Best of our wild blogs: 20 Mar 10

Wiping out the Trade in Wildlife
from The Leafmonkey Workshop

Coming up .... Chek Jawa Boardwalk trip on March 27th
from Adventures with the Naked Hermit Crabs

A Hazy and Cloudy Day @ Seletar Wasteland
from Beauty of Fauna and Flora in Nature

A Rare Visitor – Masked Finfoot
from My Itchy Fingers

ID'ed: small purple sea cucumbers under a stone
from wild shores of singapore

Supperclubionid
from The annotated budak

Repairs on Bedok Jetty: Mar-Apr 10
from wild shores of singapore

Yellow-vented Bulbul chick from a tissue paper nest
from Bird Ecology Study Group

Mystery of Missing Langkawi's Forest Reserve
from Nature Is Awesome

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Space 'eyes' to aid Singapore coastal erosion study

Amresh Gunasingham, Straits Times 20 Mar 10;

PULAU Semakau will soon be the sixth and latest point of an ultra-precise satellite navigation network that is several times sharper than traditional Global Positioning System (GPS) equipment such as car navigation devices.

The $50,000 facility, to be located at the site of Singapore's sole working landfill, will be used to study the environment around the southern tip of Singapore, measuring coastal erosion, natural habitats and tidal activity in the area.

The National University of Singapore's Tropical Marine Science Institute (TMSI) yesterday signed a memorandum of understanding to collaborate with the Singapore Land Authority (SLA), which manages the network of satellite stations across the island.

These are in Loyang, Singapore Polytechnic, Nanyang Technological University, Woodlands and the Keppel area.

TMSI's director, Professor Peter Ng, said the system will enable researchers to better understand the changes to the environment in areas around Pulau Semakau and St Johns Island, and devise methods to conserve biodiversity such as mangroves more quickly.

In beaches, only a few centimetres of sand are eroded every year, so tracking a trend over time is needed to devise the appropriate protection measures such as building sea walls, said TMSI research fellow Durai Raju.

Prof Ng said the new system could add 50 per cent to efficiency and save costs.

The three-year-old Satellite Positioning Reference Network (Sirent) system makes use of six signal receivers in fixed locations across the island to obtain the position of a user more precisely - within a 50cm radius - than conventional GPS networks.

This is because each station is able to access data from at least 24 satellites orbiting in space, up to twice the number that an ordinary GPS device installed in a car does.

At the start, Sirent was used almost exclusively by surveyors, but is now used by agencies such as the PUB and within the private sector, said Dr Victor Khoo, manager of survey services at SLA.

This is the second collaboration between SLA and TMSI on furthering environmental research along the island's coastlines.

Environmental monitoring gets a boost from NUS-SLA partnership
Dylan Loh Channel NewsAsia 19 Mar 10;

SINGAPORE : Environmental monitoring and management is set to get a boost from a collaboration between the National University of Singapore (NUS) and Singapore Land Authority (SLA).

Both parties signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to inaugurate a Global Positioning System (GPS) reference station, dubbed "SiReNT" (Singapore Satellite Positioning Reference Network).

The station will be used for engineering, recreational and scientific activities, including the study of coastline erosion, bio-diversity and tides.

It is the sixth under SLA's management and is sited at Pulau Semakau, a man-made landfill island.

Through this first partnership with SLA, NUS will provide expertise on GPS applications for scientific studies.

The joint venture aims to break new ground in the way data is collected and analysed so as to better carry out environmental monitoring and management.

- CNA/al


'Eyes' to aid erosion study
Amresh Gunasingham, Straits Times 19 Mar 10;

PULAU Semakau will soon be the sixth and latest point of an ultra-precise satellite navigation network that is several times sharper than traditional Global Positioning System (GPS) equipment such as car navigation devices.

The $50,000 facility, to be located at the site of Singapore's sole working landfill, will be used to study the environment around the southern tip of Singapore, measuring coastal erosion, natural habitats and tidal activity in the area.

The National University of Singapore's Tropical Marine Science Institute (TMSI) on Friday signed a memorandum of understanding to collaborate with the Singapore Land Authority (SLA), which manages the network of satellite stations across the island.

These are in Loyang, Singapore Polytechnic, Nanyang Technological University, Woodlands and the Keppel area.

TMSI's director, Professor Peter Ng, said the system will enable researchers to better understand the changes to the environment in areas around Pulau Semakau and St Johns Island, and devise methods to conserve biodiversity such as mangroves more quickly.

Read more!

Young NTUC holds green race on Ubin

Jeremy Au Yong, Straits Times 20 Mar 10;

THE number 350 holds little meaning for the average man but Young NTUC hopes to change that - through running.

The youth wing of the National Trades Union Congress has organised a mass run, named Run 350, to make people more aware that there is too much carbon dioxide in the air.

The number 350 refers to the upper limit of carbon dioxide, measured in parts per million (ppm), that should be in the air. Scientists have determined that it needs to be below 350 ppm to avoid runaway climate change and problems such as melting ice caps and widespread drought.

Current levels, however, stand at 389.91 ppm and have been above the limit since 1988.

Run 350, which has drawn 1,000 participants, will be flagged off at 3.50pm on Pulau Ubin today by labour chief Lim Swee Say.

Runners will complete either a 5km or 10km route around the small island located north-east of Singapore. It is the first mass run to be held on Pulau Ubin.

Participant Mohamad Haidir Basri, 27, said one reason he joined was that he had never run on Pulau Ubin.

'Moreover, Run 350 is one of the few runs in Singapore that have an environmental cause,' he added.

Apart from spreading the 350 message, all proceeds from the the day's event will also be donated to the Garden City Fund's Plant-A-Tree programme. It was set up in 2002 to preserve Singapore's image as a garden city.

Through the run and other green-themed activities, Young NTUC aims to raise $35,000 by its fifth anniversary at the end of next month.

The sum would fund the planting of 350 trees on Pulau Ubin. As of yesterday, more than $20,000 had been raised.

Young NTUC has embraced the green message this year and the run is the latest in a string of environment-themed activities.

In recent months, it held climate change dialogues and free screenings of movies with green messages.

More details about the event.

Read more!

Distilled water a potential health risk

Andy Ho, Straits Times 20 Mar 10;

AS A matter of national survival, Singapore pursues an 'aggressive' water policy. Did you know, however, there is also a policy on 'aggressive water'?

At a recent talk by an official from national water agency PUB, many were surprised at the speaker's mention of 'aggressive water'. This liquid does not snarl. It is simply water almost or completely bereft of dissolved minerals.

This low-mineral or totally unmineralised water actually dissolves and leaches out minerals like copper, lead and cadmium from metal pipes and other plumbing material, like gypsum. For this reason, only plastic pipes, hose lines, fittings, storage tanks and containers should be employed to move this water around.

Demineralised water is also called deionised water as most ions (electrically charged atoms) have been removed from it. These ions include those of table salt, (sodium and chloride), chalk (calcium and carbonate), gypsum (magnesium and sulfate) and ions of copper, iron and other metals as well.

The ions are removed by a process called reverse osmosis. It forces impure water through special membranes. Newater, which is almost as pure as distilled water, is made by this process.

Distillation, by contrast, involves boiling the water and condensing the steam. It removes not only ionic contaminants but also (non-ionic) organic impurities. Deionisation, however, cannot remove the latter - which includes microbes like viruses and bacteria. So deionised water may be chemically pure but not necessarily biologically pure. Thus home water 'purifiers' - which remove material from tap water that may not be pleasant to the taste buds - may give you a better tasting cuppa but not one that is biologically safer.

Now the $64 million question is: If aggressive water attacks the plumbing, won't bottled demineralised or distilled water be bad to drink? A 2004 World Health Organisation (WHO) review of the evidence began by noting that the potential health effects of drinking 'totally unmineralised water had not generally been considered, since this water is not found in nature'.

However, there was some research carried out in the former Soviet Union which had produced demineralised drinking water for some cities in Central Asia. It was quickly recognised that if some minerals were not added back in, the water did not taste nice enough. Today, demineralised water is usually blended with more mineral-rich water (just as Newater is added to PUB water) to make it more palatable - and less aggressive.

WHO had also reported back in 1980 some experiments in which rats were given distilled water for a year. The animals drank more water than normal rats. They also excreted more sodium and chloride ions in their urine, so they became deficient in these elements.

In 1993, the German Society for Nutrition issued a public warning against drinking distilled water. The fear was that salts would be leached from the body, so its prolonged use may alter the body's mineral and water metabolism. In 1994, the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued a public advisory asking parents not to use distilled or low-mineral water in preparing drinks for infants.

A problem that could develop with consumption of demineralised water had long been observed in some mountain climbers who melt snow to make their beverages. (Rain water and naturally formed ice have no minerals.) These individuals could develop swelling of the brain, throw a fit and go into shock.

In a 2000 study, people were found to have developed 'water intoxication' after drinking several litres of low-mineral water following strenuous physical exertion. When too much such water is ingested, the body's electrolyte balance between different body compartments is altered, which upsets organ function. This can eventuate in swelling of the brain, fits, shock and even death.

The evidence does suggest that habitually drinking distilled water may be bad for us. In fact, for some effects to appear, exposure for long durations may not be needed. Just a few months may suffice, as was seen in some Czech and Slovak cities where reverse osmosis was used from 2000 to 2002 to produce deionised drinking water at the tap. It took just weeks or months before people developed lethargy, weakness, muscle cramps and heart problems, precisely as the German Society for Nutrition had warned in 1993. The cause was found to be magnesium deficiency.

Four published reviews done between 2002 and 2003 of all epidemiological studies completed in different human populations since the 1960s suggest strongly that the intake of water with more magnesium is linked to lower risk of heart disease, especially sudden cardiac deaths.

Conversely, the intake of low magnesium water is linked to higher risk of sudden cardiac death - as well as motor neurone disease, pregnancy disorders and some cancers, according to some reports.

Given these findings, the long-term use of some bottled water may be problematic. Often, some minerals are added back into bottled water purified by reverse osmosis to improve its taste and reduce its aggressiveness - but not for health reasons.

Thus not all minerals found in natural water are put back in. Frequently, it is just calcium carbonate (chalk) or other carbonates that are added, not magnesium. So bottled water may be low in magnesium, a deficiency that is even more likely with home water treatment systems since no amateur is likely to know how to improve the water's mineral content.

In sum, the fashionable bottle of drinking water is unlikely to provide the beneficial minerals one can get in our tap water. In fact, if not remineralised, bottled water might, in the long run, even be aggressively bad for our health.

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92-Year-Old Indonesian Hunter May Have Killed More Than 50 Tigers

Jakarta Globe 19 Mar 10;

Natural Resources Conservation Office of Riau has arrested a 92 year old man for killing more than 50 Sumatran tigers over his lifetime.

“At first we didn’t believe Grandpa Wiryo was a tiger hunter, but after we conducted surveillance, we finally arrested the suspect with three sacks of evidence,” Riau conservation head Edi Susanto told SCTV on Friday.

Edi said the evidence consisted of skin and bones from a tiger killed early this month in the Kerumutan wildlife conservation area in Indragiri Hulu district. Authorities also confiscated tiger traps belonging to the suspect.

“From the preliminary investigation, the suspect admitted he had killed more than 50 tigers,” said Edi. “Grandpa Wiryo could be the godfather of tiger hunters.”

Wiryo had slaughtered more than 40 Sumateran tigers in Riau since 1960, Edi said. He also hunted in West Sumatra and Java island.

The aged hunter faces up to five years imprisonment and a penalty of Rp 100 million ($10,989). Authorities believe Wiryo was involved with an international network. Wiryo admitted that he had regular customers from Singapore.

“I have been a tiger hunter since I was 17 years old,” said Wiryo.

JG

Lifetime tiger hunter, 92, snared in Indonesia
Yahoo News 19 Mar 10;

JAKARTA (AFP) – Indonesian conservationists said on Friday they had caught red-handed a 92-year-old man who had admitted to killing dozens of critically endangered Sumatran tigers over a lifetime of hunting.

"We caught him Thursday while he was sailing a traditional wooden boat in a river in Kuala Cinaku with evidence of skin, skull and 8.3 kilos of bones from a tiger," Iwin Kasiwan, from the natural conservation agency in Riau province, Sumatra, told AFP.

The man, named Wiryo, told conservationists that he started hunting tigers for a living when he was 17 on Java island. He moved to Sumatra in 1960 as the population of Javan tiger decreased.

"According to him, he has killed more than 50 Sumatran tigers in Riau province alone," Kasiwan said, adding it could see the 92-year-old jailed for up to five years.

Wiryo explained that he managed to sell the tiger parts in Singapore.

There are fewer than 400 Sumatran tigers left in the wild and their increasing contact with people is a result of habitat loss due to poaching and deforestation, according to conservationists.

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Indonesia to review forest carbon laws: official

Sunanda Creagh, Reuters 19 Mar 10;

JAKARTA (Reuters) - Indonesia has launched a review of laws governing a U.N.-backed carbon trading scheme aimed preserving rainforests, a forestry ministry official said on Friday.

Indonesia in 2008 became the world's first country to design a legal framework for reducing emissions from deforestation and degradation (REDD), a scheme that would allow rich countries to pay developing nations not to chop down their trees.

Forest preservation is seen as an important step in slowing global warming because trees soak up large amounts of the main greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide, which is emitted by burning fossil fuels, such coal, oil and gas.

Deforestation and forest fires are another major source of greenhouse gas emissions, particularly when carbon-rich peat forests are cleared and drained.

REDD aims to reward developing nations for protecting, restoring and sustainably managing rainforests. Projects would earn tradeable credits for the CO2 locked away by the trees -- a trade potentially worth billions of dollars a year.

Local communities would share a portion of the credit sales to develop alternative livelihoods as an incentive to protect surrounding forests.

The review of forestry department decrees 30, 36 and 68 is aimed at removing rules that overlap or clash and could see the creation of a new authority to monitor REDD in Indonesia, said forestry ministry official Wandojo Siswanto.

"We would like to revisit all of and make them clearer and more simple for everybody to understand and to participate in REDD," Siswanto told Reuters by phone. "We would like to have a designated national authority for REDD. I hope it will be set up by the end of the year."

Siswanto said the new authority would assess proposals from would-be REDD developers and coordinate with the finance, planning, environment and mining ministries. It may also play a role in monitoring whether or not REDD projects actually conserved carbon.

CURBING EMISSIONS

The review would also update existing laws to reflect a global move toward what is known as REDD-plus, a beefed up scheme where project developers could earn carbon credits not just for carbon preservation but extra benefits such as biodiversity protection, social development and enhancing forest cover.

"Hopefully, altogether, the review will be finished by the end of this year," he said, adding that project developers who have already applied would not have to re-apply but would be expected to follow the new decrees.

Indonesia has more than a dozen early REDD projects and has attracted funding from the governments of Norway, Australia and the United States, as well as green groups such as The Nature Conservancy and banks such as BofA Merrill Lynch and Macquarie Group.

Indonesia, with some of the world's most complex and diverse forests, also has one of the highest deforestation rates. The government says reducing deforestation and protecting forests, particularly peat lands, is central to its goal of curbing the growth of the nation's greenhouse gas emissions by 2020.

Decree number 36, which relates to rules on how much REDD revenue should be shared with the state or local communities, would be re-assessed as part of the review, he said.

A source in the fledgling REDD industry, who asked not to be named, said he understood the finance ministry wanted more say in the revenue sharing rules.

He said more consultation with industry was needed.

"We hope these changes are for the better but this needs to involve all the stakeholders to make it work," he said.

(Editing by David Fogarty)

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Water woes in Malaysia during the dry spell

Johor resorts to cloud seeding
Shahrum Sayuthi, The New Straits Times 19 Mar 10;

JOHOR BARU: Cloud seeding operations have been started to tackle the current drought in central Johor.

State Energy, Water, Communication and Environment Committee chairman Tan Kok Hong said cloud seeding started on Saturday and will go on for a month.

It is being jointly carried out by the Bahagian Kawalselia Air Johor which coordinates water resources in the state, the Meteorological Department and the Department of Irrigation and Drainage.

"There will be 15 cloud seeding operations over one month," said Tan when contacted yesterday.

Tan said the flights would be carried out based on the weather, suitable cloud formations and wind direction to target the affected water catchment areas.

He advised the public, especially those residing in central Johor, to use water sparingly until the dry spell ends, expected to be by the end of this month or early next month.

Bakaj director Idris Kaprawi said the cloud seeding was done by an independent contractor appointed by the Meteorological Department.

"The state government has allocated RM500,000 for the exercise in an attempt to improve the water levels at several dams and water catchment areas.

"So far, the past two seeding sessions faced problems because of the lack of cloud formation, but we will keep on trying ," he said.

The aircraft used for the cloud seeding is based at the Batu Berendam Airport in Malacca.

State water management company, SAJ Holdings Sdn Bhd's corporate communication head Jamaluddin Jamil said water levels at catchment areas in other areas of the state were under control.

"In central Johor, the Bekok and Chengok dams are below the critical level," he said.

Yesterday, Bekok dam, which supplies Batu Pahat district, was at 9.92m. Its critical mark is 10m.

Chengok dam, which supplies Mersing, registered 4.14m, 0.56m below the critical level.

Jamaluddin said despite the alarming water level, SAJ Holdings could still manage the situation in Batu Pahat and Mersing without the need to ration water.


However, water is still being rationed in Kluang, the hardest hit district.

The water level at Sembrong Barat dam fell to to 8.11m, but still above the 7.4m critical mark.

The district's other water source, Sungai Sembrong Timur, is the worst hit with a level 0.1m. The river's critical level is 0.5m.

Perlis farmers told to delay sowing
The New Straits Times 19 Mar 10;

PADANG BESAR: The level of Timah Tasoh dam has declined by more than a metre.

State agriculture authorities have advised farmers to start their planting season at the end of next month instead of the scheduled end of this month.

State Department of Irrigation and Drainage director Nishad Mohamed Shaffy said the normal level of the dam was 29.1m but with the current extreme hot weather, it had now gone down to 27.9m.

"The current water level is sufficient for domestic use only but not enough for irrigation.

"This morning, we have informed the state government and relevant agencies about the situation. We suggested that they defer the planting season to the end of next month."

The dam irrigates almost 3,100ha of farmland and supplies 54 million litres of drinking water every day.

If the situation continued, he said more than 385 farming families, especially padi planters, would be affected.

Padi-planting season causes rivers to run dry
New Straits Times 19 Mar 10;

ALOR STAR: The state's padi fields are parched and rivers are running dry, but the current dry spell is not entirely the cause.

Muda Agricultural Development Authority general manager Datuk Abdul Rahim Salleh said the arid appearance in many parts of Kedah's farming region was caused by water being drawn from waterways and padi fields for the first padi-planting season of the year next week.

"We have started pumping out water from the padi fields and waterways to allow farmers to prepare their land for the first padi-planting season.

"This is the normal practice this time of the year and because of the extremely dry weather, it is not unusual for one to find the ground bone dry and waterways reduced to a trickle," he said when asked on the effects of the current dry spell on the state's agriculture.

He said the first padi-planting season for the year in many parts of Kedah and Perlis would begin on March 25.

Rahim said there was ample water at the Pedu, Muda and Ahning dams.

"There is enough water in all our dams since we have stored enough during the wet spell last year.

"In fact, water from the dams is sufficient to irrigate our rice fields for the next two padi-planting seasons."


Fires, haze and water shortages plague Sabah
The New Straits Times 19 Mar 10;

KOTA KINABALU: A host of problems has emerged as a result of the prolonged drought in the state.


Haze, bush and open fires, water shortages, dried up rivers and poor visibility have been plaguing the headlines recently.

An eight-car pile-up was also reported yesterday at the Beaufort-Menumbok highway at 7.30am, believed to be caused by hazy conditions.

No one was hurt in the incident involving trucks and a car but police have advised motorists to be careful and to switch on the headlights when travelling.

Chief Minister Datuk Seri Musa Aman has also called for water rationing for areas severely affected by drought, particularly Nabawan and Kuala Penyu.

Bernama quoted the state Water Department director, Ag Mohd Tahir Mohd Talib, as saying that the water situation in the state was manageable and supply could last until April or May.

He said the current situation was not as bad as the drought in 1997 but the hot weather was quite abnormal.

He also said so far, there would be no state-wide water rationing except for ongoing rationing in areas where water shortages normally occurred.

It was recently reported that about 500 villagers in Nabawan faced water shortages due to Sungai Penawan drying up, but Mohd Tahir said the district had been facing problems for quite sometime.

Villagers said they were turning to nearby rivers for bathing and cooking.

The situation is not expected to improve soon as Sabah Meteorological Department director Abdul Malik Tusin said that the El Nino phenomenon was expected to last until May.

"Luckily, the haze is not so bad as it is a localised source and not a transboundary haze. It is usually confined to areas where there is open burning."

The Fire and Rescue Department has been kept busy putting out bush and forest fires, with 822 fires reported in the state up till March 17. This month alone saw 440 fires.

Dry spell not affecting supply and price of greens
Florence A. Samy, The Star 20 Mar 10;

PETALING JAYA: The supply and price of vegetables have not been affected by the current dry spell.

However, the Federation of Malay­sian Vegetable Growers Association secretary-general Chay Ee Mong said the situation might change if it continued.

“There is no problem in Cameron Highlands as it has been raining over the last few days.

“But the effect will be felt if there is no rain the next week or for 10 days,” he said.

Chay, who is also the Cameron Highlands Vegetable Growers Assoc­iation secretary-general, said farmers in Johor were feeling the effect as the rivers were drying up.

“Farmers have to irrigate almost daily due to the current hot weather. In Johor, the water is not enough.”

According to the Meteorological Department, no rain has been forecast in Perlis, Penang, Kelantan, Terengganu, west Johor and Sabah over the next week.

The dry spell is expected to last until May due to the El Nino phenomenon, which has brought drier than usual weather conditions.

Several dams and rivers have recorded low water levels including the Bekok dam in Johor, which has less than 1% of its water left.

Syarikat Bekalan Air Selangor Sdn Bhd (Syabas) said there would be no water rationing in the Klang Valley for now, although all seven dams had shown a drop in water levels.

In a statement, Syabas said an emergency response plan would be activated to tackle water shortage if the need arose.

“Rivers such as Sungai Labu, Sungai Langat and Sungai Selangor that supply water to treatment plants in Selangor also recorded lower levels but they have not reached an alarming stage.

“But if the hot and dry weather continues until May, it can cause river pollution levels to increase including higher ammonia content due to lower dilution.

“This can cause water treatment plants to cease operations because the tainted raw water cannot be treated. It will cause supply disruptions,” said Syabas.

Meanwhile, the Department of Environment director-general, Datuk Rosnani Ibrahim, urged the public to refrain from open burning or throwing cigarette butts indiscriminately.


Secondary water source vital in crisis
The Star 20 Mar 10;

KUALA LUMPUR: Harvesting rainwater and using groundwater are two ways to alleviate shortages in times of drought, said the Council for Water and Green Technology Professionals.

“A secondary water source provides more security, especially in times of crisis,” said its secretary-general Mohmad Asari Daud at a roundtable discussion on “Clean Water for Our Future” on Thursday.

Currently, he said, only 1% of the country’s water supply is from groundwater while 99% is derived from surface water.

He said that in Malaysia the quality of groundwater was generally better than surface water.

“The storage of rainwater should be encouraged as it can be utilised for cleaning purposes and watering plants at home,” added Mohmad Asari.

World Water Day falls on Monday and in discussing ways to obtain clean and an undisrupted supply, Malaysian Water Partnership chairman Datuk Syed Muhammad Shahbudin emphasised the need for an Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) system.

“There are 11 ministries as well as agencies and operators involved but they are not co-ordinated,” he said, adding that the IWRM system was not moving at the moment.

Other panellists at the discussion were Malaysian Muslim Consumers Association information secretary Zulkefli Muhammad and the Institute of Geology Malaysia’s hydro-geology expert Mohd Nazan Awang.

Malaysian Water Association immediate past president and Syarikat Air Terengganu’s former chief executive officer Datuk Wan Ngah Ali was the moderator.

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Sturgeon's plight stokes conservation row

Anne Chaon Yahoo News 19 Mar 10;

DOHA (AFP) – A catastrophic fall in wild sturgeon numbers even as more and more of its lucrative caviar is farmed has stoked a bitter row over the best means of conservation -- managed catch or outright ban.

No one disputes the sturgeon is in big trouble.

In a report issued on the sidelines of a UN wildlife conference in the Qatari capital Doha, the International Union for Conservation of Nature warned the sturgeon is now the single most endangered group of animals on its Red List of Threatened Species.

"Eighty-five percent of sturgeon, one of the oldest families of fishes in existence, valued around the world for their precious roe, are at risk of extinction," the report said.

"Four species are now possibly extinct," it added.

But there the consensus ends.

Some conservationists want to see a prolonged trade ban under Appendix I of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) to allow the wild sturgeon stocks to recover.

"An Appendix I listing of highly endangered sturgeons, such as beluga, would ban the global trade of sturgeon products for an extended period of time," said Professor Ellen K. Pikitch, executive director of the Institute for Ocean Conservation Science at Stony Brook University in New York.

"An Appendix I listing would greatly reduce the illegal capture and trade of sturgeon, it would make monitoring and enforcement much simpler and much more effective," said Pikitch.

"At present, it can be very difficult for enforcement officers to determine if a particular shipment is legal or not.

"An Appendix I listing would also give sturgeon the long-term protection they require in order to recover. Given the great longevity and late maturity of sturgeons, recovery would take decades under the best of circumstances.

"It has been disappointing that CITES failed to use its authority over these past 12 years," she said.

But CITES itself and industry experts disagree, arguing the best way of conserving the remaining wild stocks is through careful management that gives local populations on the shores of the Caspian Sea and the great Russian rivers that are its homeland an interest in its protection.

CITES secretariat spokesman Juan Carlos Vasquez said counterintuitively the growing share of farmed sturgeon in the profitable caviar market was damaging the protection of wild stocks.

"Many countries are farming and this is not necessarily good for sturgeon in the wild, because they withdraw the value of the fish in the Caspian and there is no incentive for the countries to do more research control and protection," he said.

"It won't help," he added, referring to calls for an Appendix I listing.

"CITES' job is not to have tigers in zoos and sturgeons in farms. Our job is to keep the species healthy in the wild, and it's not always by banning trade that you will achieve this objective.

"If you ban for ever, they accommodate to the ban and create illegal trade and the countries disengage."

French Armenian Armen Petrossian, whose caviar house accounts for between 10 and 15 percent of the world market and who heads the International Caviar Importers Association, agrees.

He says his business now relies 100 percent on farmed sturgeon as its output has risen from just 500 kilogrammes (1,100 pounds) of caviar in 1998 to between 150 and 160 tonnes now.

During the same period the volume of legally produced wild caviar has fallen from as much as 180 tonnes to practically nothing as zero quotas have been imposed in many areas.

"Technically, we could completely dispense with wild caviar, but it would be a terrible mistake. The malign effect of farming has been to remove any incentive for managing the Caspian," Petrossian said.

"CITES would have done better to preserve an area of controlled exploitation to remove the pretext for a black market and provide a livelihood for local fishermen who currently have no alternative to the black market."

Read more!

Cheetahs return to Angola's south

Yahoo News 19 Mar 10;

LUANDA (AFP) – Wild cheetahs have returned to southern Angola for the first time in decades, having disappeared during decades of civil war, a researcher said Friday.

"I was in southern Angola to make a survey, looking for signs of cheetahs, and we were just ecstatic to find cheetahs there," said Laurie Marker, from the Cheetah Conservation Fund in neighbouring Namibia.

"I actually saw two wild cheetahs, which is very rare, to visibly see them," she said.

"To be able to see wildlife starting to come back is a huge benefit for Angola and it is wonderful news at a biodiversity level in general," she added.

The cats were seen in the Iona region in southern Namibe province, home to Angola's biggest national park, which was badly damaged during the 27-year civil war that ended in 2002.

Angola's environment ministry in January declared 2010 the "year of biodiversity", saying it wanted to restore its parks and create new conservation areas.

Marker said southern Angola could develop eco-tourism, which is the backbone of the tourist trade around the region.

"There is a great potential for tourism. But they have to be very cautious and delicate" not to destroy this wildlife that is only slowly returning.

Last year researchers discovered a rare Angolan antelope that had been feared extinct, spotting three of the giant black sable that are a national symbol.

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China says drought now affecting 50 million people

Reuters 19 Mar 10;

BEIJING (Reuters) - A severe drought across a large swathe of southwest China is now affecting more than 50 million people, and forecasters see no signs of it abating in the short term, state media said on Friday.

The drought began last autumn, and is the result not only of less rainfall but also unseasonably high temperatures, the official Xinhua news agency said, citing a central government meeting on the situation.

It is affecting the provinces and regions of Guangxi, Sichuan, Guizhou and Yunnan and the municipality of Chongqing. These parts of China are known for their sugar and rubber plantations.

Some areas have received 90 percent less rainfall than they should have at this time of the year, and the drought has caused economic losses of 19 billion yuan ($2.78 billion), the report said.

More than 16 million people are having difficulty accessing safe drinking water, it added.

"The drought has lasted for more than five straight months and is still developing," Xinhua said. "It is having a serious impact upon people's lives, industry and agriculture as well as general economic development. Losses are severe."

The area will experience no significant rainfall for at least the next 10 days, the report cited weather forecasters as saying.

Traders told Reuters in December they estimated sugar output in Guangxi, the country's largest sugar producing area, would fall by about 300,000 tonnes from 2008's 7.63 million tonnes. Guangxi produces 60 percent of China's sugar output, which totaled 12.43 million tonnes in 2008.

The drought is the worst in Yunnan in six decades, and has affected 85 percent of the province's agricultural land.

The drought has also been partly blamed for cracks appearing at one of the region's busiest airports, at Yunnan's provincial capital of Kunming.

($1=6.826 Yuan)

(Reporting by Ben Blanchard; Editing by Sugita Katyal)

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Perils of plastics: Risks to human health and the environment

Arizona State University EurekAlert 19 Mar 10;

Plastics surround us. A vital manufacturing ingredient for nearly every existing industry, these materials appear in a high percentage of the products we use every day. Although modern life would be hard to imagine without this versatile chemistry, products composed of plastics also have a dark side, due in part to the very characteristics that make them so desirable—their durability and longevity.

Now Rolf Halden, associate professor in the School of Sustainable Engineering at Arizona State University and assistant director of Environmental Biotechnology at the Biodesign Institute has undertaken a survey of existing scientific literature concerning the hazards of plastics to human health and to the ecosystems we depend on. His findings, which appear in the latest issue of the Annual Review of Public Health, are sobering.

Today, plastics accumulate in garbage dumps and landfills and are sullying the world's oceans in ever-greater quantity. And plastics and their additives aren't just around us, they are inside virtually every one of us— present in our blood and urine in measureable amounts, ingested with the food we eat, the water we drink and from other sources.

Halden's study reiterates the fact that the effects to the environment from plastic waste are acute. Measurements from the most contaminated regions of the world's oceans show that the mass of plastics exceeds that of plankton sixfold. Patches of oceanic garbage—some as large as the state of Texas—hold a high volume of non-biodegradable plastics. Aquatic birds and fish are increasingly victims because biodegradation processes are inadequate to eliminate this durable refuse.

The magnitude of society's burden of plastic waste is only beginning to be fully appreciated. In the U.S., the average person produces a half-pound of plastic waste every day. Around the world, some 300 million tons of the material are produced each year—a figure poised to expand, as new forms of plastics are devised to serve a voracious global appetite. As Halden points out, this annual production alone would fill a series of train cars encircling the globe. "We're doomed to live with yesterday's plastic pollution and we are exacerbating the situation with each day of unchanged behavior," he said.

Adverse effects to human health remain a topic of fierce controversy, though a growing consensus is emerging that plastics and their additives are not always the benign companions we once assumed them to be. Halden says he accepted the invitation to write about plastics and human health "because the topic showcases the bigger problem of how to create a sustainable future for modern civilization."

Two broad classes of plastic-related chemicals are of critical concern for human health—bisphenol-A or BPA, and additives used in the synthesis of plastics, which are known as phthalates. Halden explains that plastics are polymers—long chains of molecules usually made of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen and/or silicon, which are chemically linked together or polymerized. Different polymer chains can be used to create forms of plastics with unique and useful properties.

BPA is a basic building block of polycarbonate plastics, such as those used for bottled water, food packaging and other items. While it has been considered benign in the form of a heavily cross-linked polymer, its bonds can break down over time, when plastics are repeatedly washed, exposed to heat or other stresses, liberating the building blocks of the chemical, which are toxic. BPA has been recognized since the 1940s as an endocrine disrupting chemical that interferes with normal hormonal function.

Adding to the health risks associated with BPA is the fact that other ingredients—such as plasticizers—are commonly added to plastics. Many of these potentially toxic components also can leach out over time. Among the most common is a chemical known as di-ethylhexyl phthalate or DEHP. In some products, notably medical devices including IV bags or tubing, additives like DEHP can make up 40 or 50 percent of the product. "If you're in a hospital, hooked up to an IV drip," Halden explains, "the chemical that oozes out goes directly into your bloodstream, with no opportunity for detoxification in the gut. This can lead to unhealthy exposure levels, particularly in susceptible populations such as newborns."

What are the overall effects of the plastics we unwittingly ingest? The literature Halden surveyed is ambiguous on this point, despite more than half a century of study. Part of the difficulty lies in the absence of good controls for studying health outcomes, as plastic exposure is a global phenomenon, and finding unexposed subjects for comparison is nearly impossible. It is known however that health effects vary depending on who is exposed—and when. Infants and pregnant or nursing mothers are at heightened risk for toxic exposure or passage of BPA and additives like DEHP.

This January, the FDA announced an important reversal of its 2008 claims regarding the safety of bisphenol-A, expressing new concern about "potential effects of BPA on the brain, behavior and prostate gland of fetuses, infants and children," and pledging to collaborate with other federal health agencies to reevaluate the chemical's safety.

Studying the effects of low-dose exposure is tricky, usually requiring a very large number of study subjects. Instead, epidemiologists tracking the problem frequently base their conclusions on data gathered from individuals known to have unusually high levels of a chemical—often the result of high-level occupational exposure. Halden insists that further study on low-dose exposure is essential to settle the matter of health risks, noting some evidence in the literature suggests that high-dose studies may be inadequate to properly understand toxic effects from continuous low-level exposures.

Halden explains that while plastics have legitimate uses of benefit to society, their brazen misuse has led to a radically unsustainable condition. "Today, there's a complete mismatch between the useful lifespan of the products we consume and their persistence in the environment." Prominent examples of offending products are the ubiquitous throwaway water bottles, Teflon-coated dental floss and cotton swabs made with plastic PVC sticks. All are typically used for a matter of seconds or minutes, yet are essentially non-biodegradable and will persist in the environment, sometimes for millennia.

Despite the scourge of discarded plastics and the health risks these substances pose, Halden is optimistic that society can begin to make wiser choices and develop more sustainable products, formed from biodegradable, non-toxic chemical building blocks.

New forms of polymer, some made from renewable materials that are digestible by microorganisms, are being explored.

Ultimately, converting to petroleum-free construction materials for use in smart and sustainable plastics will become a necessity, driven not only by health and environmental concerns but by the world's steadily declining oil supply. As Halden emphasizes, the manufacture of plastics currently accounts for about 8 percent of the world's petroleum use, a sizeable chunk, which ultimately contributes to another global concern—the accumulation of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

"We are at a critical juncture," Halden warns, "and cannot continue under the modus that has been established. If we're smart, we'll look for replacement materials, so that we don't have this mismatch—good for a minute and contaminating for 10,000 years."

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China's urban elite fights trash wars

Reuters 19 Mar 10;

BEIJING (Reuters) - Thousands of China's urban elite took to the streets last year in protest against expanding garbage incinerators, angered by the threat to both their health and the value of their homes, a report launched on Friday said.

The stability-obsessed government fears growing public anger among the country's middle class, who once focused largely on securing jobs and homes but are becoming increasingly assertive -- sometimes forcing authorities to back down on unpopular plans.

City residents in the capital Beijing and the relatively well-off coastal provinces of Jiangsu and Guangdong all came out in 2009 to try and block new constructions or expansions of incinerators, an annual review by one of China's oldest and best known environmental groups, Friends of Nature, said.

"Health and safety are people's bottom line. When they feel threatened, and there's no other way to defend themselves, they protest," said Yang Changjiang, a journalist and co-author of the fifth annual "Green book of the Environment" report.

Some of the protests are successful. The government in southern Guangzhou city put off plans to install one incinerator when hundreds of people demonstrated, demanding that the facility be relocated.

But China has already surpassed the United States as the world's largest producer of household garbage as increased prosperity brings increased consumption.

The government is struggling to find new ways and places to dispose of the growing heap of rubbish, the report said. With space already at a premium in a country struggling with a shortage of farmland, incineration is an obvious alternative.

Beijing and Guangzhou now generate around 18,000 tons of garbage per day, but only have capacity to process 10,400 tonnes and 12,000 tonnes respectively, state media have reported.

TIME FOR A CHANGE

Protests included rallies, petitions, sit-ins, online forums and group efforts to dig into the financial affairs of officials who might be benefiting from any construction.

"We're tired of what the experts and officials said," one user of an anti-garbage-burning forum set up by residents of southern Guangdong province wrote. "We had no choice but to obey their decisions. It's time for change."

They are part of a sea-change in the nature of environmental protests that first gained widespread attention with efforts to block a chemical plant planned for the port of Xiamen in 2007.

Previously, most of those who challenged officials were farmers living with huge levels of pollution. The impact on their lives or livelihood was disastrous enough to outweigh the potential risks of taking on the government.

The concerns of the middle classes, about the future of their health or assets, brought a different kind of protest.

"Many people involved in 2009 cases are rich," said Xie Xinyuan, project coordinator at Friends of Nature.

"They are able to hire people to do professional research and present it to the public. Or they are so well-educated that they can do it by themselves," Xie said.

"People who live in less developed areas may also be harmed by the garbage crisis, but there is not so much they can do." So far Beijing at least has stuck to plans for more incinerators, adding three by 2012, and a further four by 2015.

By then, 8,200 tonnes of garbage could be going up in smoke -- much of it foul-smelling and potentially toxic -- around the capital each day.

"I'm not optimistic about the situation this year," Yang said. "Nationwide, 41 new incinerators will be built. It could cause some very serious problems."

(Reporting by Emma Graham-Harrison and Beijing Newsroom; Editing by Sanjeev Miglani)

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The No-Growth Fantasy

Europe's attack on capitalism
Stefan Theil, Newsweek 19 Mar 10; from the magazine issue dated Mar 29, 2010

Take the worst economic crisis in 60 years. Combine it with the erosion of the West's predominance. Add apocalyptic warnings of climate change. What you'll get are some radical new ideas.

One of those now swirling through the European zeitgeist turns out to be a very old one, albeit in new garb. It's the revival of the assertion that economic development is and should be finite—limited today by scarce resources, overpopulation, and rising sea levels.

In Britain, a government commission has drawn up plans for a "steady state economy" that forgoes future economic growth in the name of sustainability by cutting work hours and banning TV commercials (to reduce consumerism). In Germany, new bestseller called Exit: Prosperity Without Growth is just the latest in a growing body of literature pleading for Germans to learn to live with less. In France, President Nicolas Sarkozy—who once came to power exhorting the French to work harder and earn more—has thrown his weight behind an expert report that declares the pursuit of GDP growth a "fetish" and strives to replace the GDP statistic with a broader measure of national contentment.

Few would argue the world can just go back to the old go-go economy, where a large part of what was taken as growth was financed by unsustainable bubbles in credit and asset prices. The 2008 spike in the cost of food and oil reminded us that the present rate of resource depletion can't go on forever. And the debate over whether GDP statistics are really the proper measure of human progress is perfectly valid—and not new. Economists are the first to admit that GDP is at best a proxy for prosperity, not an end in itself.

Yet today's no-growthers seem to make the same mistakes as their many predecessors, from Thomas Malthus—who predicted in 1798 that rising populations would inevitably starve—to the Club of Rome, a group of scientists who warned in 1972 that the world would start running out of key resources in the 1980s. Such movements extrapolate growth rates for resource use and pollution but don't take enough account of technical innovation, environmental regulation, greater efficiency, and behavioral change. Take Exit author Meinhard Miegel's claim that the world is running out of food. It largely ignores, among other things, the barely tapped potential of genetic engineering and other plant-breeding technologies.

Such faults are often overlooked because the no-growthers resonate in Europe today for intellectual and political reasons, not economic or technological ones. Critiques of growth have always been, at their core, about uneasiness with capitalism itself. That this critique becomes mainstream when capitalism seems to be failing us is no surprise. After all, the Club of Rome made its first splash in the 1970s, during a long slowdown when people were also becoming newly aware of environmental degradation.

It's also no surprise that the movement is now centered in Europe and led by a French president. In no other country on earth is public disapproval of the market economy, as measured by opinion polls, deeper. French children, in a widely used and by no means exceptional schoolbook, learn that "economic growth imposes a hectic form of life that produces overwork, stress, nervous depression, cardiovascular disease, and cancer." To the 2.6 billion people worldwide trying to stay alive on less than $2 a day, the idea that economic growth causes stress may sound crazy. But in Europe, even conservatives have widely bought into the Marxist idea of "economism"—the notion that capitalism has reduced our lives to a series of market transactions.

There's something to these critiques. But the no-growthers are unrealistic about how painful a no-growth reality would be. As the Harvard scholar Benjamin Friedman argues eloquently in The Moral Consequences of Economic Growth, a society that gives up on growth invites nasty fights over the distribution of limited resources and paves the way for intolerance and populism. That economic growth isn't everything—it doesn't measure the value of our relationships, our communities, our culture—is obvious. But so is the correlation between prosperity and quality of life, including health, longevity, and the freedom to pursue happiness. Even if the critics are right and growth is going to be harder to attain post-crisis, that's no reason to give up on it. Just the opposite: all the more reason to spend our energy coming up with the right policies—from education and innovation to entrepreneurship and competition—that will help foster it.

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