Hawksbill Turtle @ Big Sisters Island
from colourful clouds
The Dark Side of Cyrene
from wild shores of singapore and Singapore Nature
七月华语导游 Mandarin guide walk @SBWR, July
from PurpleMangrove
Upper Seletar
from Singapore Nature
Birds and a packet of cooked rice
from Bird Ecology Study Group
Sun Bear BOLEH series: “Sun bear can climb!” Part III
from Bornean Sun Bear Conservation
Ng Jing Yng Today Online 12 Jul 10;
The Marina Barrage reservoir did help in preventing a bigger disaster during the recent flash floods, said Dr Amy Khor, who was present at yesterday's event in Bukit Gombak.
The Senior Parliamentary Secretary, Ministry of Environment and Water Resources, said that six out of the seven gates at the barrage were left open to manage the amount of rainfall during the heavy thunderstorms last month.
Dr Khor, also Member of Parliament for Hong Kah GRC, added that since the 1970s, the number of flood-prone areas had been reduced from 3,200 hectares to 66 hectares.
The Government has spent at least $2 billion to improve the drainage system and will continue to review the current system, she said.
As for the impact of climate change on rainfall patterns, Dr Khor said that the Government had undertaken a vulnerability study but rainfall patterns were difficult to predict and there was a need to wait for new inputs on improving forecasting methods. Ng Jing Yng
Satish Cheney Channel NewsAsia 11 Jul 10;
SINGAPORE : A giant monitor lizard caused a stir in Rivervale in Sengkang estate on Sunday afternoon.
The lizard, which was about two metres long, was tied up by residents.
Rescuers from the Animal Concerns Research and Education Society (ACRES) removed the rope and tape.
A spokesman from ACRES said the creature appeared to be very tired and upset.
They have released it to a suitable habitat that is approved by the National Parks Board.
ACRES said the monitor lizard could have used the drain to get to the housing estate after a heavy downpour. - CNA/ms
The postman always stops to say 'hello' on the rustic, random route order of shacks on Pulau Ubin
john lui Straits Times 12 Jul 10;
The slightly wilted piece of spa junk mail ('50 PER CENT OFF IF YOU SIGN UP NOW!') in my sweaty, mosquito-bitten hands has been on Singapore's most tortuous delivery route.
Mailed the day before, it has been processed today at the Singapore Post sorting centre off Loyang Avenue at 9am, put into a bag, taken across the water off Changi Point by a grumpy, leathery bumboat ferryman at noon, put on a van with me and now, two hours later, it has reached its end point: Mr Lee's rusty red letterbox, its hinges hanging on for dear life by bits of wire.
Mr Lee, like any resident of Singapore, is owed his spa deal, no matter where he lives, even if his home is on Pulau Ubin, home to about 90 households and falling.
Helping me, the rookie postman, is 70-year-old Harun Jomahat, who has been lugging bank statements, CPF announcements and mobile phone bills to the island, 10 minutes off the mainland's north-east corner, since 1997. He is now a part-timer, a returning retiree who serves only Pulau Ubin.
Mr Harun is the postal equivalent of a time traveller. He is the last of his kind in that he essentially serves one kampung, albeit one spread across the island's 10 sq km. His route is filled with familiar faces. They nod at him, he nods back. He does not carry a mobile phone because, if there is an emergency, he says he can rely on the residents for help.
One family invites him to share a haul of durians taken from a nearby patch. He declines but I take a bite. Some old-timers are alarmed at seeing me, togged out in my striped blue SingPost full-time worker's smock, but I reassure them that Mr Harun is not being replaced.
My day on Ubin started at 10am at the Singapore Post's Loyang Delivery Base, when I meet Mr Harun, one of SingPost's 1,040 postmen and women. He has picked up his daily stack of about 70 or so letters, a mere 0.0025 per cent trickle of the 2.8 million-piece flood that is processed each day.
The Ubin load does not vary much by season. The residents, it seems, are not deluged with Chinese New Year or Hari Raya cards. Many are elderly, with children living and working on the mainland.
The addresses could not be simpler. There are road names on the island but no one uses them. So a typical address is 32, Pulau Ubin, Singapore 508419.
From the Changi Point Ferry Terminal, I wait with Mr Harun. We travel like everyone else and hop on the bumboat only when there is a 12-person minimum.
On the island, he retrieves his scooter, probably the only one on the island. When it comes time for its annual Land Transport Authority inspection, it has to be wrestled onto a bumboat and taken to the mainland.
I follow in a rented van, the mail in my hands, arranged by route order.
House numbers were, perhaps, once based on a system but now, as tracks are overgrown and wooden shacks melt into mouldy piles in the tropical undergrowth, the numbers take on the random logic of thrown dice.
You need to know by heart that Mr Tan at 32H lives next to Mrs Lim at 412.
It is durian season now and, along the way, we pass groups of fruit hunters. They, along with the visitors to the Chek Jawa nature reserve, hikers and the mountain-bikers, now provide the only source of commerce for the island's coffee shops and bike-rental kiosks.
At 70, Mr Harun can still move his two-wheeler adeptly around puddles.
But I have to get off the van and walk to a few homes at the end of muddy tracks only a jeep or Mr Harun's scooter can traverse. At one place, a hut policed by two sleepy dogs, an elderly Chinese woman sitting outside cleaning vegetables asks me what I am giving her.
'Er, a letter,' I say, then walk off. What an odd question, I thought.
It is explained to me later that Mr Harun, if he can afford the time, can read mail for the illiterate, translating from English to pidgin Malay, or at least let the resident know that one of their children should take a closer look at a certain CPF Board announcement.
It is a forehead-slapper of a revelation for me. I hope Mr Harun can repair the damage to public relations I have wrought.
Now, at about 1.30pm, with Mr Lee's spa offer safely in his letterbox, I ask Mr Harun how long he can keep on delivering mail on Ubin.
'For as long as they want me to,' he says. For many postmen, Mr Harun's beat is about as rustic and old-fashioned - and therefore desirable - as it gets.
A postman delivers an average of 3,000 letters a day around a Housing Board estate and might not speak to a single home owner. Mr Harun delivers 70 pieces and will chat with as many people as he has the time for.
But as more homes become abandoned on Ubin, could Singapore's only ferryhandled postal route be dropped one day? Not likely.
As long as there is an address on Ubin and someone else needs to get a letter sent to that address, the route will stay, says Mr Harun. It is a public trust.
'They paid for that stamp,' he says. �
A special wetland and dry ponds are among the award-winning water features at two parks
tay suan chiang Straits Times 12 Jul 10;
Housewife Tan Bee Lian watches over her four-year-old grandson while he dabbles gleefully in water at a park.
A resident at Woodlands Drive 62, she has been visiting the seven-month-old park in the evenings. Called Greenwood Sanctuary @ Admiralty, it is a five-minute walk from her home.
The pond - one of 11 in the park - is a hit with the boy, Jun Jie. Madam Tan, 63, says: 'The water is not crystal clear but I don't mind him dipping his toes in it.'
Certifying the cleanliness of such water spots is as easy as ABC. Well, sort of.
Since 2006, national water agency PUB has had an Active, Beautiful, Clean (ABC) Waters programme that encourages the cleansing of rainwater and supports human interaction with waterways here.
Last week, which was also Singapore International Water Week, the first ABC Waters certificates were handed out to 14 projects around Singapore. Greenwood Sanctuary @ Admiralty was one of them.
Ms Angela Koh, PUB's assistant director for catchment and waterways, says the certification scheme recognises developers who 'take the effort to introduce ABC Waters design features into their projects'.
Under the 'Active' category, points are awarded for facilities that allow people to get close to the water. 'Beautiful' refers to the project's aesthetics, how surface drainage spaces are integrated with nature as well as the plant variety and biodiversity of the project. And 'Clean' refers to the measures that have been put in place to treat rainwater.
Other projects that received the certificate were Sengkang Riverside Park, the upcoming boardwalk from VivoCity to Sentosa and public residential project Sky Terrace @ Dawson.
Dry ponds fill up after rain
Greenwood Sanctuary @ Admiralty
This 1.5ha, $2.1-million park at Woodlands Drive 62 was opened to the public in January. Developed by the Housing Development Board (HDB), it is the first eco-park in Singapore with dry ponds and swales.
While conventional ponds are constantly filled with water, dry ponds fill up only after it rains. Swales are shallow depressions on the ground.
Unlike other parks which have concrete drains for rainwater to run off, this park has none. Instead, the swales lead the rainwater to the 11 dry ponds that are scattered around the park.
A HDB spokesman says that in place of concrete drains, the swales give the park a more natural look. She adds that the park's topology has contours that channel rainwater to the swales.
When it rains, water runs off the surrounding ground to the dry ponds and filters to underground percolation tanks wrapped in permeable membranes. On rainy days, only eight ponds can be seen as a few are connected.
In dry weather, the rainwater collected will slowly permeate the surrounding land to keep the ground moist. This helps provide water for the park's plants.
The spokesman says the board can save $500,000 in construction costs by introducing swales and dry ponds instead of building concrete drains. 'The savings are, in turn, spent on better quality play equipment, sculptures and plants in the park,' she adds.
Signs on how the swales and dry ponds work have also been put up so visitors can better understand the green features.
Recycled rubber mulch is used for the running track to allow rainwater to percolate into the ground.
Wetland and wild
Sengkang Riverside Park
For most families, especially those with kids, a visit to the Sengkang Riverside Park in Anchorvale Street is not complete without a stop by its pond. There, they toss in bits of bread to feed its inhabitants such as soft-shell turtles.
But the 21ha park, which opened in February last year, has also drawn non-human visitors. Birds, such as the purple heron and the collared kingfisher, which were previously not seen in the area, now drop in to feed on the fish in the pond.
A spokesman for the park's developer, National Parks board (NParks), says it had specially constructed a wetland, a first of its kind in Singapore. The park's design of contours and slopes lets rainwater flow naturally into the pond, which is divided into different sections.
In the sedimentation basin, larger particles such as soil sink to the bottom. The water then flows into a main section where micro-organisms in it are absorbed by aquatic plants via their roots. This natural process treats the water by further clearing it of pollutants. The water is then pumped out to irrigate the park's flora.
NParks sees the set-up cost of about $300,000 as an investment: The pond enhances the area's biodiversity and rainwater is recycled. In the long run, it saves water.
Hydrogen-electric hybrid bus to be used to ferry participants around the NTU campus
Grace Chua Straits Times 12 Jul 10;
ATHLETES in town for the Youth Olympic Games (YOG) next month will ride around the Olympic Village in Singapore's latest green vehicle: a hydrogen- electric hybrid bus.
The bus, developed by engineers from the Nanyang Technological University (NTU) and China's Tsinghua University, will be used to ferry participants along the steep slopes of the NTU campus, where the Youth Olympic Village is situated.
The 72-passenger, single-deck vehicle is likely to be Singapore's first fuel-cell vehicle in practical use, though a Singapore team in last year's Shell Eco-marathon car race in Germany drove a hydrogen fuel-cell car 484km on a single litre of fuel.
The bus has eight hydrogen tanks on its roof, which hold about 128kg of pressurised hydrogen; the fuel is channelled into fuel cells, which split the hydrogen into charged particles. Those charged particles then flow through a circuit to generate a current, which supplies power for the vehicle.
That current also charges a lithium-ion battery, like those used in electric or ordinary hybrid cars.
By using hydrogen, the bus emits no carbon dioxide, or sulphur dioxide, which contributes to acid rain. In comparison, a normal diesel bus produces 1.39kg of carbon dioxide per kilometre.
By using a battery as well as a fuel-cell stack, the bus needs fewer fuel cells, slashing running costs.
The project's funding of about $225,000 comes from the Land Transport Authority's Innovation Fund, a $50million kitty for transport development.
NTU electrical engineer Soh Yeng Chai said the project was first mooted about two years ago, when the university was designated the Olympic Village. It is part of NTU's clean-energy research programmes, which include fuel-cell research, Professor Soh said.
During the YOG, the bus will run modest trips - a total of 80km a day, four days a week. After the Games, it will be used to shuttle between NTU and a transit interchange. Details have not been finalised.
But the main challenges to fuel-cell vehicles becoming mainstream here include the high cost of fuel cells, their short two-year lifespan, and their performance, Prof Soh said.
He did not give a cost estimate, but producing power from fuel cells costs $4,000 per kilowatt-hour, by some estimates. In comparison, electricity from natural gas typically costs a fraction of that, at a few cents per kWh.
Among other fuel-cell applications being planned here: developer JTC will install hydrogen power for a building at its upcoming CleanTech Park near NTU.
Internationally, other fuel-cell vehicles being developed include Toyota's fuel-cell hybrid car and bus, and Honda's FCX Clarity, a fuel-cell car already available for lease in the United States.
Environmentalists Warn of Loopholes as Industries Lobby for Land Rights
Patrick Barta The Asian Wall Street Journal 12 Jul 10;
JAKARTA, Indonesia—A widely hailed new project to restrict forest-clearing in Indonesia over the next two years is turning out to be more complicated than expected and could leave large areas of the country unprotected, as environmentalists and industry groups fight over terms of the deal before it takes effect in January.
Announced by President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono at a conference in Oslo in late May, the plan was part of an international agreement aimed at reducing Indonesia's greenhouse gases by curbing deforestation. Indonesia is among the world's biggest sources of greenhouse gases, largely because of rampant burning of peat and forest land for palm oil plantations and other industries.
Norway pledged to invest up to $1 billion in Indonesian conservation projects and local authorities agreed to boost forest-monitoring efforts and other steps in addition to the two-year moratorium. Advocacy group WWF called the partnership "a huge step" toward saving Indonesia's forests, and Greenpeace hailed it as "a great start" toward reducing greenhouse-gas emissions.
But the letter of intent underpinning the plan was vague about which forests would be covered, environmentalists and industry officials now say. It indicated the moratorium would cover "all new concessions" for clearing of peat and natural forest but didn't specify what constituted "natural" forests or whether unused permits in virgin areas would be honored.
Government officials have since said that some areas, including lands around important infrastructure and renewable energy projects, won't be covered. Other forested areas may not be included because of power-sharing rules between the central government and local provincial officials, environmentalists say.
Meanwhile, industry leaders are gearing up to make sure they retain the right to clear areas they were already planning to develop. Environmentalists say more loopholes could emerge.
"We could still see quite a lot of deforestation happening over the next two years" despite the moratorium, says Moray McLeish, a project manager for the Washington-based World Resources Institute, an environmental think tank. "This I think is against the spirit of the deal."
Government officials acknowledge the program may not cover as much land as environmentalists had hoped and that many elements remain uncertain. But they argue—with some agreement from environmentalists—that the program still represents major progress in a country famous for out-of-control logging.
Government leaders also long ago admitted they weren't able to fully police land-clearing in more remote areas.
"We'll get through this and the confusion will be settled" before January, says Agus Purnomo, head of secretariat for the National Council on Climate Change in Indonesia and one of President Yudhoyono's top officials on climate-change policy. He predicts the plan will ultimately protect about 123 million acres. Indonesia lost roughly 1.2 million acres of forest per year from 2000 to 2010, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. About 49% of Indonesia's roughly 320 million acres of forest land is still pristine, the Forestry Ministry says.
Mr. Purnomo says many of the complaints over the deal "are created by elements of industry that would like to curtail this effort," while environmentalists are pressing for "radical" interpretations that could block acceptable development. "We will settle somewhere in the middle," he says.
Forested areas are critical to Southeast Asia's largest economy and a major source of revenue for many of its biggest companies, including Asia Pulp & Paper Co. and PT Sinar Mas Agro Resources & Technology, which produces palm oil.
Palm oil industry officials in particular have ambitious plans to expand so they can keep up with rising demand for a commodity that is used to make products as varied as shampoo, cookies and alternative fuel.
"We fear that the government regulation practically will stop all the possible expansion of oil palm," says M. Fadhil Hasan, executive director of the Indonesian Palm Oil Association. "We have to fight to make sure this moratorium resolves into something in accordance with our interests."
Concerns about deforestation deepened on Tuesday, when Greenpeace issued a new report alleging that Asia Pulp & Paper is acquiring and destroying rainforest and peat land areas to feed pulp mills in Sumatra, despite promises to adopt more sustainable business practices, and despite the planned moratorium. Greenpeace called on international supermarket retailers to stop dealing in the company's products.
Aida Greenbury, managing director for sustainability and stakeholder engagement at Asia Pulp & Paper, said the reports were "totally baseless" and "totally illogical." She said the company gets 85% of its pulpwood from sustainable plantations, compared with about 50% in 2006, and intends to increase that percentage in the future.
One of the biggest questions is whether the moratorium will prevent the use of land-clearing permits that haven't yet been acted on. Indonesian companies have built up giant banks of undeveloped land in recent years; according to Greenpeace, there are least 44.5 million acres of forest on the island of Sumatra alone that can be developed under prior pulp and paper concessions if they aren't affected by the moratorium.
The language of the agreement focuses on "new concessions," and suggests such lands won't be covered. But environmentalists say failing to include them would undermine the benefits of the moratorium.
Mr. Purnomo, the Indonesian climate-change official, says the government intends to honor existing permits but may offer compensation in some cases if companies willingly agree to leave already-permitted areas untouched.
The long-term solution, environmental groups and government officials say, is for palm oil and other companies to meet their growth targets by boosting productivity on existing plots and expanding onto "degraded" land, including areas that have already suffered some deforestation, rather than clearing new stretches of forest.
But officials haven't yet fully defined such areas, which are estimated to cover anywhere from 15 million acres to more than 99 million acres. An accounting of the lands is slated to occur as part of the Norway pact, but industry leaders say they can't be expected to assess the suitability of such land until it is properly identified.
—Yayu Yuniar contributed to this article.
MCOT online news 12 Jul 10;
Harmful fishing practices in Thailand are pushing the rare Irrawaddy dolphin, an aquatic mammal known scientifically as Orcaella brevirostris, toward extinction here in southern Thailand, according to the Southern Marine and Coastal Resources Research Center and a team of Irrawaddy dolphin researchers and watchers.
The aquatic animals live in Southeast Asia's freshwater areas and estuaries, and are critically endangered according to the World Wildlife Fund. In Thailand, the animal is found only in the northern part of Songkhla Lake called 'Talay Luang' in the southern provinces of Phatthalung and Songkhla.
However, the death rate of the animals there has continually increased, which raises concern for their survival.
According to Thailand's marine centre survey conducted in 2006-2008, on average some four to seven dead dolphins washed up on shore, while the number of the animals has dwindled to as few as 36. In January this year alone, six Irrawaddy dolphins were found dead, entangled in fishing nets.
Apart from incorrect fishing practices, the shallow condition of Songkhla Lake, a reduction in marine natural resources, and environmental degradation are all factors which have led to habitat loss for the animals, and which consequently affects their continued existence.
Fishermen in Songkhla's Krasae Sin district said their grandparents in years past normally saw hundreds of Irrawaddy dolphins in the lake, and the creatures were not shy when they encountered humans. For several years, however, the number of dolphins has dramatically decreased, and recently the have not been seen at all.
"In the past, those guarding boats at night said they saw dolphins that were very used to people, but now they say the animals have become frightened of fishing trawlers during these past 3 or 4 years," said Uthai Yodchan, a local fisherman who affirmed the disappearances, noting their disappearance entirely this year.
An academic at the Southern Marine and Coastal Resources Research Center said it had taken the dolphins over a century to adapt to live in freshwater zones.
"Irrawaddy dolphins in Songkhla Lake are able to survive in freshwater. It took them about a hundred years to adapt to live in this kind of water," said Santi Nilawat, an academic.
Together with the surveyors' team for the dolphins, the Centre recently followed the animals' situation. The survey recorded the specific location where dolphins were found so that data could be collected as useful tools for the conservation of the Irrawaddy dolphins, and that inappropriate fishing practices can be monitored to prevent the species from becoming their victims.
"We focus on building and raising awareness among [the local population] that Irrawaddy dolphins have been the signature animal in Phatthalung. We are also thinking of developing the dolphins' territory here in order that it becomes a tourist attraction for Songkhla Lake's Talay Luang," said protection officer, Jamnong Glaicharoen, in the Talay Luang Non-Hunting Area.
Buoys were placed to indicate dolphin territory contained within 100 square kilometres as a dolphin-protection zone. The markers are also signs for fishermen to avoid fishing in that specific area where legal action can be taken for violations.
However, sadly for the searching team, on a recent day of searching for dolphins at the boundary line of those zones in the lake, a calf dolphin less than one year old and a giant catfish were found dead on the water surface, but not one living Irrawaddy dolphin.
An initial assumption by Santi, the academic, said the fish may have been caught in fishing nets in the protected area.
"There might have been some fishing trawler coming into the premises 4-5 days before we found the two fish. Technically, if the mother dolphin has been dead for, say, a couple of days, the calf will have no milk to consume, then it will also have to die," according to Santi.
The number of fishing nets and other improper fishing gears have been increasingly used by fishermen despite their danger to this vulnerable species.
"Not many people were using trawlers or fishing nets in the beginning. But as fishing for giant catfish generally makes high profits of more than Bt100,000 each time (US$3,300), several others have followed the action. They have bought more and more trawlers to catch the fish, which also accidentally affects the decreasing number of dolphins," said Jesada Tangmanee, officer, Southern Marine and Coastal Resources Research Center.
How to preserve the number of Irrawaddy dolphins in Thai freshwater is not only a question for officials and related agencies, but also for fishermen and all of us to be aware of this critical situation and to realise the beauty and the enjoyment when we can appreciate the sea creatures.
New Straits Times 12 Jul 10;
SERIKIN (Bau): "Are you looking for crocodile penis?" the Indonesian trader whispered to a journalist couple whom he thought was looking for an aphrodisiac to spice up their lives.
The cost of the appendage? RM250.
The trader, popularly known as "Bapak Mat" at this border bazaar on the Kalimantan-Sarawak border here, is discreet in what he sells on this side of the border.
If he is caught by wildlife protection officers, he faces a fine of RM10,000 and a year's jail as the crocodile is a protected reptile in Sarawak.
Bapak Mat is one of several traders here who play hide-and-seek with officers of the Sarawak Forestry Corporation (SFC) daily to carry out their trade on protected animals.
It is the ugly side of the bazaar that is popular with Malaysians from as far as the peninsula, who come here for the cheap branded fakes.
Serikin is about 55km from Kuching.
Now feeling safe knowing that the couple were not SFC officers, Bapak Mat became persistent in what he wanted to sell even though he could only deliver it in a week.
He made it clear to the journalists why he could not keep it in stock as the risk was high.
Crocodile penis is not the only exotic item he offers.
He has eagles, mynas and parakeets, all RM250 each before bargaining.
Mynas and parakeets are also protected birds in Sarawak.
When asked what he had available on the spot, Bapak Mat said only turtle eggs, which he sold at RM10 for nine eggs.
Even then, Bapak Mat's wife had to stealthily take the journalists to a dark store behind the wooden stall to get the eggs.
They were wrapped in black plastic bags.
Trade in protected animals is thriving despite the law.
Restaurants offering dishes such as river terrapins, wild boar meat, frogs and flying foxes, dot rural Bau and Kuching.
These dishes are, however, only available after office hours when wildlife protection officers are not on duty and, therefore, the chances of getting caught are slim.
Most restaurants offer them only to their best customers.
But such exotic meals are expensive affairs.
A river terrapin dish for two costs RM18.
So is the frog meat. A wild boar dish is RM12.
State Forest director and Wildlife controller Datuk Len Talif Salleh said that trade in protected species was still taking place in rural Sarawak.
However, he added that it was less rampant than before.
Sean Mattson, Reuters 12 Jul 10;
CARTI SUGDUB Panama (Reuters) - Rising seas from global warming, coming after years of coral reef destruction, are forcing thousands of indigenous Panamanians to leave their ancestral homes on low-lying Caribbean islands.
Seasonal winds, storms and high tides combine to submerge the tiny islands, crowded with huts of yellow cane and faded palm fronds, leaving them ankle-deep in emerald water for days on end.
Pablo Preciado, leader of the island of Carti Sugdub, remembers that in his childhood floods were rare, brief and barely wetted his toes. "Now it's something else. It's serious," he said.
The increase of a few inches in flood depth is consistent with a global sea level rise over Preciado's 64 years of life and has been made worse by coral mining by the islanders that reduced a buffer against the waves.
Carti Sugdub is one of a handful of islands in an archipelago off Panama's northeastern coast, where the government says climate change threatens the livelihood of nearly half of the 32,000 semi-autonomous Kuna people.
The 2,000 inhabitants of Carti Sugdub plan to move to coastal areas within the Kuna's autonomous territory on the Panama mainland. They are eyeing foothills a half-hour walk from the swampy beach areas.
"The water level is rising. The move is imminent," said Preciado, who has been leading a group of villagers clearing tropical forest for the new settlement.
World leaders have failed so far to reach a global accord to curb the greenhouse gas emissions blamed for climate change. A U.N. climate change conference later this year in Mexico aims to make progress toward a binding agreement.
If the islanders abandon their homes as planned, the exodus will be one of the first blamed on rising sea levels and global warming.
Scientists warn that sea level rise in the next century could threaten millions with a similar fate and some communities as far apart as Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu and Fiji have already been forced to relocate
"This is no longer about a scientist saying that climate change and the change in sea level will flood (a people) and affect them," said Hector Guzman, a marine biologist and coral specialist at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama. "This is happening now in the real world."
CLIMATE CHANGE REFUGEES
The fiercely independent Kuna, famed for rebellions against Spanish conquistadors, French pirates and Panamanian overlords, have accelerated their fate by mining coral, which they use to expand islands and build artificial islets and breakwaters.
Guzman, based at a Pacific island research center on the edge of Panama City, has warned of the risks of coral mining for a decade but says speaking out against a legally permitted traditional activity is "taboo."
"(The Kuna) have increased their vulnerability to storms, wave action, and above all, the action of the rise in sea level," he told Reuters.
When Kuna speak in their native language the Spanish words for "climate change" are often among the few foreign words used. While some elders warn that sea level rise will get worse, many locals believe God will keep them safe.
"I don't know where they get that from -- that the land is going to sink and we'd better leave before it happens ... Those who want to go, can go. I'm staying here," said Evangelina, 60, who would not give her last name because she hasn't told local leadership she's opposed to moving.
Sea levels rose about 17 cm (about 7 inches) over the last century and experts say the rate is accelerating. In 2007, the United Nations predicted a rise of 18 to 59 cms (7-23 inches) by 2100 but that did not include the accelerated melting of ice sheets in Antarctica and Greenland.
U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has warned that seas could rise 2 meters (6.5 feet) by the end of the century, threatening millions of people in cities from Tokyo and Shanghai to New Orleans.
"It's something you're going to be seeing more and more," said Albert Binger, the scientific adviser to the 42-member Alliance of Small Island States, referring to potential victims as "climate change refugees."
Binger said the Kuna's coral extraction is a portent for what climate change has in store for other low-lying islands protected by reefs. The greenhouse gas carbon dioxide makes oceans more acidic, killing coral struggling to survive in warmer seas.
SLOW MOVE
While Kuna leaders say their move from cool breezy islands to stuffy forests is imminent, progress has been slow so far and the government does not have a support plan in place.
Carti Sugdub's islanders have used machetes to carve out a patch of tropical forest but lack machinery to clear the land.
Leaders at nearby Carti Mulatupu are working on an environmental impact study for their move. They reckon setting up a mainland community for 600 people could cost $5 million.
The Panamanian government, which supports the islanders financially by paying for health clinics, schools and poverty programs, has done little to support the relocation plans but officials back the idea.
"Sometimes the community is flooded up to the knees," said Helen Perez, the schoolmaster at Carti Mulatupu, as his 120 students ran around a sandy school yard by an eroded concrete pier. "The community has taken the decision to move to land."
Chani Morris, an 82-year-old fisherman, is ready to abandon the islet of Coibita he helped build out of coral 33 years ago. He said he doesn't sleep well since a flood engulfed the island, destroyed huts and carried away dugout canoes.
"The sea is very bothersome, sometimes it scares me at night," said Morris, as he fashioned fish traps out of chicken wire. "I'm just waiting for the others to decide when we can move and I'm going to go with them."
(Editing by Catherine Bremer)
It is up to society and its leaders to ensure that companies do not become cancerous, says leading UN official
Juliette Jowit, The Guardian 12 Jul 10;
Modern businesses are "soulless corporations" that are in danger of becoming a "cancer" on society, a leading UN environmental official warns today.
Companies usually take a short-term view of the importance of the environment, said Pavan Sukhdev, head of the UN's investigation into how to stop the destruction of the natural world. This short-term thinking is seen in their lobbying against new policies that could slow environmental devastation, he said.
Sukhdev, formerly an adviser to the Indian government and now on sabbatical from Deutsche Bank, spoke as he prepares to publish tomorrow one of the most eagerly awaited parts of his report – The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity (TEEB) for Business.
The report will be launched at the first Global Business of Biodiversity Symposium in London, where speakers will include environment secretary Caroline Spelman. She will highlight examples of businesses causing damage which imposes a huge cost on themselves and society – including an estimate that global destruction of forests costs the world's economies $2tn-$5tn (£1.3tn-£3.3tn) a year.
She will also speak of the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. "BP's shares have halved since the spill began in mid-April – there will be no dividends this year," she is due to say. "While the real impact on the local economy, wildlife and marine health may not be fully known for years ... What's bad for biodiversity is bad for business."
Sukhdev told the Guardian that private businesses were too important as employers and payers of taxes to embark on a revolution, calling instead for society to take a greater responsibility for regulating the behaviour of companies. When the final report is published, at a biodiversity conference in October in Japan, Sukhdev will recommend major changes in the way companies are regulated.
"We have created a soulless corporation that does not have any innate reason to be ethical about anything," he said. "The purpose of a corporation is to be selfish. That is law. So it's up to society and its leaders and thinkers to design the checks and balances that are needed to ensure that the corporation does not simply become cancerous, and that's something that sometimes we do and sometimes we really don't."
TEEB was set up after the success of the groundbreaking 2006 report by Sir Nicholas Stern for the UK government. The Stern report argued that the cost of tackling climate change would be 1-2% of the global economy, while the cost of doing nothing would be 5-20 times that. Sukhdev's team says that the failure of governments and businesses to put a "price" on ecosystem services provided by nature – from flood protection and pollination of crops, to carbon take-up by forests and the sheer wonder of nature – has led to widespread destruction of whole ecosystems and of the variety of all life on Earth.
Previously, Sukhdev has called for governments and businesses to be forced to report their environmental and social impacts alongside – not separately from – their financial accounts. He has also called for stricter limits on extraction and pollution.
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