Green Eats, Snipers for Penguins, Climate and the Economy, and Biking to Brothels

A German brothel is going green in a bid to attract more business in tough economic times.

Following the news that Wal-Mart planned to launch a "Global Product Sustainability Index," blogger Jeff McIntire-Strasburg and others joined in a conference call with senior vice president of sustainability Matt Kistler to get some more details...

One of the issues brought up was:

"The goal of transparency will certainly run up against intellectual property concerns."

This is a bold and important initiative and the fact that it's got Wal-Mart behind it makes it much more likely to succeed, but for it to be worth anything transparency is vital!

Professional snipers have been brought in to guard a vulnerable colony of penguins in Australia.

The deployment follows the mysterious deaths of nine of the flightless birds over the last two weeks.

The mutilated bodies of the animals, known as fairy penguins, were found in a national park near Sydney harbor. To even up the fight, two snipers have been deployed as bodyguards

New research suggests that higher temperatures can have a damaging effect on the economies of poor countries. The study, by economists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, found that in years with higher temperatures, poor countries experienced significantly slower economic growth.

Nobody said it was easy; they just said it'd be worth it.

The news that international leaders in Italy were not able to commit to strong, binding climate change agreements probably doesn't surprise anybody. "It is no small task for 17 leaders to bridge their differences on an issue like climate change," President Obama said. But tackling an issue of this urgency, complexity and enormity may have an upside.

Sandor Ellix Katz is a fermentation revivalist, activist, and author, who travels widely teaching and sharing fermentation skills. His passion for fermentation developed out of his overlapping interests in healthy food, nutrition, and gardening.

Eating can be one dangerous business. Max and Jason interview Robert Kenner the director of the new documentary FOOD, INC. and discover why some think it's one of the scariest movies of the year.

New green centric groups to keep an eye on:

Animal Rights Group
http://current.com/items/90439271_animal-rights-group.htm

Hemp Group
http://current.com/items/90442133_join-the-new-h-e-m-p-group-on-current.htm

The Green Business
http://current.com/groups/green-business/

Sustainable Agriculture:
http://current.com/groups/sustainable-agriculture/

Science
http://current.com/groups/science/

Green Scene Films
http://current.com/groups/green-scene-films/