'Software' areas hurt Singapore ranking in global city poll

High scores for stability, infrastructure, but low on culture, environment
Jessica Lim, Straits Times 13 Feb 10;

SINGAPORE scores highly in areas like infrastructure and stability, but does poorly when it comes to culture and living environment. That, at least, is the conclusion of a recent study by the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU), which ranked Singapore 53rd on a list of 140 cities worldwide for liveability.

The Republic scored better than culture capitals New York and London - which lost out because of crumbling infrastructure - but lower than Asian cities such as Hong Kong, Tokyo and Osaka.

The survey examined 30 factors in five categories: Stability, health care, culture and environment, education and infrastructure. Singapore's overall score was 88.5 out of a maximum of 100.

Hong Kong and Seoul did better, scoring 92 and 85.9 overall, respectively.

The top-ranked city, Vancouver, scored 98, while Osaka, the top Asian city in the poll, scored 95.2. Harare in Zimbabwe was ranked the lowest.

The Republic excelled in categories such as infrastructure and stability - scoring 100 and 95, respectively - but was dragged down by its score of 75.7 in the culture and environment category, which measures everything from the variety of quality concerts in the city to social restrictions such as censorship.

The annual survey, which combines research from resident experts and The Economist's analysts around the globe, is conducted by the magazine's research arm. The results of the EIU survey mirror those of another annual study done recently, which ranked Singapore the 70th most-liveable country out of 194.

That survey, conducted by the American magazine International Living, gave Singapore a failing grade in three out of nine categories: Climate, environment and freedom. The country excelled in the other areas, like infrastructure, which looks at factors including the length of railways and cellphones per capita.

On a score of 0-100, International Living's survey, which has been widely reported in US newspapers and elsewhere, gave Singapore a score of 39 for its climate and living environment - which includes factors such as average temperature and greenhouse emissions per capita - and 42 on the freedom scale, which measures areas such as civil liberties.

International Living's survey is compiled using government statistics, data from the World Health Organisation and the views of its editors around the globe.

France topped the survey, while Singapore's position put it alongside countries like Grenada (69) and Antigua and Barbuda (71).

News of the surveys comes on the back of the high-powered Economic Strategies Committee's suggestions last week that Singapore do more to develop 'software', such as its art and cultural scene, to match its top-notch 'hardware' in order to become a top-notch global city. Some of its suggestions include better assistance for arts and creative businesses in places like Gillman Village, and encouraging greater sponsorship of the arts.

Sociology experts and others were not surprised by the results, despite Singapore's extensive efforts to focus on culture and lifestyle over the last few years.

Said CIMB-GK Research's regional economist Song Seng Wun: 'Over the past 10 years, with infrastructure more or less in place, the Government has shifted its focus to the soft side like culture and freedom.

'But these things take time. In the medium term, we will probably continue to score low in these areas... hopefully we will evolve.'

Dr Mika Toyota, an assistant professor of sociology at the National University of Singapore, said: 'On the one hand, I think Singapore is interesting for foreigners to live in. There are great places to eat and cultural diversity, but at the same time, it is still developing in other ways, like the amount of space available for political discourse.

'A good quality of life means satisfaction not just due to efficiency, but an enriching lifestyle as whole,' she added.

Some Singaporeans, however, simply shrugged when asked about areas like the environment.

'We want a good transport system, iconic buildings, a beautiful skyline and places to relax and enjoy a drink,' said insurance consultant Lim Sock Wee, 50.

'Things like environmental issues are not a priority, and I won't put emphasis on them.'

Air stewardess Tan Xiu Mei, 27, said she is more concerned about bread-and-butter issues, like food prices. Asked about freedoms, she said: 'I don't really have much to voice anyway.'

Others, like mother of three Annie Jee, who is in her 40s, said such ambivalence frustrates her.

Noting that Singapore does not even have a battery recycling plant, she said: 'We are a First World country, and we need to advance beyond just physical infrastructure.'

Singapore more liveable than New York, less so than HK
Zul Othman, Today Online 13 Feb 10;

The Lion City has been ranked the world's 53rd most liveable city, in the latest survey by the Economist Intelligence Unit.

The Republic scored highly in stability and infrastructure, and its emphasis on healthcare and education also earned it top marks.

However, it did not fare as well in areas such as culture and living environment.

While it is ranked behind Hong Kong and Tokyo in Asia, for example, Singapore edged out London and New York, which were both pulled down by their crumbling infrastructure.

The EIU's liveability rating, part of the Worldwide Cost of Living Survey, aims to quantify the challenges that might be presented to an individual's lifestyle in 140 cities worldwide.

Each city is assigned a score for over 30 qualitative and quantitative factors across the five broad categories of stability, healthcare, culture and environment, education and infrastructure.

The annual survey uses research involving resident experts and EIU's analysts.

Earning top spot in this year's poll is Vancouver, which scored well across all categories.

"The forthcoming Winter Games (also) contribute to a strong score in the cultural and sporting events category" for the city, said Mr Jon Copestake, editor of the report.

In contrast, Zimbabwe's ongoing social and economic crisis has made its capital Harare the worst city to live in.

Read more!

FT magazine checks out the Lion City

Today Online 13 Feb 10;

SINGAPORE - Can the little red dot transform itself from "a ho-hum stopover to hot destination"?

That multi-million-dollar question is examined in this week's issue of The Financial Times magazine, How To Spend It.

Entitled "The Lion City Revs Up", the four-page cover story - which includes photos of the island's changing skyline, makes for a perfect Course 101 on the new-look Singapore.

Writer Maria Shollenbarger notes that Government agencies, such as the Singapore Tourism Board (STB) and the Economic Development Board, and private developers and investors, both local and foreign, are working together towards a common goal: "To add 'World-Class Leisure Capital' next to 'Business Capital of South-east Asia' on Singapore's CV."

She points to last year's F1 race, where the likes of Beyonce Knowles and Lewis Hamilton provided a dash of "flown-in sex appeal"; the upcoming integrated resorts which, along with their casinos, are aimed at turning Singapore into South-east Asia's hub for "high-end revelry"; the Singapore Flyer; and the Gardens by the Bay as among the massive projects undertaken towards achieving that ambition.

All these have contributed to the "growth of a legitimate leisure culture of new and unique shopping, dining, and hotel venues", she writes.

Apart from the changing skyline, Singapore also has "quite a bit" to offer visitors "looking for a more authentic and cultured take on the city".

"Singapore's ethnic enclaves are developing in ways that muddle the boundaries of their historic Jackson Plan-established identities," Ms Shollenbarger adds.

She cites Chinatown, where you can find original designers and retailers at Ann Siang Hill. In Kampong Glam, Singapore's Arab quarter, Haji Lane has turned into a mini-shopping destination where one can find Swedish menswear and mid-century furniture reissues.

Ms Shollenbarger notes that "Singaporeans also tout the emergence of a bona fide art scene, which is being engendered in galleries and exhibition spaces around the city - and with government help, in larger museums".

The STB hopes that Singapore's new attractions will increase the number of visitors to 17 million and triple tourism receipts to about $30 billion by 2015.

So, will the visitors come?

While there will be business travellers who could be converted into leisure ones "by the winning axis of Daniel Boulud-Louis Vuitton-Espa", the writer believes "others might not be convinced by all the dazzle".

The latter would prefer "to get their tropical fix in Bali or Phuket and their urban culture in cities that will always outdo Singapore on that front", Ms Shollenbarger says.

While Singapore can expect to reap economic dividends from the top-end hotels, entertainment venues and civic attractions, "now it's just a matter of waiting to see if they will, in fact, beget a sea of change in how the city's perceived", she concludes.

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Becoming vegetarian 'can harm the environment': UK study

Adopting a vegetarian diet based around meat substitutes such as tofu can cause more damage to the environment, according to a new study.
Nick Collins, The Telegraph 12 Feb 10;

It has often been claimed that avoiding red meat is beneficial to the environment, because it lowers emissions and less land is used to produce alternatives.

But a study by Cranfield University, commissioned by WWF, the environmental group, found a substantial number of meat substitutes – such as soy, chickpeas and lentils – were more harmful to the environment because they were imported into Britain from overseas.

The study concluded: "A switch from beef and milk to highly refined livestock product analogues such as tofu could actually increase the quantity of arable land needed to supply the UK."

The results showed that the amount of foreign land required to produce the substitute products – and the potential destruction of forests to make way for farmland – outweighed the negatives of rearing beef and lamb in the UK.

An increase in vegetarianism could result in the collapse of British farming, the study warned, causing meat production to move overseas where there may be less legal protection of forests and uncultivated land.

Meat substitutes were also found to be highly processed, often requiring large amounts of energy to produce. The study recognised that the environmental merits of vegetarianism depended largely on which types of foods were consumed as an alternative to meat.

Donal Murphy-Bokern, one of the authors of the study and former farming and science coordinator at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, told a newspaper: "For some people, tofu and other meat substitutes symbolise environmental friendliness but they are not necessarily the badge of merit people claim.

"Simply eating more bread, pasta and potatoes instead of meat is more environmentally friendly."

Lord Stern of Bradford, the climate change economist, claimed last October that a vegetarian diet was beneficial to the planet.

He told a newspaper: "Meat is a wasteful use of water and creates a lot of greenhouse gases. It puts enormous pressure on the world's resources. A vegetarian diet is better."

Liz O'Neill, spokeswoman for the Vegetarian Society, told The Times: "The figures used in the report are based on a number of questionable assumptions about how vegetarians balance their diet and how the food industry might respond to increased demand.

"If you're aiming to reduce your environmental impact by going vegetarian then it's obviously not a good idea to rely on highly processed products, but that doesn't undermine the fact that the livestock industry causes enormous damage."

The National Farmers' Union said the study showed that general arguments about vegetarianism being beneficial to the environment were too simplistic.

Tofu can harm environment more than meat, finds WWF study
Ben Webster, Times Online 12 Feb 10;

Becoming a vegetarian can do more harm to the environment than continuing to eat red meat, according to a study of the impacts of meat substitutes such as tofu.

The findings undermine claims by vegetarians that giving up meat automatically results in lower emissions and that less land is needed to produce food.

The study by Cranfield University, commissioned by the environmental group WWF, found that many meat substitutes were produced from soy, chickpeas and lentils that were grown overseas and imported into Britain.

It found that switching from beef and lamb reared in Britain to meat substitutes would result in more foreign land being cultivated and raise the risk of forests being destroyed to create farmland. Meat substitutes also tended to be highly processed and involved energy-intensive production methods.

Lord Stern of Brentford, one of the world’s leading climate change economists, caused uproar among Britain’s livestock farmers last October when he claimed that a vegetarian diet was better for the planet. He told The Times: “Meat is a wasteful use of water and creates a lot of greenhouse gases. It puts enormous pressure on the world’s resources. A vegetarian diet is better.”

However, the Cranfield study found that the environmental benefits of vegetarianism depended heavily on the type of food consumed as an alternative to meat. It concluded: “A switch from beef and milk to highly refined livestock product analogues such as tofu could actually increase the quantity of arable land needed to supply the UK.”

A significant increase in vegetarianism in Britain could cause the collapse of the country’s livestock industry and result in production of meat shifting overseas to countries with few regulations to protect forests and other uncultivated land, it added.

Donal Murphy-Bokern, one of the study authors and the former farming and food science co-ordinator at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, said: “For some people, tofu and other meat substitutes symbolise environmental friendliness but they are not necessarily the badge of merit people claim. Simply eating more bread, pasta and potatoes instead of meat is more environmentally friendly.”

Liz O’Neill, spokeswoman for the Vegetarian Society, said: “The figures used in the report are based on a number of questionable assumptions about how vegetarians balance their diet and how the food industry might respond to increased demand.

“If you’re aiming to reduce your environmental impact by going vegetarian then it’s obviously not a good idea to rely on highly processed products, but that doesn’t undermine the fact that the livestock industry causes enormous damage and that moving towards a plant-based diet is good for animals, human health and the environment.”

The National Farmers’ Union said the study showed that general statements about the environmental benefits of vegetarianism were too simplistic. Jonathan Scurlock, the NFU’s chief adviser for climate change, said: “The message is that no single option offers a panacea. The report rightly demonstrates the many environment benefits to be had from grazing pasture land with little or no other productive use.”

The study also found that previous estimates of the total emissions of Britain’s food consumption had been flawed because they failed to take account of the impact of changes to the use of land overseas.

Salad days

• About a quarter of the world’s population eat a predominantly vegetarian diet

• There are 3.7 million vegetarians in Britain

• Only 2 per cent of the French population don’t eat meat

• There is a longstanding myth that Adolf Hitler was vegetarian but recent research suggests that he ate at least some meat

Read more!

World Bank Faces Tiger Trap in Burma

Marwaan Macan-Markar, IPS News 12 Feb 10;

BANGKOK, Feb 12, 2010 (IPS) - As the World Bank embarks on its latest foray to protect Asian forests that are home to wild tigers, one of the continent’s iconic predators, a visible trap looms in military-ruled Burma.

The challenge for the Bank stems from a need to find a balance between its new interest as a conservationist – through its Global Tiger Initiative (GTI) – and a policy that shackles the Washington DC-based international financial institution from being directly involved, including doling out financial aid, to the South-east Asian nation.

The GTI, which the Bank unveiled in June 2008, has identified a raft of measures to help the 13 Asian countries where the last of the estimated 3,200 wild tigers roam. This includes direct investments to preserve and expand the prevailing habitats of the endangered predator, which numbered about 100,000 a century ago.

The importance of Burma, or Myanmar, as it is also known, in this unique environmental drive is not lost on conservationists. The country is home to the world’s largest tiger reserve among the 13 tiger range nations, which include Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Nepal, Russia, Thailand and Vietnam.

What is more, the Bank’s efforts to tiptoe around the trap of being prevented from working in Burma will be in the spotlight this year due to the world’s first tiger summit to be held in Vladivostok in September. Robert Zoellick, the Bank’s president, is billed to co-chair the summit with the host nation’s prime minister, Vladmir Putin.

"We in the World Bank do not have the mandate to fund projects in Myanmar," admitted Keshav Varma, leader of the GTI. "But we can provide technical assistance through United Nations agencies and other organisations."

In an interview with IPS, Varma also elaborated on other options to help Burma’s tiger population. "I think there are a lot of bilateral possibilities for Myanmar to tap. They can talk to India or other neighbouring governments."

The Bank’s inability to work in Burma goes back to 1987, when the country was classified as having "non-accrual status" for failing to clear arrears in its loans. Until that time, the country had received an estimated 700 million U.S. dollars in development aid since 1956.

Varma’s admission of the Bank’s limits in Burma is echoed by Yuki Akimoto, co-director of the Tokyo-based Burma Information Network-Japan. "The shareholders of the Bank do not support the Bank providing assistance to Burma," said Akimoto. "The United States, which is the largest shareholder and therefore with the largest voting power, is required by law to oppose any assistance from the Bank to Burma."

But under the guise of providing humanitarian assistance, the Bank has in recent years tried to engage with the country.

"Despite the restrictions, the Bank in the past has found ways to provide assistance to Burma for projects or issues that could be spun as ‘humanitarian’ or otherwise relatively non-political," Akimoto, who monitors the work of international financial institutions in Burma, said in an e-mail interview. "Saving wild tigers could be interpreted to be non-political and therefore not problematic, particularly if funds were not channelled directly to the regime."

One organisation hoping for such a broad interpretation is the New York-based Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS), which has worked with Burmese authorities since the early 1990s to increase the population of the country’s wild tigers and other endangered species.

A crowning moment for the WCS was its ability to get official support to establish the Hugawng Valley Tiger Reserve (HVTR), the world’s largest such habitat covering some 21,802 square kilometres in the mountainous north-west of the country, close to the Indian border.

"The biggest problem working in a sanctions-hit country like Myanmar is mobilising funds for our programmes," said Colin Poole, director for Asia programmes at WCS, referring to the punitive economic measures imposed on Burma’s junta since the mid-1990s by the U.S. government and the European Union. "We know the World Bank cannot be involved, but there might be other options to consider."

While the WCS is unable to give an accurate estimate of the number of wild tigers in the Hugawng tiger reserve since its work began, it speaks approvingly of the official support it has received for its work inside Burma.

"The Myanmar government has showed a lot of commitment to conserve wildlife," Poole said during a telephone interview from Phnom Penh, the Cambodian capital. "The setting up of the Hugawng Valley Tiger Reserve was not something we requested, but one that came from the country’s forestry department."

Other conservationists are not as convinced. "Although the Myanmar government has indeed created the world’s largest tiger reserve much to the surprise and then applause by the international conservation community at large, in reality the HVTR remains a ‘paper park’," noted Kevin Woods, who has been involved in environmental issues in Burma for nearly a decade. "It is only marked on a map, but in practice little conservation actually proceeds."

As worrying is how the junta has exploited the land for economic activity after the Hugawng reserve was created. "The country’s largest agribusiness concession was granted, gold mining continues by companies at the expense of local miners who have been admonished by the government, and environmental rights abuses against local residents are reported," Woods, a doctoral student at the University of California, Berkeley, explained in an e-mail interview.

"For all these reasons, I remain highly sceptical about sincere conservation efforts in Myanmar," he added.

Among the ethnic communities affected by such projects are the Kachins, a minority in Burma who live in the Kachin state, where the Hugawng reserve is located. "There are lots of posters to be seen near the HVTR to help protect the tigers but that may not be enough," says Lahpai Nawdin, editor of the Kachin News Group, based in the northern Thai city of Chiang Mai. "Gold mining has spread, land confiscation is expanding and there is large-scale logging, so the tigers may be extinct in the future."

"INGOs (international non-governmental organisations) working in the HVTR work with the military and not with the local Kachin people," he revealed in a telephone interview. "It is impossible to protect the tigers with that kind of relationship."

The WCS’ Poole admits to the complexities on the ground. "Working there is difficult because of the number of ethnic minorities," he said. "Part of the HVTR is in an area controlled by a Kachin (separatist) group (that has a ceasefire agreement with the Burmese government), and part of it near the Indian border where we can’t go to." (END)

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Russian jailed for felling 'Siberian tiger' trees

Yahoo News 13 Feb 10;

MOSCOW (AFP) – A resident of Russia's far east was sentenced to nearly four years in prison for having chopped down trees necessary for the preservation of the massive Siberian tiger, World Wildlife Fund said Friday.

"It's extremely rare that a person is sentenced to prison in such a case," said a WWF representative in Amur, Russia's Primorye region, in remarks cited by the Ria Novosti news agency.

A WWF representative and a forest inspector reportedly questioned the man last year in an area where more than 2,600 cubic metres of Korean pine had been cut illegally.

The trees provide the foundation of a critical food chain on which the Siberian or Amur tiger is on top, environmentalists say.

Local logging operations over the past half century have decimated the Korean pine, WWF says, and illegal logging continues.

Earlier this month, forest inspectors discovered a swathe of land on which up to 3,000 cubic metres of pine and other trees had been cut illegally.

The world's largest cat, the Amur tiger was on the brink of extinction in the 1940s, with only about 40 tigers remaining in the wild, according to WWF.

While the population has since recovered thanks to conservation and antipoaching efforts, the environmental group says logging and other threats pose new challenges to its survival.

Read more!

Tiger's ancient ancestry revealed

Matt Walker, BBC News 12 Feb 10;

The tiger may be more ancient and distinct than we thought.

Tigers are less closely related to lions, leopards and jaguars than these other big cats are to each other, according to a new comprehensive study.

The genetic analysis also reveals the tiger began evolving 3.2 million years ago, and its closest living relative is the equally endangered snow leopard.

The discovery comes as the BBC launches a collection of intimate videos of wild tigers and the threats they face.

Despite the popularity and endangered status of tigers, much remains to be discovered about them, including how they evolved.

It has long been known that the five species of big cat, the tiger, lion, leopard, jaguar and snow leopard, which belong to the Panthera genus, and the two species of clouded leopard, are more closely related to each other than to other smaller cats.

But it has been difficult to pin down the exact relationships between them.

So to find out more, scientists Mr Brian Davis, Dr Gang Li and Professor William Murphy conducted an analysis of the DNA of all these species.

By looking at similarities in DNA held in mitochondria and within the sex chromosomes among other places, the researchers found that the five big cat species are related to each other in a different way to previously thought.

Their data strongly suggests that lions, leopards and jaguars are most closely related to each other.

Their ancestor split from other cats around 4.3 to 3.8 million years ago.

About 3.6 to 2.5 million years ago, the jaguar began to evolve, while lions and leopards split from one other about 3.1 to 1.95 million years ago.

But the tiger had already emerged by this point.

The ancestor of tigers and snow leopards also branched off around 3.9 million years ago.

The tiger then began to evolve into a unique species toward the end of the Pliocene epoch, about 3.2 million years ago.

That makes the tiger and snow leopard "sister species", the researchers report in the journal Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution.

Both tigers and snow leopards are among the world's most endangered big cats.

Fewer than 3500 tigers are thought to survive in the wild.

One subspecies, the Sumatran tiger, is so enigmatic that the first film of a wild individual was only recorded this year, and Indonesia is considering entrusting them to private individuals for safe-keeping.

Last year, a study revealed that the largest sub species, the Amur tiger, may be on the genetic brink, as so few individuals remain.

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U.N. Treaty Key Tool in Conserving Ecosystems

Haider Rizvi, IPS News 11 Feb 10;

UNITED NATIONS, Feb 11, 2010 (IPS) - In a bid to pressure policymakers to take urgent action to implement a major United Nations treaty on the preservation of plant and animal species, the world body has launched a global campaign to raise awareness about the importance of biodiversity.

"Biodiversity is our life," said Veerle Vandeweerd, the U.N. Development Programme's energy and environment director, at a news conference to promote the campaign declaring 2010 the International Year of Biodiversity.

Like other development experts, Vandeweerd said that actions to reduce poverty and fight climate change would bear no fruit if the implementation of the U.N. Convention on Biological Diversity remained slow.

Rural communities in many parts of the world are "suffering due to the loss of biodiversity," she said, noting that biodiversity and ecosystem services are vital for the survival of rural poor and indigenous populations.

Scientific literature suggests that almost 60 percent of the ecosystem services that support life on Earth, such as fresh water, pollination, and the regulation of regional climate and pests, are being undermined as a result of human activity.

The treaty on biodiversity calls for substantial actions to reverse losses in plant and animal species by 2010. It also seeks sustainable use of natural resources and benefit-sharing arising from the use of genetic resources.

According to scientists, over the past 50 years, species have disappeared a thousand times faster than the natural rate. That has happened as a result of increasing demand for resources. Unlike climate change, however, this issue has yet to gain close attention.

U.N. officials have repeatedly said that, despite some progress, policymakers around the world have not only largely failed to deliver on the issue of biodiversity preservation, but also lack a proper understanding of the significance of this issue.

On Wednesday, at a meeting held at the American Museum of Natural History in New York, U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon called the failure to protect biodiversity "a wake-up call." In his words, "Business as usual is not an option."

"We need a new biodiversity vision," he told the meeting attended by scores of scientists, U.N. experts on biodiversity, and development experts. "We must ensure the long-term viability of our seas and oceans."

Ban's remarks indicate that U.N. development experts are becoming increasingly convinced that achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) will be unlikely without corresponding efforts to fight climate change and biodiversity.

The MDGs include a 50-percent reduction in extreme poverty and hunger; universal primary education; reduction of child mortality by two-thirds; cutbacks in maternal mortality by three-quarters; the promotion of gender equality; and the reversal of the spread of HIV/AIDS, malaria and other deadly diseases, all by 2015.

Experts say the effective implementation of the Convention on Biodiversity could lead to meaningful results in achieving sustainable development worldwide. That is something that is quite obvious in Ban's take on biodiversity issue.

"We must manage our forest sustainability," Ban added in explaining to the audience about the need for "new vision" on biodiversity preservation. "We must preserve coral reefs so they can continue to protect coasts from storms and support livelihoods," he said.

Vandeweerd argues that preserving biodiversity is not merely an issue of preserving other species, but that it would bring prosperity to hundreds of millions of people who live close proximity to the plant and animal world.

"The biodiversity is about economy. About three-fourth of the world population depends on it," she said, suggesting that meaningful actions to protect biodiversity on land and in the oceans could help millions to survive without fear of hunger and disease.

But, for many governments, it is a tough task because private concerns grabbing up indigenous-managed and other undeveloped lands are very powerful. The U.N. treaty calls for a "fair" and "equitable" share of benefits for the use of indigenous resources by business interests.

The signatories to the treaty have yet to resolve many questions on this subject. Meanwhile, the U.N. General Assembly is due to call a "special high-level meeting" this year on the issue of biodiversity.

"It will give the international community an opportunity to demonstrate much-needed opportunity in advance of the Nagoya Biodiversity Summit," said Ban in reference to the next treaty conference, which is due in Japan later this year to lay out a new agenda on how to implement the treaty in an effective and meaningful way.

Read more!

Biodiversity is life

UN Radio 12 Feb 10;

Over the past half century, human activities have caused an unprecedented decline in biological diversity. Two thousand ten is the International Year of Biodiversity. But what is biodiversity? Gerry Adams reports:

Dr. Ahmed Djoghlaf : Biodiversity is life and without biodiversity, there is no life on earth. It's our food. It's our water. It's our forest, our fish. So without biodiversity, there is no life. So biodiversity is about our life and life on earth.

Narrator: Dr. Ahmed Djoghlaf is the Executive Secretary of the Convention on Biological Diversity, an international legally binding convention to sustain the diversity of life on earth. Noting that 2010 is the International Year of Biodiversity, Dr. Djoghlaf says that we can no longer continue doing "business as usual" because the building blocks of biodiversity are being lost at an accelerated pace:

Djoghlaf: I think we have to have a paradigm shift in our relations as human beings with nature. We are only one species among millions of species and we are destroying the species. By the same token, destroying ourselves and destroying the capacity of the planet to sustain life for ourselves and our children.

Narrator: The UN Development Proramme, UNDP, notes that biodiversity underpins development through the provision of ecosystem "goods" like food, fibre and medicines and services such as crop pollination and the regulation of water supply. But, says Dr. Djoghlaf, we are destroying nature and natural resources as if they were going to be here forever:

Djoghlaf: The ecological footprint of the planet 1:10 is 20% higher than the capacity of the planet. If you had to have the same lifestyle as the Americans, we would need five planets. If you have to have the same lifestyle as the Europeans, we need three planets. And unfortunately, we have only one and we have to protect it.

Narrator: One way the loss of biodiversity is being addressed is through a project in Vietnam called the Phu My Lepironoia Project. The project, located in the Mekong Delta, continues to preserve the local biodiversity while at the same time supporting local livelihoods. Tran Triet, Director of the project, says the protection of biodiversity and the improvement of livelihoods can be mutually reinforcing:

Tran: There we are working on protecting a small wetland by creating a new model of management. It's an open protected area where local people are still allowed to harvest a wetland local plant that the local community has been harvesting for hundreds of years to make products from that raw material. What's different now is that the project has tem making better products from that same material, helps them to export their product. So instead of making very little money with exporting they can make a lot more money.

Narrator: Mr. Tran says the wetlands were able to be protected, the local community's livelihoods improved and the biological value of the wetlands improved tremendously. Mr. Tran say this project proves that biodiversity can be saved while at the same time improving people's livelihoods:

Tran: We don't have to sacrifice. We just need to put some thinking into the process to find a way we can get both achieved.

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A home from home: saving species from climate change

How can we save some of our most charismatic animals from extinction due to climate change? One US biologist, Camille Parmesan, has a radical suggestion: just pick them up and move them
Suzanne Goldenberg, The Guardian 12 Feb 10;

Picture an elephant in the wild, making its stately progress across the ­savannah, tall grass bending ­beneath its feet. Now ­transplant that image to the American prairie. In one of the most startling new ideas to emerge about ­climate change, a leading conservation biologist is calling for plants and wildlife facing extinction to be saved simply by picking them up and moving them.

Camille Parmesan, a butterfly ­biologist at the University of Texas at Austin, has been monitoring the effects of rapid climate change on ­species – particularly those threatened because they cannot adapt to or ­escape from rising temperatures – for more than a decade now. But her idea for a modern day's Noah's ark remains hugely controversial.

"The idea is that, for certain ­species at very high risk of extinction due to climate change, we should actively pick them up and move them to ­suitable locations that are outside their historic range," she tells me in her ­office at the university campus, near the biology laboratory in which she and her ­husband keep myriad caterpillar samples in the cold store.

Her proposals, once confined to a handful of scientists, are now getting a broader airing as governments begin to grapple with the enormous problem of how to insulate animal and plant life from a warming climate. Shortly after appearing in the Atlantic magazine's list of "brave thinkers of the age", ­Parmesan ­lobbied negotiators, ­environmental ­activists and scientists at last ­December's climate change summit in Copenhagen to start drawing up plans to move animals that are most at risk.

She is, not ­surprisingly, frustrated and angry with the failure of governments to cut the ­emissions that cause climate change. After the ­subsequent ­discovery of a false claim about melting Himalayan ­glaciers by the UN's climate body the IPCC, Parmesan also stresses that conservationists should not fall into a pattern of reflexively blaming climate change for each and every decline in wildlife. However, she ­remains convinced of the dangers to the world's animals from a rapidly warming atmosphere.

Scientists have long believed that 20% to 30% of all known ­species of land animal, bird and fish could become extinct because of climate change. But recent studies, based on more elevated temperature ­projections, have suggested an even greater rate of die-off – 40% to 70% – as heatwaves, drought and the increasing acidification of the oceans drive animals from their native ­habitats and destroy their food supply.

The sheer scale of threatened ­extinctions have forced conservationists to rethink what was once dismissed as an outlandish notion. And it's got Parmesan thinking about elephants . . .

To date, there is little evidence about how climate change – rather than traditional threats such as poaching or growing urbanisation – is affecting the grasslands where these majestic creatures live in the wild. "But at some point, I think we might want to think about moving them around," ­Parmesan says.

She has already been pushing for efforts to regenerate America's prairie grasslands in parts of Texas and the mid-west, by bringing in big grazing animals. There are fossils to suggest there were elephants in North America tens of thousands of years ago. So why not transplant African elephants to North America?

"With climate change, I am starting to think that, if we do get a massive reduction of Africa's grassland, then as I am advocating restoration of the US prairie anyway, we can use the large herbivores from ­Africa to help that process because they are already co-adapted. I wouldn't be opposed to that."

Parmesan can see her way to ­moving other big herbivores too, such as ­giraffes. She can even justify finding new homes for pandas. However, she concedes that most of the planet's iconic large animals would still have to find their own way out from climate change – it would be impractical to move carnivores, for example.

"What we are advocating is not moving tigers to Africa, nor moving polar bears to Antarctica – nothing as dramatic as that – but [on the whole] to take species that are fairly innocuous, including a lot of plants and insects," she says. "We know enough about their competitive abilities and their behaviour, and we have no expectation that they are going to be able to take over an eco-system."

Climate studies since 2000 reveal a growing threat to animal life far ­beyond the polar regions that have been feeling its early impacts. A review of ­recent scientific literature showed 52% of species striking out for more temperate areas as their traditional habitats became unsuitable, migrating from 50km to as far as 1,600km away when geography and human settlements allowed.

Climate change is also altering their way of life: some 62% of ­species, for example, are mating earlier in the spring. The studies noted huge ­varieties in response to climate change except for one fatal trait: no species was exhibiting the kind of large-scale evolutionary changes needed to adapt to warming temperatures in its existing habitat. "Evolution is not going to save the polar bear," says Parmesan simply.

If it were up to her, the evacuation would start now – perhaps with a ­variety of the ephemeral Checker­spot butterfly which started her on this ­unlikely career path. Now 48, she did not set out to become a campaigner – or even a lepidopterist, for that ­matter. The youngest (and smallest) of six daughters, she grew up in a solidly Republican family with deep roots in the Texas oil industry. Her mother, a geologist, worked for an oil company, as does one of her sisters.

Initially, Parmesan wanted to study primates, but she did not have the stomach to work with caged animals. She claims she is uncomfortable even describing herself as an environmentalist – although she does drive a blue Prius, and watches her carbon footprint.

It was fieldwork that set Parmesan on her more public trajectory, ­after she published her first paper on the plight of Edith's Checkerspot. In the early 1990s, she spent more than four years rattling across the Pacific Northwest in an old Toyota pickup truck, tracking these butterflies from Mexico to Alberta.

Earlier researchers – including her husband, Singer – had established that the Checkerspot was sensitive to temperature. The trek convinced Parmesan that it was dying out ­because of climate change: rising ­temperatures in California were ­drying up the plant that was its main food source, although the butterfly continued to do fine in northern ­latitudes. And yet Parmesan admits she was, at first, sceptical about ­projections of the broader impacts of climate change on the animal world.

"I have to admit that 10 years ago, I thought they were a bit too extreme," she says. But now she fears the scientific community is under-estimating the risk of extinction, and is frustrated with conservation organisations for failing to grasp the urgency of this situation.

When Parmesan first began talking about moving species, or "assisted ­colonisation", at academic conferences, her fellow biologists erupted. They accused her of playing God; of tampering with nature in ways that carry enormous risk. They warned that her approach would set off a whole new chain of problems. How did Parmesan know the transplants would take to their new surroundings? How did she know they would not stage a hostile takeover, chasing out the native species?

"I was surprised at how angry ­people got – how emotional," she says. "They were just horrified that I advocated playing God. They thought I was advocating an engineering ­approach to conservation."

Which, Parmesan concedes, she is. But she argues that her approach may be the only way left to save some ­species whose escape routes are blocked by urban sprawl or punishing desert, or which cannot adapt in time.

Unlike traditional threats to wildlife, Parmesan says there is no prospect of recovery from climate change. Loss of habitat and poaching can be reversed, given enough money. Threatened animals can be coaxed back to healthy numbers – as in the case of the wolf in the Rocky Mountain West region of the US. Degraded landscapes can be ­restored. But climate change is ­irreversible, at least on a human timescale. And besides, it's not as if there hasn't been transportation of animal or plant life in the past.

"It doesn't make any sense to say it's OK for the shipping industry and the transport industry to accidentally move stuff around, for the aquarium trade to move stuff around, for the garden trade to move stuff all over the place, but that it's not OK for a conservation biologist who is desperately trying to save a species from extinction to move it 100 miles. Come on, we have mucked around with Earth to such a degree that I think it's a ridiculous argument."

In recent years, Parmesan and a handful of other scientists have ­ begun work on a blueprint for ­moving plants and wildlife on the verge of extinction. She argues it would be far more effective to ­transplant entire communities of plants and animals, rather than a few token species.

"If we move individual ­species, it will just be: 'Let's save a few cool things for our grandkids.' But if we can get people to think about it on a grander scale, it could save some significant percentage of species."

Their idea is to start small – with plants, butterflies, birds, small rodents, and mammals – and to restrict the relocation plan to isolated spots that are immediately threatened by climate change. That is, high-altitude species that are being forced to migrate higher and higher up mountains to find cooler temperatures. Parmesan would shift those populations to ­another, higher mountain within close range.

It is too soon to say if she is winning the argument. Her ideas are still considered ­outside the mainstream of conservationists, and undertaking any kind of mass animal rescue will require rewriting existing international laws on transporting animals, as well as huge infusions of cash. But some of the bigger wildlife NGOs are beginning to listen more seriously to what was seen only a decade ago as an outlandish idea.

"We need to have as many potential tools as possible in our tool boxes," agrees Thomas Brooks of Conservation International. "It is not very easy and it is not very cheap, but I do see this as an option that needs to be explored when cheaper and easier options aren't working. But this is a more difficult and expensive approach, and needs to be evaluated carefully in that light."

Even with temperature rises of 0.7C, some animals have already been lost – such as the golden toad that lives in the cool mountains of Costa Rica ­(biologists there have warned that more than a dozen amphibian species have disappeared from the ­jungles ­because of climate change). And last year, researchers in Australia ­reported what would be the world's first ­mammalian extinction of modern times: the lemuroid ringtail possum. These animals drop out of trees and die if the temperature rises above 30C – ­although subsequent reports suggest a number have since been sighted.

Many other species are under a death ­sentence. In the American west, ­researchers have charted a sharp ­decline in the pika, a small, furry brown animal that lives in the Rocky mountains. As for the polar bear, its natural hunting grounds are fast disappearing with the melting sea ice. Some studies suggest the Arctic's summer sea ice could disappear entirely by 2020, and with it the seals that are the bears' main food supply. Recently, Canadian biologists reported at least seven cases of male polar bears eating their young because they were going hungry.

But while it's too late for the ­polar bear, Parmesan believes there is a chance of saving other animals – ­provided governments and conservation organisations overcome their ­reservations and act now. "Otherwise, we are going to see a whole slew of species go extinct that we could have saved, if only we'd been willing to think a little bit more outside the box."

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More Mega-Snowstorms Coming -- Global Warming to Blame?

Get used to heavy U.S. snowstorms, scientists say. The cause, though, is a subject of hot debate.

Willie Drye, National Geographic News 12 Feb 10;

As snowstorm-ravaged states on the U.S. East Coast dig out, scientists say the past week's "Snowpocalypse" could be a taste of harsh winters to come—and that, strangely enough, global warming may be to blame. Others aren't so sure.

Meteorologist Joe Bastardi says the recent snowstorms may be the start of a trend of cold, snowy winters similar to those of the 1960s and 1970s.

Bastardi, of the AccuWeather forecasting service in State College, Pennsylvania, believes the February record snowfalls, though, are due more to an El Niño that formed last year than to climate change.

An El Niño occurs when Pacific waters off the northwest coast of South America become unusually warm. The event is erratic and unpredictable, but it occurs roughly every three to seven years.

In a prepared statement, Bastardi noted that the current El Niño has been "very strong, prompting many major blizzards for the mid-Atlantic region."

The El Niño also is altering the normal flow of upper-level winds known as the jet stream, he said. That disruption is pushing cold air from northern Canada into the United States, Bastardi added.

Global Warming Fueling Snowstorms?

Cyclical patterns of heating and cooling—as opposed to long-term global warming—could herald a coming period of harsher U.S. winters, Bastardi told National Geographic News.

"We know that Earth's cycles are changing," he said. "The Pacific is cooling. The Atlantic will join it in several years. When you get an El Niño with a cold Pacific, you get crazy winters in the East."

Still, other scientists say global warming is the main culprit behind this month's eastern-U.S. snowstorms—and it could cause more heavy snowfalls in future winters.

Attributing snowstorms to warmer weather seems contradictory, but climate scientist Amanda Staudt says relatively warmer weather causes more water to be evaporated from the oceans and thus creates more moisture for winter storms, as long as temperatures remain below freezing.

As for Snowpolaclypse, said Staudt of the National Wildlife Federation in Reston, Virginia, "It's hard to determine global warming's effect on any particular storm, but it's highly unusual to have these really large winter storms in one winter."

Washington, D.C., for example, has had two two- to three-foot snowfalls this winter—which should be a once-every-300-to-400-years rarity, according to Staudt.

Waiting ... and Waiting ... for More Global Warming Evidence

Like AccuWeather's Bastardi, Staudt believes the current El Niño is contributing to this winter's harsh U.S. snowstorms, but to a lesser extent than climate change, which she sees as a clear and present danger.

"I think there's overwhelming evidence that global warming is happening and that human activity is responsible for it," Staudt said.

(Related: "Five Last-Ditch Schemes to Avert Global Warming Disaster.")

Regarding scientists who believe global warming is under way, Bastardi said, "I respect their argument; they may have a point." But he thinks it'll take many more winters—not to mention springs, summers, and falls—before we know for sure whether global warming is occurring.

"I feel strongly," he said, "that we'll get an answer in the next 20 or 30 years."

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Beating back biofuel crop invasions

IUCN 12 Feb 10;

The risk of biofuel crops becoming invasive and outcompeting native species is increasing as more advanced crops are planted. This can be managed to reduce the impact on local livelihoods and the environment, according to a new report by IUCN.

Ways to reduce this risk have received little or no attention until now. The report sets out recommendations for decision makers and biofuel producers to minimize the risk of crops becoming invasive, ranging from assessing potential traits of biofuel species in a given environment to effective controls when biofuel crops are being transported.

“Current biofuel production is based on established food crops, and while this raises other sustainability concerns, the risk of invasion is not large,” says Nadine McCormick, IUCN Energy Network Coordinator. “However, this risk will increase exponentially as new plants – that grow fast with many seeds in pretty much any land – are cultivated for more advanced biofuels.”

The most important step is prevention. Biofuel crops are not, by definition, invasive but they can be, depending on the area where they’re cultivated and how the crop is grown. However, some plants have a higher risk of causing a biological invasion, if not managed correctly.

For example, the controversial Jatropha curcas is known to have invasive tendencies in Western Australia, but that doesn’t mean that it will be invasive in other parts of the world, for instance in India where it is currently being produced for biofuels. However, extra precautions should be taken to minimise the risk.

Giant reed and elephant grasses both have a history of becoming invasive in many ecosystems – so particular care needs to be taken when assessing the risk of invasion when it is introduced into a new environment.

“Biological invasions from the introduced species themselves, as well as from the production processes, are real risks to biodiversity and livelihoods,” says Geoffrey Howard, IUCN Global Invasive Species Coordinator. “The risks can be reduced by following the guidelines we’ve set out.”

The guidelines developed by IUCN in close cooperation with the Roundtable on Sustainable Biofuels (RSB) outline step-by-step recommendations for how to minimise risks of biological invasions along the biofuels supply chain.

IUCN Guidelines on Biofuels and Invasive Species 3.05MB

Invasive Biofuel Crops an Overlooked Danger
Environment News Service 19 Feb 10;

GLAND, Switzerland, February 19, 2010 (ENS) - The risk that biofuel crops will become invasive and outcompete native species is increasing as more advanced biofuel crops are planted, according to new research into this previously neglected but potentially costly problem.

A new report by the nonprofit International Union for the Conservation of Nature, IUCN, finds it is "likely that the cost of an invasion by a biofuel feedstock or associated pest would, in the long run, outweigh any economic benefit offered by biofuel development."

"The economic costs of invasive species are extremely high," the IUCN report states, relying on a 2006 calculation by the Convention on Biological Diversity that puts the total annual cost of invasive species to the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, South Africa, India and Brazil at over US$100 billion.

Most of this cost is the result of reduced productivity of agriculture, forestry and other production systems, but direct costs include damage to infrastructure, lost tourism revenue and costs of eradication, containment and management. Indirect costs include loss of ecosystem services, as well as loss of traditional livelihoods.

In view of these costs, the IUCN outlines recommendations for decision makers and biofuel producers to minimize the risk of invasive biofuel crops.

"Current biofuel production is based on established food crops, and while this raises other sustainability concerns, the risk of invasion is not large," says Nadine McCormick, IUCN Energy Network coordinator. "However, this risk will increase exponentially as new plants that grow fast with many seeds in pretty much any land are cultivated for more advanced biofuels."

The report details how Prosopis, a group of Central and South American species that seemed ideal for second-generation biofuels, have become a major headache in other parts of the world.

Prosopis are fast growing, have low nutrient requirements and are able to access deep sub-surface water in dry areas. They are nitrogen fixing and can improve soil fertility. So, Prosopis species were introduced to Australia, Asia, and dryland Africa for fuelwood, fodder, shade, to improve soils and reduce soil erosion.

But Prosopis proved to be invasive "due to traits such as rapid growth, abundant seed production, the tendency to form impenetrable thickets, the ability to thrive in dry, saline soils, and foliage that is unpalatable to livestock," the report states.

When demand collapsed, many Prosopis plantations were abandoned without adequate management and eradication, and the thickets now cover millions of hectares in Africa, impacting grazing and traditional pastoralist livelihoods.

The dense thickets have outcompeted local species and lowered ground and stream flow levels in watersheds. Despite these negative effects, some positive benefits from Prosopis include wood and charcoal so there is often conflict over plans to control or eradicate it.

"Biological invasions from the introduced species themselves, as well as from the production processes, are real risks to biodiversity and livelihoods," says Geoffrey Howard, IUCN Global Invasive Species Coordinator. "The risks can be reduced by following the guidelines we�ve set out."

IUCN developed these guidelines through an interactive process of consulting experts from regional government, plant protection organizations, research institutions, NGOs and the private sector. The guidelines were developed following two workshops hosted by IUCN in Nairobi, Kenya and an extensive consultation.

"The most important action is prevention," says the IUCN. Biofuel crops are not, by definition, invasive but they can be, depending on the area where they are cultivated and how the crop is grown. For instance, giant reed and elephant grasses both have a history of becoming invasive in many ecosystems, so particular care needs to be taken when assessing the risk of invasion when they are introduced into a new environment.

Jatropha curcas is known to have invasive tendencies in Western Australia, but that does not necessarily mean that it will be invasive in India where it is currently being produced for biofuels.

Researchers at the Florida Native Plant Society have rung alarm bells, warning that jatropha could become an invasive species in Florida, as kudzu and melaleuca have. Scientists at the University of Florida have rejected claims that jatropha is similar to these other southern plant invaders. Still, critics of jatropha note that a predictive tool developed in Australia that has 90 percent accuracy in determining whether a plant will become uncontrollable, predicts that outcome for jatropha in Florida.

Key recommendations in the IUCN report touch on four phases of keeping biofuel crops from becoming invasive species - planning, importation, and production plus the final phase of transportation and processing.

In the planning phase, all stakeholders - governments, developers and investors - should conduct a cost-benefit analysis and environmental assessment that includes the potential costs of an invasion. These plans should include a contingency fund as insurance for any future remedial actions and a commitment from the outset to be vigilant to the invasion possibility, and take measures to prevent spread outside the project area.

In the importation phase, a robust quarantine system must be in place. Governments should strengthen their capacity to monitor and enforce phytosanitary regulations and exclude any pests associated with the biofuel plants.

In the production phase, an Environmental Management Plan audited by a neutral third party should be in place. A contingency plan should be in place in the event of an escape of a plant species or pest organism that could cause an invasion. A contingency fund to pay for eradication, containment, management, or restoration should be in place.

In the transportation and processing phase, risks of invasion should be minimized by reducing the distances that viable feedstocks are transported, and, ideally, converting feedstocks to biofuels on-site. Governments and developers should ensure adequate monitoring of transport vehicles for the presence of seeds, plant feedstock remnants and pests. And all stakeholders should promote awareness among transporters about the risks of invasive species.

These guidelines were developed by IUCN in close cooperation with the Roundtable on Sustainable Biofuels, a multi-stakeholder initiative that has developed a Standard for sustainable biofuel production that addresses environmental, social and economic issues.

The RSB Standard, published in November 2009, includes a set of principles and criteria, compliance indicators, guidance documents and a certification system.

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Is Ethanol from Corn Bad for the Climate?

The Obama administration says no, California says yes. Who is right?
Douglas Fischer and The Daily Climate
Scientific American 12 Feb 10;

The Obama administration last week gave the green light to corn ethanol as a low-carbon renewable fuel – in apparent contradiction to California's declaration last summer that the biofuel's carbon footprint was too big to help the state mitigate greenhouse gas emissions.

Regulators and policy experts insist there's no conflict: Both rules match the science; it's simply a matter of what year you start counting emissions.

Indeed, timing is everything: California looked at current emissions associated with corn-based ethanol and concluded they were too steep.

The White House, looking to triple annual production to 36 billion gallons a year in 12 years, based its decision on projections for 2022. It assumed higher crop yields, production efficiencies and other breakthroughs would mitigate emissions.

"There's not a conflict," said Stanley Young, a spokesman for the California Air Resources Board, the agency carrying out California's first-in-the-nation global warming initiative. "We use different methodologies."

"Plus we also indicate that there are several pathways to produce corn ethanol that have carbon intensities that come under our standard," he added. "Not all ethanols are created equal."

But the decision generated a bit of head-scratching – and some skepticism – among experts who question whether the administration took advantage of the wiggle room afforded by casting projections into the future to come to a politically expedient conclusion.

"It seems a little far-fetched at first glance," said Nathanael Greene, Natural Resources Defense Council's director of renewable energy policy. "You can kind of talk yourself into it, but in any case they make a lot of assumptions on what yield will look like, what the markets will look like."

"The result is that things look a lot better in that year (2022) than in California's estimates."

To meet the nation's renewable standard, a fuel's "life-cycle" carbon emissions must be at least 20 percent below that of gasoline. Calculating those costs is tricky. Fuel crops tend to displace food crops, resulting in a pulse of emissions as displaced farmers clear forests and cultivate previously undisturbed land to meet food demand.

Those emissions can be considerable. A paper published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences found that Brazil risks incurring a 250-year carbon debt based on the deforestation expected by 2020 as it expands production of sugarcane ethanol and soybean biodiesel.

Researchers are skeptical of federal claims that ethanol's advances would be sufficient enough to counter emissions associated with food-crop displacement.

"It's not consistent with what I have read in the peer-reviewed literature," said David Tilman, a University of Minnesota professor of ecology who has studied biofuels' conflict with food crops.

"You can make very optimistic projections about what yields may be in the future, but if you look at past yield trends, yield improvements even during the Green Revolution have not been enough to meet the demands we have coming in the future."

Recent evidence out of Brazil buttresses that point. A team of researchers headed by David Lapola of the University of Kassel in Germany found that 90 percent of Brazil's sugarcane expansion in the last five years displaced cattle rangeland, forcing ranchers to push into the forest. Lapola's team concluded Brazil's plan to expand biofuel cropland over the next decade will push displaced rangeland into more than 47,000 square miles of forest and another 17,760 square miles of other native habitat.

That's a patch of land equal to New York and New Jersey combined.

"It seems like for the U.S. corn ethanol, there would be a lot of friction with food crops and (indirect land-use changes) not only inside the U.S. but abroad, too," Lapola said via email from Germany.

The Obama Administration insists it used the most recent, accurate science. Briefing reporters as the change was unveiled last week, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack noted the science of crop productivity "is constantly evolving."

EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson stood by her agency's scientists amid charges that the agency bowed to pressure from the farm lobby. "I don't agree that we changed the science to fit any outcome," she said. "I would not sign a rule if I didn't believe we had met the requirements of the law."

But in some ways the carbon savings from corn ethanol might be a secondary – or even moot – point.

Announcing the change, the administration highlighted biofuels' potential to create jobs and offer energy independence. President Obama, speaking to governors about the policy shift last week, mentioned climate change once: "Even if you don't believe in the severity of climate change, as I do, you still should want to pursue this agenda."

Plus the administration – and many in the ethanol industry – views corn ethanol as a bridge to less carbon-intensive biofuels. "We believe that's where the market is going," Vilsack said.

But the push to develop corn ethanol has a cost, and NRDC's Greene wonders if that's the wisest policy choice. "It's folly to do what we're doing today, which is mandating it, giving it multiple tax credits and still throwing other government subsidies at it," he said.

"We're bribing the market.... That's $5 billion a year that we could be using to help our farmers and help our industry get to the next generation of this stuff."

Lapola, looking at Brazil, notes some biofuels don't have the huge carbon footprint of sugarcane, soybean or corn. But so long as governments keep a sharp eye on land-use changes, he thinks biofuels make a good "workaround" for petroleum fuels.

"A workaround, but not a complete solution," he added. "The point is that from now on we need to evaluate more carefully our energy matrix to not incur in the same mistakes we made with petroleum."

This article originally appeared at The Daily Climate, the climate change news source published by Environmental Health Sciences, a nonprofit media company.

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