM firm Syngenta, told the Guardian last year: "GM won't solve the food crisis, at least not in the short term".
David Adam
From allotment to table in 50 years
With the appetite for home-grown food growing like, well, bindweed, it is good to see urban balconies and backyards groaning under the weight of courgettes and tomatoes. But with National Allotment Week starting today, it is hard to see how the government can meet the demand.
The waiting list in Camden and Islington for an allotment now stands at a staggering 40 and 25 years respectively. With more than 80,000 people nationwide facing an average three-year wait, this isn't all due to middle-class demand – or the Observer Organic Allotment. Research released today by home insurance firm LV shows that 56 per cent of allotment users use their plot to save money, while more than a third do so because of concerns about pesticides.
London food czar Rosie Boycott has promised 2012 new plots by (you guessed it) 2012 and even the venerable National Trust is promising 1,000 new plots in the next three years to help meet this growing demand to grow your own. And if you get your name down today in Camden, your first crop will be ready just in time for 2050.
Allan Jenkins is allotment gardener-in-chief and editor of Observer Magazine
Britain wants "rethink" on food production
Peter Griffiths, Reuters 10 Aug 09;
LONDON (Reuters) - Britain must find ways to grow more food while using less water, energy and fertilizers to help feed a growing world population and offset the effects of climate change on agriculture, the government said on Monday.
A senior minister said last year's sharp rise in the cost of food and oil and a severe drought in Australia showed the urgent need to develop a food security plan.
"Last year the world had a wake-up call with the sudden oil and food price rises," Environment Secretary Hilary Benn said in a statement to launch a national debate on food security. "We need a radical rethink of how we produce and consume our food.
Food and agriculture rose to the top of the political agenda at the G8 meeting in Italy in July. Leaders of the world's richest countries pledged $20 billion in farm aid to help poor countries feed themselves.
A sudden rise in the price of staple foods like rice, maize and wheat in the first half of 2008 triggered riots and hoarding in some parts of the world. Scientists say global warming could lead to devastating droughts and crop failures.
Farmers will have to adopt new methods to grow bigger crops while being more careful with increasingly valuable commodities such as water and fuel for machinery and fertilizers, Benn said.
"Globally we need to cut emissions and adapt to the changing climate that will alter what we can grow and where we can grow it," he said.
Global food production needs to rise by 70 percent by 2050 to meet the demands of a growing world population of 9 billion people, according to estimates from the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization.
Food production and consumption accounts for about 18 percent of Britain's greenhouse gas emissions, while generating 7 percent of its GDP on sales worth 172 billion pounds ($287 billion) in 2007.
Britain, which imports 37 percent of its food, must find ways of cutting the amount of food that is wasted and making the food and drink sector more sustainable, Benn said.
Environmental group Friends of the Earth said the government had failed to address the global impact of food production and consumption, overplayed the importance of genetically modified crops and failed to establish a supermarket watchdog.
Shadow Environment Secretary Nick Herbert accused the government of letting Britain become increasingly dependent on imports of foods which could be grown domestically.
The government's consultation on how the sector should look in 2030 will examine the whole supply chain, from farming and distribution to retail and disposal. The findings will be published later this year at www.defra.gov.uk/foodrin/security
(Additional reporting by Nina Chestney; editing by Andrew Roche)
UK food research 'needs a boost'
Pallab Ghosh, BBC News 10 Aug 09;
The world's food production needs to double by 2050 to feed the world's growing population.
But over this period, climate change, reduced access to water and changing land use are likely to make growing crops harder rather than easier.
Scientists are trying to find new ways of using fewer resources to produce more food.
Dr Chris Atkinson, head of science at East Malling Research in Kent, UK, said that in the next few years the UK would not be able to rely on imports of cheap food.
"A number of places where the UK sources food, like southern Spain, Greece and Italy, are going to find it very difficult in the next 50 years to continue to produce the levels of food they currently do," he said.
"That's in part due to the predictions of the scarcity of water in those parts of Europe."
The work at East Malling Research has focused on refining traditional agricultural techniques. But Dr Atkinson believes that GM technology will eventually be needed to produce enough food to feed the world.
"The concept of using tools like GM to improve water use efficiency are a reality. It is a matter of whether people want to accept that technology," he explained.
Currently, many people refuse to accept the technology - particularly in Europe, where it is effectively banned.
Professor Bob Watson, chief scientist at the Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs (Defra), believes that food production has to be doubled over the next 50 years.
That can only be done by developing all relevant technologies - including GM.
"We need science and technology to [find] ways to double food production over the next 50 years in a way that is environmentally sound," he said.
Professor Watson said there were a number of key issues which needed to be tackled.
One of the most important was how to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from farming, such as methane from rice production and nitrogen oxide from use of fertilisers.
He added that thought also needed to be given to how agricultural systems should be adapted to a changing climate.
The government's chief scientist, Professor John Beddington, has set up a food strategy task force to answer these very questions.
He has also commissioned a "foresight study" into food and farming, due out later this year.
BBC News understands it will highlight concerns that the UK's agricultural research has been cut back by 70% since the 1980s. Professor Ian Crute, the former director of Rothamsted Research, is among those involved in producing the report.
"Over the last 20 years or so, we have been extremely complacent. We have really eroded our capability in research and development focused on agriculture and food," he said.
"Having wound it down over the last 20 years, we have to really begin to wind it back up again. We have to invest in skills, our research and development.
"If we are to get this increase in efficiency we just have to make these investments. I think it is quite urgent."
'Radical rethink' needed on food
Mark Kinver, BBC News 10 Aug 09;
A "radical rethink" of how the UK produces and consumes its food is needed, Environment Secretary Hilary Benn has warned.
He was speaking at the launch of the government's assessment of the threats to the security of what we eat.
The food supply was currently secure but population growth and climate change could have an impact, he warned.
Producers, supermarkets and consumers have been invited to suggest how a secure food system should look in 2030.
Some of the findings from the consultation are expected to be published in the autumn.
As well as launching the consultation process, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) has published a scorecard-style assessment of the current state of the UK's food supply.
"It is to stimulate a debate within the UK on what a food policy should be, and how do we define and look at food security more broadly," said Defra's chief scientific adviser Professor Robert Watson.
"Food is absolutely essential, and over the past few years we did see a food price increase - not only in the UK, but across the globe," he told BBC News.
"We think it is time to have a debate with consumers, farmers, the private sector... on what the food policy should be for the UK.
"We are clearly food secure in the UK today," he observed. "We produce about 60-65% of our own food [and] import about 20% from Europe.
"So the [test] for us will be, as the Earth's climate changes, what will be the challenges not only in the UK but throughout the world?"
Environment Secretary Hilary Benn said while Britain was more self-sufficient now than it was in the 1930s and 1950s, everyone had to start thinking ahead about how to produce more using less water and less fertiliser.
He said last year's sudden jump in the price of food and oil, which most fertilisers are based on, was a "wake-up call".
"We saw last year when the oil price went up and there was a drought in Australia, which had an impact on the price of bread here in the UK, just how interdependent all these things are," he said.
"We have to feed another two and a half to three billion mouths over the next 40 to 50 years, so I want British agriculture to produce as much food as possible."
He also encouraged British consumers to buy more UK-grown produce and called for a re-think on best before or sell by dates to reduce waste.
Food for the future
Today's food security assessment focuses on six areas, including global availability, UK food chain resilience and household food security.
It assesses the current situation in each area, and the likely situation in 5-10 years time.
One sector identified as "very unfavourable" and showing no sign of improving is global fish stocks.
Yet other areas, such as the diversity of the UK's suppliers of fresh fruit and vegetables are deemed "favourable" and likely to improve even more.
In July, the Sustainable Development Commission - the government's environmental watchdog - warned that the current food system was failing.
In its report, the commission warned that the current approach was a major source of greenhouse gas emissions, and paid little attention to soil quality and water use.
Responding to the Defra publications, the British Retail Consortium said that any strategy had to be centred around consumers.
"Without their buy-in, no plan will work," said food policy director Andrew Opie.
"We do need a sustainable supply chain, but retailers do not need government statements to wake them up to these issues, they are already taking action.
"What we need is joined-up policy with government agreeing what it wants from food across all its departments and agencies."
GM crops set for role in Britain's food revolution
Environment Secretary says new techniques will help increase production
Martin Hickman, The Independent 11 Aug 09;
Ministers left open the door for the introduction of genetically modified (GM) crops yesterday as part of a new green revolution to transform food production.
Hilary Benn, the Environment Secretary, declined to rule out commercial GM planting in Britain as he stressed that new scientific techniques were needed to raise crop yields and ensure future generations could eat. His department published a food security assessment yesterday, warning that climate change, water and energy scarcity and low fish stocks were likely to place strains on the global food system that Britain could not ignore.
The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said the UK would "play a full part" in hitting a UN target of raising food production by 70 per cent by 2050 to feed a projected global population of nine billion.
Friends of the Earth and other green groups suspect the Government may see food security as an opportunity to introduce GM crops, which have so far proved unpopular with the public.
None are currently grown commercially here despite large-scale farm trials between 1999 and 2003. In 2004, ministers denied permission for GM beet and oilseed rape because they lessened food for farmland birds, while a herbicide-resistant maize they approved was later abandoned by its manufacturer.
Proponents of GM crops say they have the potential to raise yields dramatically by making crops resistant to drought, herbicides and pesticides. However, they have been fiercely opposed by environmentalists who say higher yields have not been proven and fear they could cause uncontrollable damage to animals and other plants.
Asked whether GM crops were part of the solution to what he called "a new green revolution," Mr Benn said that farmers would decide what to grow but stressed the importance of new techniques. "If GM can make a contribution, then we have a choice as a society and as a world about whether to make use of that technology – and an increasing number of countries are growing GM products," he told the BBC Today programme.
"And the truth is we will need to think about the way in which we produce our food... because one thing is certain: with a growing population, the world is going to need a lot of farmers and a lot of agricultural production in the years ahead."
As a result of public opposition, no major British supermarket stocks own-brand products with GM ingredients, although non-GM ingredients are becoming increasingly expensive because the US produces so many GM crops.
The Government will publish its plans for inceasing production this Autumn. In a draft document, Food Matters: One Year On, Defra said the Food Standards Agency would "take forward a programme of consumer engagements on genetic modification over the next 12 months." The section was omitted from the published version.
"Every time the UK gets the opportunity to vote on GM at European level, it votes in favour. We have no doubt that the Government is fully behind GM growing," said Clare Oxborrow, senior food campaigner at Friends of the Earth.
Pete Riley, of GM Freeze, said: "The Government has always been very pro-GM. They would like to see GM crops grown here. I suspect they will say we need GM crops on a case by case basis and will base it around science," he said, adding that there were political and economic arguments against GM.
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