Best of our wild blogs: 26 Nov 14

November walks at the Sisters' Islands Marine Park
from Sisters' Island Marine Park

Park toa
from The annotated budak

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Singapore presses Malaysia on Johor Strait reclamation projects

Channel NewsAsia 25 Nov 14;

SINGAPORE: Minister for the Environment and Water Resources Dr Vivian Balakrishnan emphasised Singapore's concerns over Malaysia's land reclamation projects in the Straits of Johor, during the 27th Annual Exchange of Visits between the environment ministries of Malaysia and Singapore.

Dr Balakishnan led a delegation to Kuala Lumpur on Tuesday (Nov 25) and met with Malaysia's Deputy Minister of Natural Resources and Environment Dr. James Dawos Mamit in Kuala Lumpur.

At the meeting, Dr Balakrishnan reiterated Singapore's request for such reclamation works to be suspended until Singapore has received and studied all the relevant information from Malaysia, including the Environmental Impact Assessments, and established that there would be no transboundary impact on Singapore from these projects.

Dr Balakrishnan stressed that both Singapore and Malaysia are obliged under international law, in particular, the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, to undertake and share Environmental Impact Assessments on all works that could have transboundary impact, before starting work.

He said Singapore looked forward to Malaysia's expeditious reply to requests on this issue.

Other issues discussed include the control of vehicular emissions, the joint monitoring of water quality in the Straits of Johor, and the emergency response plans for chemical spills at the Malaysia-Singapore Second Link and at the East Johor Strait.

- CNA/hx

Vivian Balakrishnan restates Singapore's concerns over Johor Strait land reclamation projects during KL visit
Straits Times 25 Nov 14;

SINGAPORE - Singapore on Tuesday restated its concerns to Malaysia over land reclamation projects in the Strait of Johor , given their close proximity to Singapore.

It has also reiterated a request that works be suspended until Singapore received and studied all relevant information from Malaysia, including Environmental Impact Assessments, and has established there would be no transboundary impact on Singapore from the projects.

Singapore's position was stated by Environment and Water Resources Minister Vivian Balakrishnan during a visit to Kuala Lumpur on Tuesday for the annual exchange of visits between the Environment ministries of the two countries.

Malaysian news reports earlier this year said that a China property developer and a Johor government company were behind a reclamation project to create a 2,000ha island for luxury homes. A project map showed part of the man-made island under the Second Link, which connects Tuas in Singapore to Johor.

Singapore has previously expressed concern to Malaysia about the project and its possible impact on Singapore and the Strait.

A Environment and Water Resources Ministry statement on Tuesday on Dr Balakrishnan's visit said he stressed that both Singapore and Malaysia are obliged under international law - in particular the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea - to undertake and share Environmental Impact Assessments on all works that could have transboundary impact, prior to the commencement of such works.

It added that "he noted that Singapore looked forward to Malaysia's expeditious reply to Singapore's requests on this issue".

At the Kuala Lumpur meeting on Tuesday, Dr Balakrishnan and Malaysian Deputy Natural Resources and Environment Minister James Dawos Mamit reviewed discussions and exchanges that were held on Monday by a meeting of the Malaysia-Singapore Joint Committee on the Environment.

Those issues included the control of vehicular emissions, joint monitoring of water quality in the Strait of Johor, the emergency response plans for chemical spills at the Malaysia-Singapore Second Link and at the East Johor Strait, as well as Malaysia's land reclamation projects in the Strait of Johor.

Singapore restates reclamation concerns
The Straits Times AsiaOne 28 Nov 14;

SINGAPORE - Singapore yesterday restated its concerns to Malaysia over land reclamation projects in the Strait of Johor, given their close proximity to Singapore.

It also reiterated a request that the works be suspended until Singapore had received and studied all the relevant information from Malaysia, including Environmental Impact Assessments, and established that there will be no transboundary impact on Singapore.

Singapore's position was stated by Environment and Water Resources Minister Vivian Balakrishnan on a visit to Kuala Lumpur yesterday for the annual exchange of visits between the environment ministries of the two countries.
Malaysian news reports earlier this year said a China property developer and a Johor government company were behind a reclamation project to create a 2,000ha island for luxury homes. A project map showed part of the island under the Second Link, which connects Tuas in Singapore to Johor.

Singapore has previously expressed its concern to Malaysia.

An Environment and Water Resources Ministry statement yesterday said Dr Balakrishnan stressed that both countries are obliged under international law - in particular the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea - to conduct and share Environmental Impact Assessments on all works that could have transboundary impact, prior to starting such works.

It added: "He noted that Singapore looked forward to Malaysia's expeditious reply to Singapore's requests on this issue."

In Kuala Lumpur, Dr Balakrishnan and Malaysian Deputy Natural Resources and Environment Minister James Dawos Mamit reviewed discussions held on Monday. These covered issues including the control of vehicular emissions, and emergency response plans for chemical spills at the Malaysia-Singapore Second Link and the East Johor Strait.

Minister Reiterates Singapore's Concern Over Land Reclaimation Projects In Straits Of Johor
Tengku Noor Shamsiah Tengku Abdullah Bernama 25 Nov 14;

SINGAPORE, Nov 25 (Bernama) -- Singapore's Minister for Environment and Water Resources Dr Vivian Balakrishnan raised his country's concerns over Malaysia's land reclamation projects in the Straits of Johor, reported Channel NewsAsia (CNA).

The local television reported that the minister emphasized his concern during the 27th Annual Exchange of Visits between the environment ministries of Malaysia and Singapore.

CNA said Dr Balakishnan led a delegation to Kuala Lumpur on Tuesday (Nov 25) and met Malaysia's Deputy Minister of Natural Resources and Environment Dr James Dawos Mamit in Kuala Lumpur.

At the meeting, CNA reported Dr Balakrishnan reiterated Singapore's request for such reclamation works to be suspended until Singapore has received and studied all the relevant information from Malaysia, including the Environmental Impact Assessments, and established that there would be no transboundary impact on Singapore from these projects.

The report said Dr Balakrishnan stressed that both Singapore and Malaysia were obliged under international law, in particular, the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, to undertake and share Environmental Impact Assessments on all works that could have transboundary impact, before starting work.

The local television reported that the minister said Singapore looked forward to Malaysia's expeditious reply to requests on the issue.

-- BERNAMA

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PUB invites proposals to study flood risks

Feng Zengkun The Straits Times AsiaOne 26 Nov 14;

Singapore is looking far ahead to identify the risks of coastal and inland flooding here due to climate change.

National water agency PUB has invited companies to submit proposals to study the extent and impact of such risks for almost half of the island, up to the year 2100.

The area involved comprises 12 catchment areas which make up 46 per cent of Singapore's mainland area, and includes the Bedok, Siglap, Kranji, Joo Chiat and Marina East catchment areas.

A catchment area is a basin, with the boundaries being its highest geographical points. All the water that falls in the basin drains to its lowest point.

A PUB spokesman said the 12 catchment areas were chosen because they are in older parts of Singapore where the ground levels of buildings and developments are generally lower, or they are highly urbanised, or both.

PUB chief sustainability officer Tan Nguan Sen said: "As the waterways in some of these catchments eventually flow to the sea, a sea-level rise or storm surge can have an impact on the flood risks in these areas."

Earlier last year, the international Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said in a landmark report that the sea level could rise by almost 1m by 2100 if the most aggressive climate change scenario came to pass.

The global mean sea level between 1986 and 2005 was used as the reference point.

Much of Singapore lies within 15m above sea level, and about a third is less than 5m above the water, the National Climate Change Secretariat said.

To address this, in 2011, the Government raised the minimum reclamation level of new projects by 1m, to 2.25m above the highest recorded tide level.

The PUB study will take into account the IPCC's methodologies and guidelines, its climate projections, and initial findings of the Government's ongoing Second National Climate Change Study.

The contractor is expected to generate flood maps "for extreme rainfall and sea-level rise scenarios due to climate change for the 2030s, 2050s and 2080s, taking into account future land use and stipulated drainage networks".

PUB will also provide details of proposed adaptation measures, such as the widening of drains, tidal gates and pumping systems to be modelled by the contractor.

The agency wants the risks of inundation across the catchments to be specified "in terms of locations, total area affected and flood depth". It added: "This will include providing a list of infrastructure, developments and critical installations that will be affected in a flood area."

The study is expected to start next month and be completed within a year.

Mr Kevin Kho, 53, an engineer with more than 20 years' experience, said the study is timely as the impact of sea-level rises on flooding has been well documented in other parts of the world.

"The problem is a mega one and a real one, and that's why PUB needs to put a lot of thought into it now," he said.

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Malaysia: Pangolins seized from carat roadblock

RUBEN SARIO The Star 26 Nov 14;

KOTA KINABALU: Pangolins bound for the cooking pot have been saved, thanks to observant policemen manning a roadblock in the southwest Beaufort district.

The policemen discovered the animals tied up in nine sacks when they checked a car driven by a man from Johor on Oct 30.

Two of the pangolins had already died while others were severely dehydrated and under stress.

The police immediately alerted the Sabah Wildlife Department and its rangers provided treatment to the pangolins.

Four of the animals subsequently survived, the department’s assistant director Dr Sen Nathan said.

Yesterday, the vehicle driver was fined RM10,000 by the Beaufort magistrate court’s after he admitted to illegally possessing 12 pangolins.

Carlvin Cher Jia Wei, 21, pleaded guilty to the charge under section 41(2) of the Wildlife Conservation Enactment 1997 before Magistrate Ryan Sagirann Raynor Jr.

He paid the fine.

Prosecuting Officer Abdul Karim Hj Dakog of the department told the court that the pangolins were hidden in a storage compartment of the car.

Department deputy director Augustine Tuuga said they would not tolerate crimes on wildlife in Sabah and all cases would be brought to court.

“I urge the public who have any information regarding crimes against wildlife to contact our 24 hour hotline number 012-8019289 so we can take appropriate action,” added Tuuga.

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Vietnam seizes over 1,000 dead endangered sea turtles

Record haul of over 1,000 endangered sea turtles, all dead, were bound for illegal export to China
AFP The Guardian 25 Nov 14;

Vietnam’s environmental police have seized a record haul of over 1,000 endangered sea turtles which were being prepared for illegal export to China, an official said on Tuesday.

“The turtles were all dead,” said Le Hong Thai, an official of the Ministry of public security’s environmental police department.

“They were meant to be processed into handicrafts for export to China,” he added.

The raids were made on Wednesday last week in the resort town of Nha Trang on Vietnam’s south-central coast.

“The case is under investigation, so we cannot reveal the number of detainees or any other details,” Thai said.

Marine turtles are protected under Vietnamese law. Hunting and trading, including the storing, of any of the five native species (green, leatherback, loggerhead, hawksbill and olive ridley turtles) is a criminal offence.

Scores of Vietnamese have been arrested in regional waters over the past years for catching or trading sea turtles.

Nguyen Phuong Dung, the director of conservation group Education for Nature-Vietnam, welcomed the raid but said it must be followed with legal penalties for those involved.

Courts “need to send the message that Vietnam is serious about prosecuting and punishing” crimes involving endangered species, she said in a statement.

Environmental groups say Vietnam is one of the world’s worst countries for trade in endangered species – an accusation which it denies.

Police regularly seize hauls of ivory, rhino horn and exotic species including pangolins and tigers, but conservation groups say these represent just a small part of the trade passing through the country.

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Wildlife crime study finds 33,000 items worth £7m for sale online

Biggest ever survey in 16 countries finds adverts for live tigers, orangutans and chimps – plus a ‘toilet-trained’ gorilla
Damian Carrington The Guardian 25 Nov 14;

The world’s endangered wildlife is for sale on the world wide web: live tigers, bears, orangutans and chimpanzees are all just a few clicks away. For those seeking a more manageable purchase, there are emerald boas, hummingbirds or poison dart frogs available by the dozen.

The trade in animal products is just as vigorous. Ivory dominates, but also on offer are polar bear rugs, snow leopards’ teeth and a £55,000 cup fashioned from a rhino’s horn.

The extent of the shadowy online trade in protected animals is revealed on Tuesday in the most comprehensive analysis of the multi-million-pound market yet published. The International Fund for Animal Welfare worked with law enforcement professionals to analyse the online trade in 16 target countries over a six week period earlier in 2014. They found over 33,000 animals and items that should be protected by international laws on sale at a total value of $11m (£7m). Many of the online adverts identified are now being investigated by police.

“As poaching reaches alarming levels, wildlife cybercrime poses a sinister, silent threat to endangered species, enabling criminals to go about their grisly business with anonymity,” said Azzedine Downes, president and chief executive of IFAW.

Wildlife crime is estimated to be worth $19bn a year, making it the fourth most lucrative illegal trade after drugs, counterfeit goods and human trafficking. It has been increasingly linked to organised crime, terrorism and militias and Ban Ki-moon has warned the UN security council of the threat it poses to global security.

The UK had the fourth highest number of online adverts for protected wildlife, after China, Germany and France, with British adverts including birds of prey, monkeys and a hyacinth macaw offered for £15,000.

“Wildlife crime can seem like a remote problem but the internet brings it into everyone’s home,” said Philip Mansbridge, IFAW’s UK director. He said the report, while wide-ranging, exposed only a fraction of wildlife cybercrime. “If you think about all the countries in the world where people are using the internet, then it is obvious the scale of the trade is mind-blowing”

To compile the report, IFAW’s experts scoured openly accessible websites in 16 countries and found almost 10,000 adverts on 280 sites in the six-week study period. They focused on the most seriously endangered species, for which international trade is forbidden under Appendix One of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (Cites). Some species on Appendix Two, for which export permits must obtained, were also included if law-breaking was suspected.

The team found a menagerie of wildlife for sale, both dead and alive. The highest number of adverts for large, live animals were found in Russia and Ukraine, even after investigators had been careful to exclude scams aimed at tricking money from potential buyers. The Russian adverts included orangutans and chimpanzees for sale, starting at $45,000, as well as tigers, leopards, jaguars and a “toilet-trained” gorilla. The Ukraine sites offered live crocodiles, Asian black bears and an extremely rare bridled nail-tail wallaby. Sites in the Middle East also offered live animals, including cheetahs at $18,000 and exotic gazelles and antelopes.

Overall, ivory was the most commonly touted product in the online adverts, accounting for almost a third. “An elephant is killed now every 15 minutes. It is incredibly disturbing,” said Mansbridge. “The scale of wildlife crime has reached unprecedented levels.”

Ivory items comprised 80% of the adverts found on Chinese websites, including one carving being sold at $65,000. Other Chinese ads touted rhinoceros items for sale as well as tiger bone wine. Rhino poaching in South Africa has reached an all-time high this year, with 1,020 animals already killed.

Ivory was also the most commonly touted item in the UK. Investigators found 406 suspected ivory items, of which 376 were on eBay. This represents a 50% increase since the last IFAW study in 2008, despite the online auction company banning such sales that year.

Wolfgang Weber, an eBay director, said: “Acting on information from IFAW and other organisations, we have been able to put new measures in place to prevent sellers from listing items of concern on the site. In order to even better address this issue we will apply stricter sanctions against sellers who intentionally circumvent our enforcement.”

After ivory, reptiles were the next most common category of advert (26%) around the world, offering turtles, tortoises and lizards to collectors. Turtles and tortoises accounted for 70% of German adverts, including a critically endangered Egyptian tortoise. The north-German city of Hamm is an international hub for the reptile trade.

A report next month from German NGO Pro Wildlife will criticise the EU for enabling trade in species that are fully protected in their home nations such as Sri Lanka, Indonesia and Guatemala. “Professional reptile smugglers specialise in such species, because this dirty business promises maximum profit at minimum risk,” said Sandra Altherr of Pro Wildlife. “Currently sought after are Borneo earless monitor lizards at €8,000 per pair.”

A wide range of poison dart frogs made up 30% of all advertisements in the Netherlands, including phantasmal poison frogs and strawberry poison dart frogs. As with almost all the adverts investigated in the IFAW study, virtually none made any reference to the legality of their items and none provided legal documentation.

Adverts for birds were also common around the world (23%), ranging from birds of prey to parrots and including 100 owls for sale in the UK alone.

Mansbridge said a key recommendation of the IFAW report was to appoint wildlife cybercrime officers to national crime units. The UK had such a post but it was lost due to budget cuts and the UK National Wildlife Crime Unit only has funding until 2016. A spokeswoman for the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said: “The government is committed to tackling illegal trade in wildlife products, which is why we have designed a £10m package over four years to reduce demand, strengthen law enforcement, and develop sustainable livelihoods for communities that have been affected by it.”

“It is also why earlier this year the UK hosted the Illegal Wildlife Trade Conference where 40 countries agreed at the highest political level on practical steps to eradicate this global trade, including in rhino horn, ivory and tiger parts.”

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Geo-engineering: Climate fixes 'could harm billions'

David Shukman BBC News 25 Nov 14;

Schemes to tackle climate change could prove disastrous for billions of people, but might be required for the good of the planet, scientists say.

That is the conclusion of a new set of studies into what's become known as geo-engineering.

This is the so far unproven science of intervening in the climate to bring down temperatures.

These projects work by, for example, shading the Earth from the Sun or soaking up carbon dioxide.

Ideas include aircraft spraying out sulphur particles at high altitude to mimic the cooling effect of volcanoes or using artificial "trees" to absorb CO2.

Long regarded as the most bizarre of all solutions for global warming, ideas for geo-engineering have come in for more scrutiny in recent years as international efforts to limit carbon emissions have failed.

Now three combined research projects, led by teams from the universities of Leeds, Bristol and Oxford, have explored the implications in more detail.

The central conclusion, according to Dr Matt Watson of Bristol University, is that the issues surrounding geo-engineering - how it might work, the effects it might have and the potential downsides - are "really really complicated".

Sun block

"We don't like the idea but we're more convinced than ever that we have to research it," he said.

"Personally I find this stuff terrifying but we have to compare it to doing nothing, to business-as-usual leading us to a world with a 4C rise."

The studies used computer models to simulate the possible implications of different technologies - with a major focus on ideas for making the deserts, seas and clouds more reflective so that incoming solar radiation does not reach the surface.

One simulation imagined sea-going vessels spraying dense plumes of particles into the air to try to alter the clouds. But the model found that this would be far less effective than once thought.

Another explored the option of injecting sulphate aerosols into the air above the Arctic in an effort to reverse the decline of sea-ice.

A key finding was that none of the simulations managed to keep the world's temperature at the level experienced between 1986-2005 - suggesting that any effort would have to be maintained for years.

More alarming for the researchers were the potential implications for rainfall patterns.

Although all the simulations showed that blocking the Sun's rays - or solar radiation management, as it is called - did reduce the global temperature, the models revealed profound changes to precipitation including disrupting the Indian Monsoon.

Prof Piers Forster of Leeds University said: "We have found that between 1.2 and 4.1 billion people could be adversely affected by changes in rainfall patterns.

"The most striking example of a downside would be the complete drying-out of the Sahel region of Africa - that would be very difficult to adapt to for those substantial populations - and that happens across all the scenarios."

Despite the risk of catastrophic side-effects from geo-engineering, the study authors believe that research should continue just in case runaway warming leaves no other options.

Prof Forster said: "If we were in a really desperate situation, trying to cool the temps for a 10-20 year time period, there could be some merit in those circumstances in introducing solar radiation management to give you a 10-20 year time period."

Lack of knowledge

According to Prof Steve Rayner of Oxford University, it is easier to devise the technology than to understand its effects or how its use should be governed.

"If you were just thinking of the capability of putting sulphate aerosols in the atmosphere, that you could do in less than two decades - whether you would know it was smart to do it in less than two decades is another question.

"We don't know enough - we have a few islands of knowledge in a sea of ignorance and it's absolutely worth knowing more. There is the potential that some of these technologies may be part of a broader tool kit of ways in which we can better manage climate change.

"People decry solar radiation management as a band-aid but band-aids can be useful for healing."

Geo-engineering has long been one of the most controversial aspects of the debate about solutions to climate change and few experiments have been conducted in the field.

One of the largest, known as Lohafex, was an Indian-German experiment in 2009 which involved dumping six tonnes of an iron solution into the South Atlantic to encourage plankton to bloom - trapping carbon which would then be sent to the seabed when the organisms died. Results showed limited success.

Another proposal for the trial flight of a balloon in Britain, as part of geo-engineering research for the SPICE project, attracted stiff opposition from environmental groups and was cancelled.

It would have been the precursor to a test of a technique for pumping sulphate aerosols into the atmosphere in an effort to bounce solar radiation back into space and cool the planet.

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