Can the world afford a middle class?

More countries are pulling themselves out of poverty, placing greater demand on food supplies and natural resources.
Moisés Naím, Los Angeles Times 8 Feb 08;

The middle class in poor countries is the fastest-growing segment of the world's population. While the total population of the planet will increase by about a billion people in the next 12 years, the ranks of the middle class will swell by as many as 1.8 billion -- 600 million just in China.

Homi Kharas, a researcher at the Brookings Institution, estimates that by 2020, the world's middle class will grow to include a staggering 52% of the total population, up from 30% now. The middle class will almost double in the poor countries where sustained economic growth is fast lifting people above the poverty line.

While this is, of course, good news, it also means humanity will have to adjust to unprecedented pressures.

The rise of a new global middle class is already having repercussions. In January, 10,000 people took to the streets in Jakarta to protest skyrocketing soybean prices. And Indonesians were not the only people angry about the rising cost of food.

In 2007, pasta prices sparked street protests in Milan. Mexicans marched against the price of tortillas. Senegalese protested about the price of rice, and Indians took up banners against the price of onions. Argentina, China, Egypt, Venezuela and Russia are among the nations that have imposed controls on food prices in an attempt to contain a public backlash.

These protesters are the most vociferous manifestations of a global trend: We are all paying more for bread, milk and chocolate, to name just a few items. The new consumers of the emerging global middle class are driving up global food prices. The food-price index compiled since 1845 by the Economist is now at its all-time high; it increased 30% in 2007 alone. Wheat and soybean prices rose by almost 80% and 90%, respectively. Many other grains reached record highs.

Prices are soaring not because there is less food (in 2007, the world produced more grains than ever before) but because some grains are now being used as fuel, and because more people can afford to eat more. The average consumption of meat in China, for example, has more than doubled since the mid-1980s.

The impact of a fast-growing middle class will be felt in the price of other resources. After all, members of the middle class are also buying more clothes, refrigerators, toys, medicines and eventually will buy more cars and homes. China and India, with nearly 40% of the world's population -- most of it still very poor -- already consume more than half of the global supply of coal, iron ore and steel. Thanks to their growing prosperity and that of other countries such as Brazil, Indonesia, Turkey and Vietnam, the demand for these products is booming.

Moreover, a middle-class lifestyle in these developing countries, even if more frugal than what is common in rich nations, is more energy-intensive. In 2006, China added as much electricity as France's total supply. Yet millions in China lack reliable access to electricity; in India, more than 400 million don't have power. The demand in India will grow fivefold in the next 25 years.

And we know what happened to oil prices. Oil reached its all-time high of $100 a barrel not because of supply constraints but because of unprecedented growth in consumption in poor countries. China alone accounts for one-third of the growth in the world's oil consumption in recent years.

The public debate about the consequences of this global consumption boom has focused on what it means for the environment. Yet its economic and political effects will be significant too. The lifestyle of the existing middle class will probably have to drastically change as the new middle class emerges. The consumption patterns that an American, French or Swedish family took for granted will inevitably become more expensive; driving your car anywhere at any time, for example, may become prohibitively so. That may not be all bad. The cost of polluting water or destroying the environment may be more accurately reflected.

But other dislocations will be more painful and difficult to predict. Changes in migration, urbanization and income distribution will be widespread. And expect growing demands for better housing, healthcare, education and, inevitably, political participation.

The debate about the Earth's "limits to growth" is as old as Thomas Malthus' alarm about a world in which the population outstrips its ability to feed itself. In the past, pessimists have been proved wrong. Higher prices and new technologies that boosted supplies, like the green revolution, always came to the rescue. That may happen again. But the adjustment to a middle class greater than what the world has ever known is just beginning.

As the Indonesian and Mexican protesters can attest, it won't be cheap. And it won't be quiet.

Moisés Naím is editor in chief of Foreign Policy magazine, where a longer version of this column will appear.

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Best of our wild blogs: 10 Feb 08

Little Heron, hooked
a tragic event on the bird ecology blog

Butterfly pals
a new blog about butterflies "An encomium to the lepidoptera of Singapore and the surrounding regions"

Guide training at Pulau Semakau
cool critters on the discovery blog and manta blog and tidechaser blog

When the tide recedes
a compilation of finds on recent shore trips on the colourful clouds blog

Kusu Island explorations
despite non-compliant tide, many marvellous creatures on the nature scouter blog and ramblings of a peculiar nature blog and wildfilms blog

Another look at Hantu
giant clams and curious blenny behaviour on the ramblings of a peculiar nature blog

The Northern Isle
a young explorer shares a day out at chek jawa and pulau ubin on the nautilus blog

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Singaporeans camping on the shores

Taking in the sun, sand and sea over Chinese New Year
Straits Times 10 Feb 08;

THIS Chinese New Year holiday has been a super long weekend - with several hundreds hitting Changi Beach and the East Coast Park to camp or just to swim, many since Thursday .

Mr Samsul Ahmat, was one of them. 'Camping is a great way to bring the family together,' the 39-year-old storekeeper said.

His extended family of 20 stayed overnight on Friday and went home yesterday.

For customer service officer Lim Boon Khin, 38, who lives in a Housing Board flat, it was a chance for her young daughter to have fun in open spaces. 'We want to give kids the freedom to roam and run around,' she said on yesterday .

Then there was sailor Mohamed Ali, 33, who has been camping there since Tuesday. From his sandy shaded spot by the beach, he said with a grin: 'There are many pretty girls hanging around here.'

By late yesterday, many campers were packing up to prepare for the Monday blues.

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CNY plants now food for butterflies

Chinese New Year plants which do not get sold become grub for the butterflies at Sentosa's Butterfly Park & Insect Kingdom
Tay Suan Chiang, Straits Times 10 Feb 08;

IT IS not just people who are enjoying the Chinese New Year feasting, butterflies also get to indulge during this festive season.

But while humans tuck into pineapple tarts, yusheng and bak kwa, the fluttering ones feed on the fruit and nectar of traditional Chinese New Year plants such as kumquats and four season limes.

According to two nurseries that LifeStyle spoke to, small quantities, about 20 pots of these potted plants from each nursery, left over from the Chinese New Year buying frenzy, are sold to the Butterfly Park & Insect Kingdom on Sentosa for use as butterfly feed.

A spokesman for the park, which has about 1,500 butterflies, says caterpillars feed on the leaves while the butterflies feed on the fruits and the nectar.

When contacted on Friday, nurseries say that more than 95 per cent of their stock of traditional Chinese New Year plants have already been sold, thanks to shoppers who believe that buying plants will ensure them a year of wealth and prosperity.

These include traditional favourites such as kumquats and limes, chrysanthemums, pussy willows and lucky bamboo.

'We have only very few pots of plants left. The good quality ones have already been bought over the last two weeks,' says Mr Lee Meng Kwan, 41, sales manager at World Farm nursery in Sembawang.

Over at Far East Flora nursery in Thomson Road, hot items such as chrysanthemums and pussy willows were sold out by last Tuesday, says Mr Peter Cheok, 28, its sales and marketing director.

Still, the company, like other nurseries around the island, went all out to sell the remaining stock of Chinese New Year plants, with many holding sales, particularly on the eve of the new year.

Depending on the nursery, late shoppers could get plants at a whopping 50 per cent less last Wednesday, but nurseries point out that these plants tend to be of a poorer quality, some even sporting dried leaves and flowers.

The deal gets even better today, as some nurseries sell off remaining stocks at bigger discounts, sometimes up to 70 per cent off.

For example, Far East Flora was selling its lime plants in small pots from $18 per pot before Chinese New Year. This fell to $9 a pot on the eve, and since Thursday, each was selling at $5.40.

At Ang Mo Kio Floral & Landscape nursery, items were on offer at 20 per cent less since Tuesday, with kumquats going from $15 for a small pot.

Its managing director, Mr Chen Yeow Chong, 52, says when the nursery reopens on Tuesday for business, there will still be discounts given. 'There's no fixed discount, but rather the price is open to negotiation,' he says.

Mr Ben Tan, 43, a director at Prince's Flowers, says there is usually very little leftover stock after Chinese New Year.

'We order based on the amount sold the previous year, so most items usually get sold out,' he says.

However, he does admit that these plants are still available throughout the 15 days of the Chinese New Year, as there will be some home owners or companies that still need to buy them for decorating.

The good news is that nurseries keep wastage to a minimum. Some nurseries such as Ang Mo Kio Floral throw old stock away - its managing director, Mr Chen, says this is because it is not fair to sell poor quality plants.

Others try and keep the plants going for longer. Lifestyle store Ikea is keeping Chinese New Year plants such as chrysanthemums on its shelves. According to a spokesman, customers continue to buy them even after the celebrations.

It helps that some of these plants have a longer shelf life.

For example, the zamioculca (also known as the gold tree in Mandarin) is available throughout the year. And those not picked up by Chinese New Year shoppers will be repotted and offered for sale. This also applies to the lucky bamboo, especially those created as table top accessories, as well as limes which can be pruned and repotted to be sold.

One person who is looking to capitalise on the leftover stock is housewife Jin Lim, 35. Even though she bought plants before the Chinese New Year festivities, she is looking forward to visiting the nurseries from tomorrow.

'I want to buy a zamioculca which will last me throughout the year. With lower prices now, I'm getting a good bargain,' she says.

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Northern Mariana Islands ban on scuba-spear fishing helps wrasse population growth

Rianne Pangelinan-Brown, Saipan Tribune 10 Feb 08;

The CNMI is the only jurisdiction in the Pacific to ban scuba-spear fishing, which is seen as a primary factor why the islands still teem with Napoleon wrasses, a type of fish that is being fast depleted in other parts of the world.

According to the Division of Fish & Wildlife, scuba spear fishing is a type of fishing that is potentially the cause of the rapid decline of Napoleon wrasses in other areas.

“The use of scuba-spear has probably been the single most important cause of the decline of the Napoleon wrasse worldwide,” said DFW fisheries research section supervisor Michael Trianni.

The CNMI has outlawed the use of scuba-spear in 2002 and has also placed restrictions on the use of monofilament gill, surround, and drag nets.

These actions, Trianni said, have provided protection to juvenile wrasse that utilize lagoon and reef flats to grow.

It's been noted that the Napoleon wrasse is a target of live fishery in the Pacific.

Its numbers are declining in other areas of the Pacific such as Indonesia, the Philippines and other locales where effective legislation or enforcement are not enacted.

Trianni explained that with scuba-spears, divers would fish at night when the wrasse are resting in their caves or under or in between large reef structures, making it very easy to kill them.

“The divers can then bring the fish back to the boat, offload it, and go back down to continue fishing. Catching a wrasse while free diving is much more difficult since it requires a person to hold their breath and descend to deeper waters to spear them. It is a physically challenging method, and very few people possess the attributes to be successful,” Trianni said.

He said that the number of wrasses that can be killed by scuba-spear is much higher than what can be harvested by a free-diver.

DFW's Felix Sasamoto Jr. recently caught two Napoleon wrasses while spearfishing at Obyan Beach.

According to Trianni, the fact that Sasamoto was able to catch the fish in 43 feet of water is “rather encouraging.”

“Perhaps the management measures that are in place are paying some dividends,” Trianni said.

He added that the intent behind the ban on scuba spear fishing was to provide fish with a refuge by depth, “recognizing that there are not a lot of free-divers with the capabilities of someone like Felix.”

“This action, in time, would slowly replenish the diveable fishing depths,” Trianni said.

The DFW has created a marine protected depth zone throughout the CNMI for fish that are not primarily harvested by hook and line, “such as the wrasse.”

In Hong Kong, a Napoleon wrasse can fetch up to about $9 a pound, otherwise $400 for a set of its lips.

It is reported that the high prices are not a result of any superb flavor or texture. Instead, eating the fish is seen as a status symbol-a representation of wealth.

The Napoleon wrasse is red-listed by the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources.

The IUCNNR are stated that the ongoing threats have caused the fish to be considered endangered and that they are not being replaced fast enough to compensate for the excess fishing rate and other threats.

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Tenth of China's forests damaged by blizzards

Reuters 9 Feb 08;

BEIJING (Reuters) - About one-tenth of China's forests were damaged by recent winter storms, the worst in at least five decades, and in the hardest-hit regions nearly 90 percent of forests were ruined, Xinhua news agency said on Saturday.

The State Forestry Administration (SFA) said total losses reached 17.3 million hectares of forest in 18 provinces in southern China, said Xinhua.

The agency did not give any value of the losses, but in an earlier report the administration said by the end of January the storms had caused about $2.5 billion of damage to China's forests.

Blizzards across central, southern and eastern China -- areas not prepared for severe winter weather -- cut power to 169 counties, killed scores of people and caused unprecedented havoc for tens of millions of people traveling ahead of the Lunar holidays.

(Reporting by Kirby Chien; Editing by Alex Richardson)

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Floods kill six in Indonesia

Channel NewsAsia 9 Feb 08;

JAKARTA : Six people were killed, dozens injured and hundreds forced to flee their homes after floods in Indonesia following days of heavy rain, officials said Saturday.

Water as high as one metre (three feet) had submerged Situbondo district in Indonesia's densely populated East Java since Friday evening, but started to recede Saturday, the health ministry said.

"Two people were killed, one hospitalised and 27 others injured in Situbondo floods," Rustam Pakaya, a health ministry official, said in a text message received by AFP.

Separately, four people died and hundreds forced to evacuate their homes due to severe floods in eastern Indonesia, Sentianus Medi of the local disaster management centre said earlier in the day.

He said all four victims drowned after rivers overflowed following three days of heavy rain.

"Four people in three districts in East Nusa Tenggara province were killed yesterday (Friday)," he told reporters. "They all lived on riverbanks."

The official said more than 500 people had left their homes and 1,000 hectares (2,500 acres) of rice fields were under water.

Landslides and flooding are common in Indonesia during the rainy season, which hits its peak from December to February.

Torrential rain across Central and East Java provinces at the start of the year triggered landslides and floods that killed more than 100 people and displaced tens of thousands.

- AFP /ls

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Best of our wild blogs: 9 Feb 08

Hantu's Splendours
on the wonderful creations blog and wildfilms blog and discovery blog (with the legend of Hantu) and manta blog and urban forest blog and nature scouters blog and tidechaser blog

“Prevalence of microplastics in Singapore’s coastal marine environment” from News from the International Coastal Cleanup Singapore blog

The Brown Boobook
more about this amazing owl on the bird ecology blog

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'Ocean thermostat can save coral'

BBC News 8 Feb 08;

Some coral reefs could be protected from the impacts of climate change by an "ocean thermostat", a study says.



Researchers suggest that natural processes appear to be regulating sea surface temperatures in a region of the western Pacific Ocean.

Reefs in the area had only suffered relatively few episodes of bleaching because the naturally warm waters had remained stable, they observed.

The findings appear in the Geophysical Research Letters online journal.

The study, carried out by scientists from the US National Center for Atmospheric Research (Ncar) and the Australian Institute of Marine Science (Aims), appears to support a theory that natural processes prevent ocean sea surface temperatures exceeding 31C (88F).



A limit on the amount that water can warm, the team argues, will help protect reefs that have evolved in warm waters.

Whereas reefs found in cooler waters will experience a larger degree of warming.

"Global warming is damaging many corals," lead author Joan Kleypas explains, "but it appears to be bypassing certain reefs that support some of the greatest diversity of life on the planet.

"In essence, reefs that are already in hot water may be more protected from warming than reefs that are not; this is rare hopeful news for these important ecosystems."

Feeling the heat

Although reefs are exposed to a number of threats, such as overfishing, pollution and acidification, climate change is of particular concern to marine ecologists.

Unusually warm temperatures can cause "bleaching", which is when coral turns white after expelling colourful microscopic organisms that provides the community with its nutrients.

If the water temperature does not return to normal within a few days or weeks, the bleached coral collapses and dies.

The researchers say that a region, called the Western Pacific Warm Pool, to the north-east of Australia has only experience four episodes of bleaching between 1980 and 2005.

Sea surface temperatures in the area average 29C (84F), which is near the limit of the so-called thermostat.

It is suggested that as surface waters warm, more water evapourates, and this can lead to an increase in cooling cloud cover and winds.

"This year is the International Year of the Reef, and we need to go beyond the dire predictions for coral reefs and find ways to conserve them," says Dr Kleypas.

But her Ncar colleague, Gokham Danabasoglu, warns that projections do not paint an optimistic picture.

"Computer models of Earth's climate show that sea surface temperatures will rise substantially this century," he says.

"Unfortunately, these future simulations show the Western Pacific Warm Pool warming at a similar rate as the surrounding areas, instead of being constrained by a thermostat.

"We don't know if the models are simply not capturing the processes that cause the thermostat, or if global warming is happening so rapidly that it will overwhelm the thermostat."

Ocean "Thermostat" May Be Secret Weapon Against Warming
Brian Handwerk
for National Geographic News 8 Feb 08;

A natural but mysterious "ocean thermostat" may be limiting seawater warming in at least one Pacific Ocean locale.

The phenomenon may help protect some of the world's largest and most ecologically diverse coral reefs from the effects of climate change, a new study says.

"There appear to be natural negative feedbacks that keep water temperatures in check—at least in this part of the planet," said study co-author Joan Kleypas from the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado.

Kleypas and colleagues focused on the Western Pacific Warm Pool, a region in the open ocean northeast of Australia.

Water temperatures at the pool, which on average has been about the size of Australia, have risen little in recent decades, even as the rest of Earth's oceans have heated up.

"In the 20th century, warming has been less in that region, and coral bleaching has been less in that region," Kleypas said.

Coral bleaching occurs when warming waters cause corals to expel the colorful algae that sustain them. The corals turn a ghostly white and die in a few days unless temperatures cool down and the algae return.

"The model shows that there is a reason that the water is warming less—it's not just a fluke," Kleypas continued.

"The models and observations are showing the same thing, [which] points to some sort of mechanism or feedback process that is keeping temperatures in check."

Mysterious Process

Scientists have proposed several ways that the world's oceans might be able to regulate sea-surface temperatures.

One theory suggests that warming waters cause more evaporation, which in turn creates cooling cloud cover and prevalent winds.

Warmer waters could also alter the flow of ocean currents and initiate an influx of cooler water in certain areas.

The controversial thermostat theory holds that an undefined process will naturally prevent sea-surface temperatures from rising above 88 degrees Fahrenheit (31 degrees Celsius) in the open oceans.

This is good news for corals in warm waters, such as those that live in the Western Pacific Warm Pool, where the average temperature is about 85 degrees Fahrenheit (29 degrees Celsius).

That's because stable water temperatures—rather than any specific temperature—are what reefs need to survive, said coral expert Nancy Knowlton of the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Natural History.

"In general, if the temperature gets above a degree Centigrade [two degrees Fahrenheit] over the normal seasonal maximum, coral reefs are often in trouble," she said.

(Knowlton, who was unaffiliated with the new study, is a National Geographic Committee for Research and Exploration grantee. National Geographic News is owned by the National Geographic Society.)

Warm-water corals will experience less drastic changes than their cold-water counterparts if an ocean thermostat is in effect.

(Related news: "Corals May Have Defense Against Global Warming" [October 4, 2007].)

The new research, which will appear tomorrow in the online edition of the journal Geophysical Research Letters, lends support to the thermostat theory.

The team's analysis of historical data combined with computer simulations show that the pool has warmed up only half as much as colder ocean regions.

With little idea of how the effect operates, it is unknown if such a thermostat is unique to the Western Pacific Warm Pool.

Such a process may be more widespread and either remain undetected or be overwhelmed by a larger and more complex mix of other climate drivers in waters nearer continental landmasses.

The effect's apparent beneficial impact is likely to draw much more attention to the Western Pacific Warm Pool and its reefs.

"It means that these kinds of places might be high-priority places to protect," the Smithsonian's Knowlton said.

Ancient Regulator

Study author Kleypas and colleagues also say that the pool's thermostat process may have been at work for a long time.

Evidence from the paleontological record suggests that the pool's water temperatures were not much warmer in the past—even during the Cretaceous period, which had higher-than-present levels of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide (CO2).

But those ancient climates were more stable, and the team's computer models suggest that the projected rates of carbon entering the atmosphere—and subsequent warming—could overwhelm the regulating effect.

"The bad news is that we did look at some existing runs where [our modeled increase in atmospheric CO2] was pretty strong, and we did not see an effective thermostat," Kleypas said.

While the research raises more questions than it answers, Kleypas said, it provides a hopeful path to pursue.

"It's about solutions to deal with global warming," she said.

"It gives us some hope that these feedbacks exist, and we should be paying attention."

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Killer jellyfish population explosion warning

Paul Eccleston, The Telegraph 8 Feb 08;

It could easily have been the role model for the terrifying creature in the film 'Alien'.

A perfect toxin-loaded killing machine, there is no creature on earth that can dispatch a human being so easily or so quickly.

The box jellyfish is so packed with venom that the briefest of touches can bring agonising death within 180 seconds.

And if comes under sustained attack it responds by sending its compatriots into a super-breeding frenzy in which millions of replacements are created.

The really bad news is that the box jellyfish and another equally poisonous species, Irukandji, are on the move. Scientists are warning that their populations are exploding and will pose a monumental problem unless they are stopped.

The warning comes in a film Invasion of the Jellyfish to be screened by Channel 5 on Tues February 12.

It focuses on the change in behaviour patterns of jellyfish in the Pacific Ocean off Japan and Australia due to depleted food resources as humans fish the world seas.

But a similar incident happened much closer to home in November 27 off the Northern Ireland coast when a 10 mile wide, 13 metre deep swarm of jellyfish swam attacked the country's only salmon farm, wiping out over £1million worth of stock.

Billions of small jellyfish, known as Mauve Stingers, flooded into the cages about a mile into the Irish Sea, off Glenarm Bay and Cushendun.

On the other side of the world scientists who managed to place tracking devices on the jellyfish in the Pacific proved that they were not drifting on the ocean currents but heading determinedly - and at the speed of an Olympic swimmer - towards the coast.

In the film perplexed Japanese salmon fishermen are seen hauling in tonnes of box jellyfish in their nets. The few fish they do haul in are writhing in their death agonies after being stung.

An attempt by the Japanese government to protect their fish stocks by wiping out the swarms using a fleet of commandeered fishing boats to drag razor-sharp wire through them backfired spectacularly.

Scientists discovered captured big female box jellyfish were swollen with millions of eggs - far more than they would normally carry. Similarly males were carrying billions of sperm. Trying to kill them had unleashed a breeding explosion because they are genetically programmed to ensure their survival by producing more offspring than normal when under attack.

The jellyfish have a formidable array of genetic equipment to help them survive:
# Four brains that operate competitively in the search for food.

# A highly complex sensory capacity and the ability to distinguish colour.

# The ability to live in inhospitable waters at a depth of up to 10,900 metres.

# A total of 24 eyes with moveable pupils giving them 360-degree visibility.

# Box jellyfish have 6-8ft long tentacles. Just 5-6ft across the body is enough to kill a human in 180 seconds.

# Venom is released on contact - even after it is dead - and each creature has 4000,000,000 venomous fibres.

# Humans who have been stung and survived have needed 30-40 milligrams of morphine. A broken leg requires between 5-10 milligrams.

# Despite decades of study scientists have been unable to unravel the mysteries of its complex venom but it is known to contain 20 different proteins.

The swarms of jellyfish are multiplying in the Western extent of the Pacific ocean and threatening 20,000 miles of coastline off Japan, Irian Jaya, Papua New Guinea and Australia.

In the film scientists conclude that they swim towards land because it is easier to kill their main prey - fish - in shallow water off the coast which puts them on a dangerous and potentially fatal collision course with unwary swimmers.

In an experiment off the north Australia coast small netted pools were created and kept the large box jellyfish out but people were still being stung. They eventually discovered the tiny transparent Irukandji - almost invisible in daylight - was slipping through the holes in the nets.

The only deterrent so far found is a colour - red. The jellyfish simply ploughed through white-coloured poles in the water and swam round black poles but they stayed as far away as they could from red poles.

Read more!

Ahmed Djoghlaf: Wrong planning kills biodiversity

Straits Times 9 Feb 08;

With the world in the grip of urbanisation, United Nations biodiversity chief Ahmed Djoghlaf, who visited Singapore last month, tells ARTI MULCHAND that the threat to biodiversity is tremendous. This makes the need to embrace the notion of sustainable development more urgent

There seems to be a heightened sense of urgency in the conservation movement now. Why?

The world is becoming more urbanised, and a third of humanity will live in cities in the coming years.

This growth of urbanisation is taking place in developing countries like China, India, Brazil and Africa, and that is where we have biodiversity that needs to be protected.

If development there is done wrongly, the expansion of cities will contribute dramatically to the loss of biodiversity.

How much of the world's biodiversity is under threat, and what will the impact be?

We have so far recorded two million species but, according to experts, we could have 10 or 100 million species...which we are already losing at a tremendous rate.

Eighty-five per cent of all the biodiversity is in the tropical forests and, every year, 13 million hectares of tropical forests are disappearing.

According to some experts, in one square metre of tropical forest, you can find up to 500 species, and that does not even count micro-organisms.

So we don't know how much we are losing, and how that will affect the global web of life, because there is a domino effect. It is all interconnected.

We have a moral responsibility and an inter-generational responsibility, to give our children a planet that is as healthy as the one we inherited from our ancestors.

Unfortunately, the current generation has done a fantastic job of destroying nature.

The Asean Centre for Biodiversity recently signed an MOU with the Convention on Biological Diversity. What is its significance?

Biodiversity knows no boundaries. Malaysia is right next door and the birds will go where they want. They do not need passports to cross the border.

Similarly, plants and other animals move as well. So you need some regional collaboration to approach conservation.

The MOU means that the centre can act as an implementation arm at the regional level for decisions taken at the international level.

As we go forward, what would your advice to Singapore be in terms of its conservation efforts?

I am extremely impressed by Singapore and never imagined that you would have such greenness and nature in the heart of one of the most populated cities in the world.

Singapore is already going in the right direction. But my plea is that the experience that you have accumulated...you share with the world and your neighbours.

What has happened in Singapore mirrors what will happen in other Asean countries as they grow and become more urban.

You have made some mistakes and you have repaired them, so you have a moral responsibility to help your neighbours avoid the same mistakes.

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Singapore faces hard choices over cost of going green

Clarissa Oon, Straits Times 9 Feb 08;

IN NEW Delhi, the city's entire fleet of 10,000 buses runs on compressed natural gas (CNG), which is less polluting than diesel or petrol.

The sight impressed MP Charles Chong, who was visiting the Indian capital to find out how other cities juggle economic growth with protecting the environment.

'I thought, if India can do it, why can't we?' said Mr Chong, who chairs the Government Parliamentary Committee for National Development and the Environment.

The problem here, he found, is the cost of setting up a network of CNG refuelling stations.

Ten refuelling stations would cost around $40 million.

Singapore has only one, on Jurong Island, supporting more than 300 buses and taxis that have switched to CNG. Three more are due to open this year.

Hence the dilemma: save money or save the environment?

As countries across the globe relook their economic policies against the backdrop of climate change and shrinking natural resources, Singapore is no exception.

Last month, it set up an inter-ministerial committee on sustainable development that will find ways to keep the economy growing in an environmentally-sound way.

The move could result in pro-environment changes cutting across sectors such as housing, transport and trade and industry.

Mr Chong and other pro-environment MPs and environmentalists argue that the costs of green technology and infrastructure will translate to long-term gains in clean energy and air.

Insight explores the 'sustainable development' debate and the hard choices ahead for Singapore.

Going green - and staying that way
Clarissa Oon, Straits Times 9 Feb 08;
A new inter-ministerial committee on sustainable development is set to rethink Singapore's wasteful, fossil-fuel-reliant culture across sectors such as housing, transport and industry. CLARISSA OON examines the task ahead.

IN DENMARK, drinking to the health of Mother Earth is, literally, a way of life.

Customers do not trash beer and soft-drink bottles but voluntarily return them to retailers to be cleaned and reused.

In return, Danes are refunded the deposit they must pay for each bottle, an amount ranging from 30 to 85 Singapore cents, depending on the bottle size.

If that is not mind-boggling in Singapore's use-and-throw consumer culture, what more the way energy-saving Danes blithely hop on public transport and even ride bicycles to get around in their cities.

Private cars are heavily taxed and taxis are expensive. Cabbies save fuel by not cruising around - they wait atdesignated taxi stands or await calls from passengers.

Environmentalists consider Denmark - along with other green-conscious Scandinavian countries - one of the success stories of sustainable development for the way it has increased its gross domestic product by 70 per cent over the last 25 years without increasing its energy consumption.

Now Singapore too wants a piece of 'sustainable development' - a concept economists and environmentalists have been debating for years.

In recent years, the debate has acquired greater urgency against the backdrop of an unprecedented onslaught on the world's shrinking natural resources by fuel-guzzling cars, polluting factories and mountains of waste.

On the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, last month, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong announced the setting up of a new inter-ministerial committee on sustainable development.

National Development Minister Mah Bow Tan and Environment and Water Resources Minister Yaacob Ibrahim will co-chair the committee, which will also include Minister for Finance Tharman Shanmugaratnam, Minister for Transport Raymond Lim, and Minister of State for Trade and Industry S. Iswaran.

Sustainable development essentially means keeping the economy humming in an environmentally sound way. The question is how, and that is the difficult part.

Members of Parliament and environmentalists interviewed say the committee will have to make hard, long-term choices to get the mix right.

In particular, it needs to cut waste, push more Singaporeans to recycle, and bring down energy consumption in Singapore's over-air-conditioned buildings and transport systems.

Not just business as usual

SUSTAINABLE development is not simply about playing catch-up with other countries but 'starting and sustaining the effort in a manner that makes sense for us', says MP Jessica Tan (East Coast GRC).

The committee's work will affect how towns and transport are planned and designed, using 'cleaner sources of energy and more environmentally friendly products', adds Ms Tan.

'It could also change our way of life in terms of consumption habits and recycling.'

However, some environment observers think the committee should go further and prescribe out-of-the-box solutions to reduce Singapore's dependence in the long run on imported fossil fuels, like oil.

Apart from the problem of soaring fuel prices, the burning of oil, coal and natural gas releases harmful greenhouse gas emissions. These have been blamed for an overheating planet, rising sea levels and climate change.

Clean and renewable energy, such as solar or wind energy, is now several times more expensive than conventional power, but environmentalists argue that the costs are decreasing as global demand rises and technology improves.

Sustainable development does not mean thinking in the 'same old business-as-usual model', says Nature Society president and former Nominated MP Geh Min.

'I wouldn't like a scenario where the committee says, okay, the economy comes first, so we can't make any drastic changes, we still look at Formula One, tourism, industries, petrochemicals, more of the same.'

For sustainable development to fly, policymakers and ordinary Singaporeans have to develop an environmental consciousness, 'the way cost-effectiveness or social responsibility is built into our thinking', says Dr Geh.

Too small to matter?

ASIDE from the sheer cost of green technologies, another argument in favour of doing nothing is that Singapore is simply too small a country to have any impact on climate change, despite being vulnerable to its effects.

Last November, the Ministry of Trade and Industry released a National Energy Policy Report that made improving energy efficiency and reducing carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas emissions a priority.

The report said climate change could result in increased flooding and the spread of diseases in Singapore, as well as a loss of coastal land and water resources.

However, it added pointedly that as a small country, Singapore's 'domestic energy demand is small, and we account for only about 0.15 per cent of the world's carbon dioxide emissions'.

'If the Singapore economy were to shut down completely for one whole year, the CO2 savings would be offset by incremental emissions elsewhere in less than two weeks, based on the current rate of global emissions growth.'

In response, environment observers say Singapore should still do its part as a responsible player in the global economy.

Going green makes good business sense when more consumers go green, they argue.

In addition, Singapore can offer solutions to other cities.

Turning Singapore into a model environmental city gives it a competitive edge at a time when a growing number of economies are looking for ways to minimise the fallout on the environment, said Nominated MP and waste recycling company boss Edwin Khew Teck Fook.

'Right now we are helping (the northern Chinese port city of) Tianjin to develop an 'eco-city'.

'But, looking at ourselves, are we a perfect model to be able to teach others?' he asked.

Spotty track record

WHILE it has done well in water recycling and introducing many 'green lungs' in the form of parks and trees, Singapore is still far from the eco-city it can be.

For one, its buildings and vehicles are spewing emissions at a rate that is among the highest in the world, according to a World Bank Environment Department report last October.

The report ranked 70 countries, according to percentage increase, for their emissions from 1994 to 2004. Singapore was 10th.

Its carbon dioxide emissions jumped 60 per cent over the period, just 8 percentage points lower than high-profile polluter China and higher than India (53 per cent) and Indonesia (48 per cent).

Over the same period, Singapore's population also surged from 3.4 million to 4.2 million.

Littering offences have gone up about three times since 2006.

Just over half of all waste is recycled, according to National Environmental Agency figures.

This lags far behind Scandinavian countries where the recycling rate is 70 to 80 per cent or higher, says MP Charles Chong (Pasir Ris-Punggol GRC), who chairs the Government Parliamentary Committee for National Development and Environment.

While recognising the need to clean up its own backyard, Singapore is also stepping up cooperation with the region.

On April 12, 2006, it ratified the Kyoto Protocol, an international treaty binding members to cut their emissions by specified rates within a specified time frame.

Last November, it pushed successfully for an Asean declaration in which member countries work together on climate change.

MP Penny Low (Pasir Ris-Punggol GRC) believes that finding the right sustainable development solutions requires careful cross-cultural studies.

'We should scan the world for innovation and take it further here,' she says.

Yet there is no one perfect country when it comes to sustainable development, says Dr Geh.

'Japan, for example, is very clean, but look at the Japanese whaling and over-fishing practices, and the way they have depleted forests in South-east Asia.

'They're not so conservation-minded outside their national borders,' she quips.

In a way, she says, the old environmentalists' adage of 'think global but act local' no longer holds.

'You also have to act to influence global action. I think the PM realises this, that's why he's making environmental pronouncements at Davos.

'But we have to set our own house in order first.'

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