tagged w/ Environment
-
Thousands of crustaceans were found dead off the coast of Lima following the mystery mass death of dolphins and pelicans, the Peruvian Navy said Friday.
The cause of death is under investigation, said Industry and Fishing Minister Gladys Triveno, warning that "it would be premature to give a reason for this phenomenon."
The Navy said it presented a report on the find to the Agency of Environmental Evaluation and Control to determine the cause.
Biologist Yuri Hooker of Cayetano Heredia University said the species found on Pucusana Beach, 60 kilometers (37 miles) south of Lima, was a type of red krill about three centimeters (1.2 inches) long.
"They live mostly along the coast of Chile up to the coast of northern Peru. What is happening is that these crustaceans are being affected by the warming of Pacific waters in the north of the country," he said, adding that the phenomenon occurs "with some frequency."
Hooker explained that the warmer temperatures led the shrimp-like creatures that usually live far away from the coast to move in closer to land, where they died.
Nearly 900 dolphins washed up along Peru's northern coast between February and April. A government study said the marine mammals died of natural causes, while environmental groups insist the massive toll was linked to offshore oil exploration in the area.
Peruvian officials have suggested that the dolphins, along with 5,000 dead sea birds -- mostly pelicans -- died due to the effects of rising temperatures in Pacific waters, including the southern migration of fish eaten by the birds.
More at the linkThousands of crustaceans were found dead off the coast of Lima following the mystery... more
-
-
It's no secret that corporate conglomerates basically run consumer goods, swallowing up smaller businesses like voracious monsters in order to maximize their bottom lines. The top ten, which control everything from food to make-up to soap: Kraft, Nestle, P&G, Coca-Cola, PepsiCo, General Foods, Kellogg's, Mars, UniLever, and Johnson and Johnson. And their vast reach might feel pretty unfathomable, like some kind of shadow government, but for an illustration that shows exactly how far their tentacles reach, via Occupy Together. It's pretty astonishing how inevitable it seems that consumers feed into these companies whether they know it or not, particularly because the mega-corporations enable lower price points on junk foods and crap with no nutritional value. It's a good case for going local and small-business, if you can afford it.
More at the linkIt's no secret that corporate conglomerates basically run consumer goods,... more
-
-
An inaugural interactive workshop discussing historic and future sea level trends and their implications for Virginia’s Eastern Shore is planned for June.
“We’ve got the highest rate of sea level rise on the East Coast,” said Skip Stiles, executive director, Wetlands Watch, who will be making a presentation on the historic, current and future sea level changes and potential impact on the Eastern Shore.
Stiles said some of the evidence of sea level rise visible to people who spend time around the water include seeing wetlands disappear, ditches going tidal, backyard vegetation changes, and “ghost forests” — full grown trees that are dead along the shore because the water is “moving in underneath them.”
The Coastal Flooding Workshop will take place on June 13 from 6 - 8:30 p.m. at Shore Bank Headquarters, 25020 Shore Parkway in Onley.
The Eastern Shore Climate Adaptation Working Group consisting of representatives of local government staff, state and federal agencies, and private groups involved in coastal management is hosting the workshop as part of its efforts to assist the Eastern Shore in preparing for a changing climate, which includes sea level rise.
Curt Smith, director of planning, Accomack-Northampton Planning District Commission, said the group’s activities also include involvement in acquiring the new high-resolution LiDAR elevation data; developing “a rollout campaign” to educate the public and elected officials about the LiDAR data and how it benefits the Shore; and “partnering with the NOAA Coastal Services Center who is using the LiDAR data to produce a series of models that will accurately simulate flooding and impacts to the built and natural environment on the Shore.”
“I think that is going to be very helpful for their planning,” said Smith, about information from the June 13 workshop, saying he hopes to present information to the Accomack and Northampton County Boards of Supervisors and towns about the presentations and the responses they receive from the residents who will be able to actively participate through written surveys and electronic polls in the workshop about what they may be experiencing concerning sea level changes.
More at the linkAn inaugural interactive workshop discussing historic and future sea level trends and... more
-
-
Russia is still the world's largest producer of oil and gas, but growth has stalled and to get to new supplies requires going to a very difficult place — the Arctic.
"If you want to be in this business in 2020, 2025, you must think about the Arctic," says Konstantin Simonov, head of the National Energy Security Fund in Moscow.
In the past month, Moscow has signed several deals with foreign oil companies designed to maintain Russia's position as the top producer. The most important deal, and the most lucrative, is a partnership between Exxon Mobil and Russian oil giant Rosneft.
Exxon Mobil could eventually spend half a trillion dollars to look for and extract oil and gas in the Russian Arctic. The investment is enormous, but so are the potential rewards.
Getting To The Arctic's Reserves
"The reserves in the Russian Arctic are vast," says Roland Nash, chief investment strategist for Verno Investment in Moscow. "Nobody quite knows how vast, but the numbers are enormous."
Some estimates put the oil and gas reserves in Russia's Arctic waters at 100 billion tons. According to Simonov, the deal with Exxon Mobil is a sign that Russia knows it needs international investment and technology to get to those reserves.
"Without foreign partners, for us it will be impossible to develop this area," Simonov says. "It's out of [the] question."
The deal was signed on April 18 with Russian President Vladimir Putin looking on. It gives Exxon Mobil access to oil fields in the Black Sea and provides Russia some access to Exxon Mobil's oil deposits in Texas, Canada and the Gulf of Mexico.
At the signing, Putin said Exxon Mobil also had the option to work in Russia's north and south, as well as in other regions. Meanwhile, the Russians will soon start work with Exxon Mobil in the U.S. and Canada.
Changing Russia's Reputation
Russia Pushes To Claim Arctic As Its Own
Russia has launched a drive to own vast parts of the Arctic, including its oil and gas deposits.
Shell Pushes Forward To Drill Well In Arctic
The company says it's ready to clean a spill, but environmentalists say it's not worth the risk.
In addition to the Exxon Mobil deal, Russia's Rosneft recently signed smaller deals with Italian oil company Eni to go after oil in North Africa, and with Norway's Statoil elsewhere in the Arctic.
But it hasn't been easy for foreign oil companies to do business in Russia. BP had a similar deal with Rosneft that fell apart last year. According to Roland Nash, everyone knows about Russia's troubled past with international oil companies.
"Signing the deal is Step 1," Nash says. "Implementing the deal is a bigger step in some ways."
So Russia has changed the game in favor of the oil giants. The government has eased the tax burden on Exxon Mobil and others looking for oil in the Arctic, making it a more attractive proposition.
And, according to Simonov, letting Rosneft in on energy deposits elsewhere in the world turns the Russian oil giant into an international player, helping it spread its risks. There are also potential political benefits.
"It's like, you know, the logic of capitalism," Simonov says. "If you are the shareholder of serious assets in Europe and the United States, maybe there will be more reason to have political dialogue also."
More at the link
http://media.npr.org/assets/img/2012/05/24/russia4_wide.jpg?t=1337896132&s=4Russia is still the world's largest producer of oil and gas, but growth has... more
-
-
Today President Barack Obama will return to Iowa for an official “grassroots event” at the Iowa State Fair in an effort to fire up his base in the state where he unexpectedly won the first in the nation caucus in 2008, launching him on the road to the White House. Right now, Iowa is considered a crucial battleground state and one of the 12 that six months from the election is too close to call. The doors at the event open in the next few hours, but President Obama isn’t scheduled to appear until 7 pm.
Even though Obama’s campaign stop in Iowa may seem routine, for many Iowans, especially family farmers, environmentalists, animal welfare advocates and rural residents, the location of the visit, at the Paul R. Knapp Animal Learning Center is certain to cause real alarm.
While the name of the building on the Iowa state fairgrounds sounds fairly innocuous, during the famous state fair, the building is transformed into a major propaganda set piece for industrial agriculture, complete with life-size gestation crates, full of sows with newborn baby pigs, dioramas of factory farms and posters full of factory farm PR platitudes. See the slideshow below for the real story of where Obama will speak to voters today in Iowa.
Ironically, President Obama’s visit to the factory farm propaganda site comes at a time when major food companies such as Burger King, McDonalds, Wendy’s, Denny’s and Safeway are responding to consumer pressure to dump gestation crates. Now it seems that the practices of locking sows in cages for much of their adult life as advocated by Iowa’s factory farm pork producers and the Big Ag money behind this nasty effort to whitewash the factory farm industry, will get what they paid for - the Presidential seal of approval. The Paul R. Knapp building is also sponsored by Christensen Farms, a Minnesota-based factory farm operation that boasts on its website as being “one of the top three producers in the United States”. Last year, Christensen Farms featured banners with the soft porn feel-good-themed motto: “Farming Feels Good”.Guess they’ve never asked a sow in a gestation crate for her opinion.
For many family farmers and rural Iowans, who helped pushed Obama to a first place finish during the 2008 caucus, Obama’s appearance in this building is an outrage and a major misstep by the campaign. Four years ago, such a mistake would have likely cost Obama the Iowa caucus and thus the election. And many, including myself, have written that a similar gaff by Hillary Clinton, cost her more than first place in 2008. While factory farms may seem to be an odd issue to outsiders, the ungodly stench of pig shit from factory hog confinements and the political collusion in Iowa’s state capital have been leading hot button issues during state and presidential campaigns since the mid 1990s.
The issue was so important for progressive farmers, environmentalists and rural residents that John Edwards paraded a cart with hogs in it through Des Moines and onto the state fairgrounds that said, Edwards for Local Control and Hogs for Edwards. Not to be outdone, then Senator Barack Obama challenged Edward’s commitment on factory farms in front of an audience of Iowa farmers and rural advocates who knew the issue best. On November 10, 2007, speaking at the Food and Family Farm Presidential Summit, an event that I organized where 5 of the 6 Democratic presidential candidates spoke, Obama boasted about his record on factory farms or CAFOs (confined animal feeding operations).
Said Obama: “So when I hear other candidates say they’ll stand up to the special interests on the issues that matter to you – like CAFO’s – I’m reminded that the test of leadership isn’t what you say, it’s what you do. Voting records matter. And unlike other candidates who have changed their position on CAFO’s, I look at this issue as a matter of principle, not politics. That’s why I have always stood for tougher environmental regulations and local control over whether a CAFO can be built in your neighborhood, and that’s why we need to limit EQIP funding to giant CAFO’s so they are forced to pay for their own pollution. And that’s what I’ll do as President.” Clearly President Obama’s advance staff this time around is either so clueless about the state’s farm, environmental and rural issues or so arrogant that they just don’t care to get it right.
To the more than 22,000 family hog farmers that have been forced out of business in Iowa in the past 15 years and the tens of thousands of rural Iowans who have seen their property value drop precipitously and their quality of life ruined by the stench of nearby factory hog confinements, the appearance by the Obama campaign is just another sign of how far his administration has moved away from the progressive, family farm agenda that helped him win the 2008 Iowa caucus.
In the past nearly four years, Obama’s family farm and rural supporters have watched as his administration has caved on nearly every major campaign promise he made in his now famous shrinking rural agenda. While President Obama planted a garden on the White House lawn and his wife launched a major healthy food initiative called Let’s Move, the Obama USDA, FDA and EPA have gone out of their way to favor agribusiness in their rule making and review processes, including the failure to ban subtherapeutic antibiotics for livestock used for treatment of human diseases, the White House’s caving to agribusiness on GIPSA (or fair market livestock reforms for family farmers) to their rampant approval of genetically engineered crops and Obama’s failure to follow through on his campaign promise to label GMOs.
At the same time, President Obama and his administration is failing on even his most basic campaign promises, the factory farm fight in Iowa is heating once up once again, with more new factory farms being proposed as the spring planting finishes. Last week, the application for a 5,000 hog confinement facility was withdrawn by the farmer after public outcry.
More at the link
____
How is this different from what Mitt Romney would do? Politics is bs.Today President Barack Obama will return to Iowa for an official “grassroots... more
-
-
Following years of intense pressure from the agribusiness sector, Brazil's parliament has approved destructive reforms to the country's forest protection. President Dilma has just 9 remaining days to veto this hatchet job before it becomes law. With the world watching, which side of history will she choose to be on? Will her legacy be Amazon ruin? Or, will she demonstrate courage and act on behalf of future generations?
This article appeared in the New York Times today.
YOU can urge President Dilma to do the right thing for Brazil, the Amazon and the planet.
Take action now by signing this petition, tell her to veto the new Forest Code!
More at the linkFollowing years of intense pressure from the agribusiness sector, Brazil's... more
-
-
Last year, India asked the International Olympics Committee (IOC) to discontinue Dow Chemical’s sponsorship of the upcoming London Olympics, citing the American corporation’s links to Union Carbide, the company responsible for the 1984 Bhopal gas leak that killed 2,500 people.
Now Vietnam is calling for Dow to quit the games because of the company’s record in producing the toxic defoliant Agent Orange, writes the Thanh Nien News, an influential newspaper in Ho Chi Minh City.
The United States military used Agent Orange extensively in the Vietnam War. Contained in drums with orange stripes (hence the name), the defoliant was sprayed on farms and forests to deprive the communist North Vietnamese and their allies of food and cover.
The systematic dumping caused death, disease and genetic deformities among millions of Vietnamese, including generations born 40 years after the war ended in 1975. The poison continues to contaminate Vietnam’s ecosystem and food chain, the newspaper reports.
The News says Vietnamese government recently sent a letter to the IOC expressing “profound concerns” about Dow’s involvement in the Olympics, which are due to start in less than two months.
“What is worth condemning is the fact that despite [international opinion], Dow Chemical expressed their indifference and refused compensation for the victims of Agent Orange produced by the company, as well as their responsibility to clean up contaminated areas,” according to the letter.
The paper quotes a Dow spokesman dismissing the letter as “misguided” and wrongly focused,” while the IOC said it carefully studied the history of the company and found it “committed to good corporate citizenship.”
But leftist American political author Noam Chomsky is siding with Vietnam, saying it is “entirely appropriate” for the government to object to Dow’s sponsorship, the paper reports. “The use of Agent Orange was a major war crime. The victims have been largely ignored, another crime,” Chomsky said.
Washington has largely rebuffed efforts to be held responsible for the ill effects of Agent Orange in Vietnam, though the U.S. government has promised to help clean up contaminated airports formerly used by American troops.
Ironically, Dow and Monsanto, another Agent Orange producer, are now conducting business in Vietnam.
But if the chairman of the Vietnam Association of Victims of Agent Orange could have his way, the two companies would pack up and leave, the paper reported. “My ultimate goal is to push the government to get both Dow and Monsanto out of Vietnam,” he said.
More at the linkLast year, India asked the International Olympics Committee (IOC) to discontinue Dow... more
-
-
I made a career of sorts writing about the "big six" agrichemical companies—Monsanto, Dow, Bayer, DuPont, Syngenta, and BASF—that produce the great bulk of the world's pesticides and, increasingly, seeds. But last week, I did something different. Rather than investigate and critique these companies in print, I broke bread with some of their executives. And then, in a public forum live-cast on the internet from DC's Newseum, I told them bluntly what I thought of their industry.
They seemed a bit stunned by the spectacle, rapt in attention but increasingly silent as my critique went on. From my perspective, I was looking into a sea of dark suits, red ties, and wide eyes, with only the stray vigorous shake of the head to register open dissent from my critique.
.
The event was the annual policy summit held in Washington, DC, by CropLife America, the trade group representing Big Agrichem/Biotech and the suppliers and retailers that sell their goods throughout farm country. The group had invited me to speak at the behest of my friend, green-business journalist Marc Gunther, who has an annual gig moderating the event.
My foray into agrichem-exec shoulder-rubbing began the night before the conference, when I attended the pre-event speakers' dinner in a private dining hall of a DC hotel.
The CropLife event planners greeted me warmly when I arrived—to my delight, as one of them handed me a goodie bag, she joked, "And it's not pesticides!" What was in there delighted me, too—a coffee mug and a baseball jersey emblazoned with CropLife's slogan: "Modern Agriculture."
As I pulled down my name tag and made my way into the dining hall, I quickly spied the bearded, stout figure of Bob Stallman, president of the American Farm Bureau Federation, which calls itself the "voice of agriculture" but is more accurately described as the "voice of industrial agriculture." He is a zealous evangelist of chemical-intensive farming, preaching the virtues of GMOs, biofuels, factory-scale animal farms, and minimal regulation. I walked right up to him and shook his hand, declaring that it was great to finally meet someone whom I had been reading about for years. He accepted my greeting cordially—and seemed genuinely nonplussed as to who I was: a deflating experience.
Soon I was shuffled to a table featuring some Dow and DuPont execs and a man who owned an input supply company in the Midwest. It was a small gathering—maybe eight tables, each with around five people. The dress code was strictly business—I was one of the few men not in a dark suit and tie. Again, none of them seemed to have the foggiest idea as to who I was. The input guy and I sparred cordially through dinner about the viability of organic ag—he was open to my ideas and listened to me; I returned the favor.
How was the food? That was a major point of curiosity for me when I accepted the gig. What does the agrichemical industry eat at its feasts? Not surprisingly, fancy—and generally passable—hotel fare. The night's menu included a reasonably fresh salad, some competently cooked mixed vegetables, and a filet mignon cooked medium. Normally I don't eat meat whose origin is mysterious to me, but that night I was famished from travel and work. As I laid into the filet mignon, I thought of the specter of meat glue and how it's commonly used to fabricate filet-mignon-like beef cuts in institutional settings. I remembered the vow, in my recent piece on meat glue, to "eat around" filet mignon if I'm ever—"God forbid"—served it "at some cursed banquet." Shaking off my vow, I ate about half of it. As with all filet mignon dishes, it was tender but didn't taste like much.
At the next day's conference, I appeared on a panel of food bloggers, along with Danielle Gould of Food + Tech Connect and Hemi Weingarten of Fooducate.
snip
The mood darkened considerably at other points in my remarks. Gunther asked me what role I thought I played as a blogger. I said, to explain, that we had to back up a bit. The agrichemical industry had become extremely consolidated, which meant that a vast amount of profits had become concentrated into the coffers of a handful of companies. That effect gave these companies the resources to invest millions of dollars in research and marketing. I noted a report that I had seen that very week showing Monsanto has already spent $1.4 million on lobbying in the first three months of 2012 alone.
In that context, I said, I see my work as a counterweight. I'm a journalist on the ground digging into the industry's claims, looking critically at how its technologies play out for people and ecosystems. I pointed to the example of ubiquitous neonicotinoid pesticides and the growing weight of science linking them to declining honeybee health, as well as to the failure of Monsanto's Roundup Ready technology and the gusher of toxic herbicides now hitting US farmland as a result. These were the kind of stories I fixate on on from my modest perch at a nonprofit publication while a steady blitz of marketing and lobbying held those very products in place.
And so it went on for a while, the room feeling both highly charged and dead silent as I spoke bluntly and from the heart.
The tension reached a dramatic crescendo during the Q&A period. A distinguished older gentleman took the mic, declared his name was Charlie Stenholm and had been a US representative from Texas for many years and was now a lobbyist—though his wife prefer he call himself an educator.(Stenholm serves as senior policy adviser to Olsson, Frank & Weeda, the powerhouse lobbying firm). How, he demanded to know in his slow and charming Texas drawl, looking me in the eye, could I possibly question GMO technology when it was so clearly needed to feed the world?
That gave me the opportunity to deliver my critique of GMOs. After 25 years of R&D and 16 years in the field, the industry has so far delivered precisely two widely used traits: herbicide resistance (Roundup Ready) and pesticide expression (Bt). The first has already failed, and the second is showing signs of coming undone. Meanwhile, the so-called complex traits—crops that use less water or nitrogen—clearly aren't working. Moreover, despite all the "feed the world" rhetoric, GMOs have so far succeeded in boosting crop yields only marginally. GMOs have been a magnificent success in the marketplace, I declared, but what had they succeeded at? Mainly, I charged, at generating profits for a few big companies in the form of licensing fees and herbicide sales.
I have to say, it felt cathartic to face down a man who had unapologetically barreled through the revolving door between government and agribusiness.
When the panel ended, I was greeted immediately by reps from Syngenta and Dow.
More at the linkI made a career of sorts writing about the "big six" agrichemical... more
-
-
China spurred a jump in global carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions to their highest ever recorded level in 2011, offsetting falls in the United States and Europe, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said on Thursday.
CO2 emissions rose by 3.2 percent last year to 31.6 billion metric tons (34.83 billion tons), preliminary estimates from the Paris-based IEA showed.
China, the world's biggest emitter of CO2, made the largest contribution to the global rise, its emissions increasing by 9.3 percent, the body said, driven mainly by higher coal use.
"When I look at this data, the trend is perfectly in line with a temperature increase of 6 degrees Celsius (by 2050), which would have devastating consequences for the planet," Fatih Birol, IEA's chief economist told Reuters.
Scientists say ensuring global average temperatures this century do not rise more than 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels is needed to limit devastating climate effects like crop failure and melting glaciers.
They believe that is only possible if emission levels are kept to around 44 billion metric tons of CO2 equivalent in 2020.
Negotiators from over 180 nations are meeting in Bonn, Germany, until Friday to work towards getting a new global climate pact signed by 2015.
The aim is to ensure ambitious emissions cuts are made after the Kyoto Protocol expires at the end of this year.
Procedural wrangling and a reluctance to raise ambitions to cut emissions due to economic constraints is threatening progress, however. (ID:nL5E8GLCRU]
"I think it would be unrealistic to think that there will be major breakthroughs very soon," Birol said.
"Climate change is sliding down in the international policy agenda, which is definitely a worrying trend."
More at the linkChina spurred a jump in global carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions to their highest ever... more
-
-
Want to see how severely we humans are scouring the oceans for fish? Check out this striking map from the World Wildlife Fund’s 2012 “Living Planet Report.” The red areas are the most intensively fished (and, in many cases, overfished) parts of the ocean — and they’ve expanded dramatically since 1950: Fish gone cause of fishing! (more at link)Want to see how severely we humans are scouring the oceans for fish? Check out this... more
-
-
Mexico and Central America look like they are covered in dried blood on maps projecting future soil moisture conditions.
The results from 19 different state-of-the-art climate models project extreme and persistent drought conditions (colored dark red-brown on the maps) for almost all of Mexico, the midwestern United States and most of Central America.
If climate change pushes the global average temperature to 2.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial era levels, as many experts now expect, these regions will be under severe and permanent drought conditions.
Future conditions are projected to be worse than Mexico's current drought or the U.S. Dust Bowl era of the 1930s that forced hundreds of thousands of people to migrate.
These are some of the conclusions of the study "Projections of Future Drought in the Continental United States and Mexico", which was published in the December 2011 issue of the American Meteorological Society’s Journal of Hydrometeorology and has gone largely unnoticed.
"Drought conditions will prevail no matter what precipitation rates are in the future," said co-author Michael Wehner, a climate scientist at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, a U.S. government research centre in California.
"Even in regions where rainfall increases, the soils will get drier. This is a very robust finding," Wehner told Tierramérica.
Without major reductions in carbon emissions from the burning of fossil fuels, global temperatures will increase to at least 2.5 degrees of warming between 2050 and 2090, depending on rates of emissions of greenhouse gases, climate sensitivity and feedbacks.
The 19 models used in the study show that the increased heat will dry soils more than any additional rain can replenish soil moisture levels. Ever warmer air temperatures will cause greater evaporation, drying out soils.
Climate change is also altering precipitation patterns, so that more and more precipitation occurs in winter months. And it is more likely to occur in the form of very heavy rainfalls over short periods of time, Wehner said.
Once the ground is dry, the sun’s energy goes into baking the soil, leading to a further increase in air temperature, as Beverly Law, a global climate change researcher at Oregon State University, told Tierramerica at the 16th session of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, held in 2010 in Cancún.
Large areas of the Southern hemisphere, including major portions of Australia, Africa and South America, have been drying up in the past decade, according to a study by Law and colleagues, "Climate Change: Water Cycle Dries Out", published in the journal Nature in 2010.
Another 2010 study in Nature, "Drought Under Global Warming: A Review", examined future climate projections and also found severe drying of soils over much of the central United States, Mexico and Central America by 2060, but beginning well before then.
This study by Aiguo Dai, a scientist at the National Centre for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) in the U.S. state of Colorado, also projected that northeastern South America will experience similar drought conditions.
"If the projections in this study come even close to being realised, the consequences for society worldwide will be enormous," Dai said in 2010.
More at the linkMexico and Central America look like they are covered in dried blood on maps... more
-
-
Members of the Group of Eight, in a declaration, said deep-water drilling and hydraulic fracturing were key to a safe and secure energy future.
The G8 industrialized nations wrapped up meetings last weekend at the U.S. presidential retreat at Camp David, Md.
In a 40-point declaration, the G8 said it was committed to a policy of energy security that focused on safety and sustainability.
"We are committed to establishing and sharing best practices on energy production, including exploration in frontier areas and the use of technologies such as deep water drilling and hydraulic fracturing, where allowed, to allow for the safe development of energy sources, taking into account environmental concerns over the life of a field," the declaration read.
Hydraulic fracturing, known also as fracking, uses a mixture of water, sand and chemicals to coax oil and natural gas out of underground shale formations. The practice is controversial because of the perceived toxicity of the chemical components. The United States has moved forward with the practice, though some European countries have placed a moratorium on fracking.
Deep-water drilling slowed in the wake of the 2010 oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico but has since gained momentum.
"As our economies grow, we recognize the importance of meeting our energy needs from a wide variety of sources ranging from traditional fuels to renewables to other clean technologies," the G8 declaration added.
Read more: http://www.upi.com/Business_News/Energy-Resources/2012/05/21/G8-warms-to-fracking-deep-water-drilling/UPI-82701337603041/#ixzz1vZ0nFmZs
More at the linkMembers of the Group of Eight, in a declaration, said deep-water drilling and... more
-
-
Nearly one in four American adolescents may be on the verge of developing Type 2 diabetes or could already be diabetic, representing a sharp increase in the disease’s prevalence among children ages 12 to 19 since a decade ago, when it was estimated that fewer than one in 10 were at risk for or had diabetes, according to a new study.
This worsening of the problem is worrying in light of recently published findings that the disease progresses more rapidly in children than in adults and is harder to treat, experts said.
The study, published online on Monday in the journal Pediatrics, analyzes data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, which has a nationally representative sample. While it confirmed that teenage obesity and overweight rates had leveled off in recent years and that teenage rates of high blood pressure and high cholesterol had not changed greatly, it found that the percentage of teenagers testing positive for diabetes and prediabetes had nearly tripled to 23 percent in 2007-8 from 9 percent in 1999-2000.
Researchers said the data should be interpreted with caution because the prediabetes and diabetes status of the adolescents was based on a single test of each participant’s fasting blood glucose level, which could be unreliable in children if they had not fasted for at least 8 hours before taking the test. In addition, children this age are going through puberty, a process that induces insulin resistance.
“Nationwide, this is the best sampling of youth to inform us about cardiovascular risk factors,” said Dr. Lori Laffel of the Joslin Diabetes Center in Boston, who was not involved in the study. But she said that the figure of nearly one in four teens having diabetes or prediabetes was high and that the findings needed to be replicated by other researchers in order to support them.
Still, experts and doctors who treat young diabetics said the trend over the past decade was troubling. They were not entirely able to explain why diabetes and prediabetes rates had continued to rise while obesity held steady, but they said it may have taken time for the disease to “catch up” with teenagers who were overweight or sedentary as children.
Other factors may also play a role, including the increasing use of computer and mobile devices that has made youngsters more inactive and the growth of minority ethnic and racial groups who have higher rates of diagnosed diabetes than whites.
The study did not differentiate between adolescents who had diabetes and those with prediabetes, but most are likely to be prediabetic, experts said. That means blood glucose levels are higher than normal, but not high enough to diagnose diabetes.
Many people with prediabetes go on to develop Type 2 diabetes, but they can prevent that from happening with modest weight loss and exercise. The disease, once called adult-onset diabetes because it was so rare in children, if not managed properly causes complications including vision problems, heart disease, nerve damage and kidney failure.
The new study, which included 3,383 participants in different studies over the decade, found that even teenagers of normal weight had risk factors for heart disease, including prediabetes.
More at the linkNearly one in four American adolescents may be on the verge of developing Type 2... more
-
-
The past 12 months were the hottest on record, and forecasters are predicting high temperatures across the U.S. this summer. Science and environment contributor M. Sanjayan explains the risk of climate change.
M Sanjayan is lead scientist for the Nature Conservancy.
Here's hoping to seeing more media coverage of the most important issue for our future.
More at the linkThe past 12 months were the hottest on record, and forecasters are predicting high... more
-
-
Here’s what happens when corporations begin to control education.
"When I approached professors to discuss research projects addressing organic agriculture in farmer's markets, the first one told me that 'no one cares about people selling food in parking lots on the other side of the train tracks,’” said a PhD student at a large land-grant university who did not wish to be identified. “My academic adviser told me my best bet was to write a grant for Monsanto or the Department of Homeland Security to fund my research on why farmer's markets were stocked with 'black market vegetables' that 'are a bioterrorism threat waiting to happen.' It was communicated to me on more than one occasion throughout my education that I should just study something Monsanto would fund rather than ideas to which I was deeply committed. I ended up studying what I wanted, but received no financial support, and paid for my education out of pocket."
Unfortunately, she's not alone. Conducting research requires funding, and today's research follows the golden rule: The one with the gold makes the rules.
A report just released by Food and Water Watch examines the role of corporate funding of agricultural research at land grant universities, of which there are more than 100. “You hear again and again Congress and regulators clamoring for science-based rules, policies, regulations,” says Food and Water Watch researcher Tim
Schwab, explaining why he began investigating corporate influence in agricultural research. “So if the rules and regulations and policies are based on science that is industry-biased, then the fallout goes beyond academic articles. It really trickles down to farmer livelihoods and consumer choice.”
The report found that nearly one quarter of research funding at land grant universities now comes from corporations, compared to less than 15 percent from the USDA. Although corporate funding of research surpassed USDA funding at these universities in the mid-1990s, the gap is now larger than ever. What's more, a broader look at all corporate agricultural research, $7.4 billion in 2006, dwarfs the mere $5.7 billion in all public funding of agricultural research spent the same year.
Influence does not end with research funding, however. In 2005, nearly one third of agricultural scientists reported consulting for private industry. Corporations endow professorships and donate money to universities in return for having buildings, labs and wings named for them. Purdue University's Department of Nutrition Science blatantly offers corporate affiliates “corporate visibility with students and faculty” and “commitment by faculty and administration to address [corporate] members' needs,” in return for the $6,000 each corporate affiliate pays annually.
In perhaps the most egregious cases, corporate boards and college leadership overlap. In 2009, South Dakota State's president, for example, joined the board of directors of Monsanto, where he earns six figures each year. Bruce Rastetter is simultaneously the co-founder and managing director of a company called AgriSol Energy and a member of the Iowa Board of Regents. Under his influence, Iowa State joined AgriSol in a venture in Tanzania that would have forcefully removed 162,000 people from their land, but the university later pulled out of the project after public outcry.
What is the impact of the flood of corporate cash? “We know from a number of meta-analyses, that corporate funding leads to results that are favorable to the corporate funder,” says Schwab.
More at the linkHere’s what happens when corporations begin to control education.
"When... more
-
-
Cameras rolled one day last fall as Ty E. Lawrence led journalists into a room-sized meat locker on the campus of West Texas A&M University, where bloody sides of beef, still covered with a slick layer of ivory-colored fat, hung from steel hooks. Dressed in a white lab coat, a hard hat on his head, Lawrence pointed to the carcass of a Holstein that had been fed a new drug called Zilmax. He noted its larger size compared with the nearby body of a steer never given the drug.
"This is thicker, and it's plumper," said Lawrence, an associate professor of animal science, pointing at the beast's rib-eye. "This animal right here," he said, waving his hand at the pharmaceutically enhanced meat, "doesn't look like a Holstein anymore."
Convincing ranchers that Zilmax will transform their cattle into bovine Schwarzeneggers has been part of Lawrence's work ever since the drug was introduced by Intervet, a subsidiary of Merck, the global pharmaceutical company. The tour he led of the carcasses in his lab was just one of many events where he has helped Intervet sell Zilmax. He's given speeches to ranchers and written an article for a beef-industry magazine to promote the drug. He's repeatedly let Intervet include his comments in news releases, including one in which he said the drug could "revolutionize the beef production system."
Lawrence is hardly alone. Scores of animal scientists employed by public universities have helped pharmaceutical companies persuade farmers and ranchers to use antibiotics, hormones, and drugs like Zilmax to make their cattle grow bigger ever faster. With the use of these products, the average weight of a fattened steer sold to a packing plant is now roughly 1,300 pounds—up from 1,000 pounds in 1975.
It's been a profitable venture for the drug companies, as well as for the professors and their universities. Agriculture schools increasingly depend on the industry for research grants, a sizable portion of which cover overhead and administrative costs. And many professors now add to their personal bank accounts by working for the companies as consultants and speakers. More than two-thirds of animal scientists reported in a 2005 survey that they had received money from industry in the previous five years.
Yet unlike a growing number of medical schools around the country, where administrators have recently tightened rules to better police their faculty's ties to pharmaceutical companies, the schools of agriculture have largely rejected critics' concerns about industry cash. Administrators have set few limits on how much corporate money agricultural professors can accept. Faculty work with industry is governed by confidentiality rules that veil it from public view.
In certain ways, the close relationship between animal scientists and pharmaceutical companies has never served the public well. Few animal scientists have been interested in looking at what harm the livestock drugs may be causing to the cattle, the environment, or the people eating the meat. They've left most of that work to scientists outside of agriculture, consumer groups, and others who take interest.
But with the introduction of Zilmax, the situation may have reached a tipping point. Critics say some academic animal scientists have become so closely tied to the drug companies that they may be working more in the companies' interests than in those of farmers and ranchers—the very groups that land-grant universities were created to serve.
More at the linkCameras rolled one day last fall as Ty E. Lawrence led journalists into a room-sized... more
-
-
When home-front battles over GMO labeling, beekeeping, and the Farm Bill get heated, we can sometimes lose sight of the fact that Big Ag’s influence extends far beyond our own borders. Micha Peled’s documentary Bitter Seeds is a stark reminder of that fact. The final film in Peled’s “globalization trilogy,” Bitter Seeds exposes the havoc Monsanto has wreaked on rural farming communities in India, and serves as a fierce rebuttal to the claim that genetically modified seeds can save the developing world.
The film follows a plucky 18-year-old girl named Manjusha, whose father was one of the quarter-million farmers who have committed suicide in India in the last 16 years. As Grist and others have reported, the motivations for these suicides follow a familiar pattern: Farmers become trapped in a cycle of debt trying to make a living growing Monsanto’s genetically engineered Bt cotton. They always live close to the edge, but one season’s ruined crop can dash hopes of ever paying back their loans, much less enabling their families to get ahead. Manjusha’s father, like many other suicide victims, killed himself by drinking the pesticide he spreads on his crops.
Why is Monsanto seen as responsible for these farmers’ desperation? The company began selling Bt cotton in India in 2004, after a U.S. challenge at the WTO forced India to adopt seed patenting, effectively allowing Monsanto to monopolize the market. Bt cotton seeds were — and still are — advertised heavily to illiterate Indian farmers, who have bought the company’s promises of high yields and the material wealth they bring. What the farmers didn’t know until it was too late is those seeds require an expensive regimen of pesticides, and must be fertilized and watered according to precise timetables. And since these farmers lack irrigation systems, and must instead depend on not-always-predictable rainfall, it’s incredibly difficult to control the success or failure of any year’s crops. As farmers bought the Bt cotton in droves, the conventional seed they’d been using — which needed only cow dung as fertilizer — disappeared in as little as one season.
Now, in communities like Manjusha’s, it’s virtually impossible to buy anything but Monsanto’s seed.Manjusha, the film’s protagonist, goes looking for answers after her father commits suicide.To pay for seeds, pesticides, and fertilizer, farmers must take out loans, but most banks refuse to deal with them, so instead they turn to moneylenders, who charge exorbitant interest rates. Many farmers have nothing to offer as collateral besides their land. If a crop fails and they can’t pay back the loans, they lose everything.
The film offers a glimmer of hope in Manjusha, an aspiring journalist in a world where farmers’ daughters aren’t exactly encouraged to pursue independent careers. Scenes of her first earnest attempts at reporting are intimate and touching (“I had other questions to ask, but I forgot”), and her commitment to telling the story of her family’s and her community’s struggle always shines through her nervousness. This appealing heroine makes a story of global manipulation more personal, and thus more devastating.
Piece by piece, Bitter Seeds lays out the bleak situation in India, using interviews with all players, from condescending seed sales reps and callous Monsanto execs, to activist Vandana Shiva, to farmers, their families, and village old-timers who remember when life as an Indian cotton farmer was not so bitter.
More at the linkWhen home-front battles over GMO labeling, beekeeping, and the Farm Bill get heated,... more
-
-
The Obama administration's proposed rule for hydraulic oil and gas drilling on public lands is the equivalent of closing the barn door after the horses have escaped.
The Interior Department issued a proposal Friday that calls for companies to disclose the chemicals used in extracting gas and oil from shale deposits deep underground. The problem is, unlike an earlier plan that would have required them to release the information at least 30 days before starting a well, the new provision says the contents of the fracking fluid -- water, sand and chemicals -- don't have to be divulged until after drilling is over.
That's hardly proactive.
The rule was supposed to address concerns raised by environmentalists, scientists, politicians and landowners about potential groundwater contamination and the treatment of tainted water that flows out of wells during and after drilling. In particular, researchers and physicians say knowing the contents of the chemicals used to extract gas and oil is key in pinpointing potential health issues.
But the Obama administration, under criticism from Republicans and industry officials for the president's energy policies, bowed to drillers' objections. They said the additional paperwork would slow the permitting process and could jeopardize trade secrets. It decided scientists would be able to use the records to trace any future contamination after the fact, and that there was no reason to require disclosure in advance of drilling.
The federal rule would apply only to 3,000 or so wells drilled each year on 700 million acres of public land administered by the Interior Department's Bureau of Land Management and another 56 million acres of Indian land. Regulation of drilling on private land -- the majority of the 13,000 wells drilled each year -- falls to the states, and some already require prior disclosure of fracking chemicals.
The rule for public lands should be at least as stringent as those being imposed by states. The watered-down rule announced last week is too weak.The Obama administration's proposed rule for hydraulic oil and gas drilling on... more
-
-
NOTE: Monsanto could be ordered to pay back an estimated 6.2 billion Euros to Brazil's 5 million soya farmers. A judge in the Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul has already ordered the suspension of the payment of royalties on Monsanto's GM seeds this year. And the verdict envisages backdating the reimbursement of royalties to the 2003/2004 season. If Monsanto ignores this judgement, the firm will incur a daily penalty of 400,000 Euros. Monsanto will appeal but an appeal brings the risk that this decision by a state tribunal could be extended nationwide.
---
Court decision concerning Monsanto in Brazil: Grower associations win legal action against biotech giant … more
Daniel Coelho Barbosa
TraceConsult, April 2012
http://db.zs-intern.de/uploads/1335221694-MediaInfo_Monsanto_Royalties_Braz_ENG_...
[Daniel Coelho Barbosa is an agribusiness analyst
working in Germany and Brazil]
(1) Brazil, Monsanto and a dispute over royalties worth 6.2 billion euros
On 4 April 2012, the courts of Brazil's southern‐most state of Rio Grande do Sul, in the
way of a preliminary injunction, suspended the collection of royalties on GMO soy seeds by Monsanto.
The ruling by Judge Giovanni Conti also provides for the reimbursement of license fees paid (so‐called royalties) since the harvest campaign 2003/2004, as the business practices of seed multinationals Monsanto violate the rules of the Brazilian Cultivars Act (No. 9.456/97).
According to Neri Perin, the attorney of the farmers associations of Passo Fundo, Santiago and Sertão, who filed a class action suit in 2009, the claim lodged may lead to an advantage for up to five million farmers in Brazil and could mean for them a reimbursement of about 6.2 billion euros.
The Brazilian soybean farmers question the regulations prohibiting them from withholding seed for a renewed planting (after a first planting for which they have paid royalties) and from giving or exchanging seed under public programs.
Monsanto has been accused of unlawful and abusive collection of royalties on seed and soybeans of the Roundup Ready (RR) cultivar. Until the ruling, royalties were required not only for the entire soybean crop, but also for soybean seed, that was retained from the previous harvest.
The farmers recognize that Monsanto is entitled to royalties when they buy soybean seed, but they demand the right to plant again the GM soybean seed they purchased and to sell this production, as food or feed, without another payment of license fees.
Subsequent joint plaintiffs have arisen: FETAG, the organization of farm workers from Rio Grande do Sul, and the farmers associations of the towns of Giruá and Arvorezinha...
Daniel Coelho Barbosa
Agribusiness AnalystNOTE: Monsanto could be ordered to pay back an estimated 6.2 billion Euros to... more
-
-
Oyster hatcheries along the Washington and Oregon coastlines began experiencing calamitous die-offs beginning in 2006. Scientists suspected they were because of increased carbon dioxide levels in the air that were causing ocean acidification. That theory has now proved out, according to a study just published by the journal Limnology and Oceanography.
Researchers studied oysters at Oregon’s Whiskey Creek Hatchery in 2009 after the hatchery reported that oyster production had declined by as much as 80 percent in recent years. The scientists paid close attention to the seawater that had bathed the oysters. Oceans absorb a significant portion of carbon dioxide in the air and when they do so a chemical process takes place called acidification. Laboratory studies have already shown that elevated carbon dioxide changes the pH and reduces the availability of calcium carbonate in the seawater. And calcium carbonate minerals are the material that sea creatures like oysters and corals use for building shells and skeletons.
The study breaks new ground, according to its authors, because this is the first time these theories on the impact of ocean acidification that were tested in laboratories were verified on an actual commercial shellfish farm with ambient ocean waters. The findings linked the production failures of the farms to the carbon dioxide levels in the seawater in which the larval oysters were spawned and spent the first 24 hours of their lives. That is the time when oysters start to develop their first shells.
“I think that the clear take-home message from this research is that for the oceans, the Pacific Oyster larvae are the ‘canaries in the coal mines’ for ocean acidification. When the CO2 levels in the ocean are too high, they die; when we lower the CO2 levels, they live,” Richard A. Feely, a co-author of the study and senior scientist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, said in a statement released by the Center for Biological Diversity.
The center is deeply invested in the findings because in 2009, it filed a lawsuit demanding that the Environmental Protection Agency address ocean acidification in the waters off Washington State under the Clean Water Act. In a settlement, the E.P.A. agreed that states had a duty to look at the impact of ocean acidification. But the implication for sea life is national and global in scale.
“Oyster die-offs are an unmistakable warning that our oceans are in trouble and we’ve got to cut the carbon pollution if we want to have oysters, corals and whales,” said Miyoko Sakashita, oceans director for the center, which last week petitioned the White House and E.P.A. to develop a national plan to address ocean acidification.Oyster hatcheries along the Washington and Oregon coastlines began experiencing... more
-
