Rainforests // Current TV

Rain Forest for Sale

Demand for oil is squeezing the life out of one of the world’s wildest places.... more

coolplanet
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5 months ago
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Article: Oakland Institute, Greenpeace expose New York investors' land grab in Cameroon

Oakland, USA, 5 September, 2012 - An American owned company with a track record of... more

frankpatton
added this
9 months ago
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Dilma's dilemma: Urge Brazil to veto new forest code

Following years of intense pressure from the agribusiness sector, Brazil's... more

JanforGore
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12 months ago
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7 comments

Tribal peoples use GPS mapping to protect lands

From the rainforests of central Africa to the Australian outback, indigenous people armed with GPS devices are surveying their territories and producing maps they can use to protect them from logging and other outside development.
by fred pearce

Deep in the African rainforest and three days from home, a tribal hunter, punting down a backwater, puts aside his spear and takes out a GPS handset. He doesn’t need the Global Positioning System to know where he is. He is intimate with every inch of his tribe’s forests. But he taps an icon on the screen to identify the burial ground, sacred grove, or wildlife-rich swamp he is passing, then puts the handset back in his hunting bag, and carries on. The data on the handset will later be uploaded onto remote sensing maps created by Google Earth. Now his knowledge can be shared with the world.

These days, across the rainforests of central Africa and in South America, Southeast Asia, and other parts of the world, the new weapon of choice for defending community lands against outsiders is digital mapping technology. The aim is to produce maps that governments cannot ignore and that will help inhabitants to claim legal ownership of their lands and to fight back against ministers and officials intent on handing over their forests to loggers, mining companies, and other outside exploiters.

In a largely unheralded technological revolution, thousands of forest dwellers have been trained in how to combine their old ways of marking and remembering territory, in which a boundary might be “the big tree by the river two days’ walk away,” with digitized mapping techniques. “It is becoming a powerful tool of advocacy,” says Georges Thierry Handja, the Cameroonian technical advisor for the Rainforest Foundation UK, a Western NGO active in the field.

The Rainforest Foundation/Mapping for RightsVillagers navigate a river in northeast Gabon as part of mapping program supported by the Rainforest Foundation UK.Consider events in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, formerly Zaire. There, in the aftermath of a long civil war, the government is currently zoning its forests — which cover as much as 316 million acres, an area nearly the size of France, Germany and Spain combined — in preparation for their mass allocation to logging companies. Old European timber conglomerates want to reactivate their concessions, some dating back almost to the brutal days more than a century ago when the entire country was run by King Leopold of Belgium. Logging newcomers from Malaysia and China also want a slice of the action.

Faced with the threat of losing their lands, both Bantu farmers and indigenous hunters in the western province of Bandundu, a center of rubber harvesting in Leopold’s time, have been mapping their forests. Each community has produced an initial sketch map of their area. Then more than 400 volunteers from 200 remote villages, all trained by Handja and his colleagues to use GPS handsets, have traveled for days by boat or on foot to record the precise locations of important points on their sketch maps — not least the boundaries of their territories.

“When communities are involved in mapping their lands,” Handja says, “they can play an important part in the conservation, management and development of forests.” The Bandundu mapping project, supported by the British government through the Rainforest Foundation, was last year’s runner up in the Buckminster Fuller Challenge awards for “socially responsible design in solving the world’s complex problems.”

More at the linkFrom the rainforests of central Africa to the Australian outback, indigenous people... more

JanforGore
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First Gorilla Genome Map Offers Clues to Human Evolution

CNN... First gorilla genome map offers clues to human evolution By Matthew... more

EthicalVegan
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1 year ago
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5 comments

Anti-Cancer Fungus Found To Naturally Eat Away Plastic Waste

(NaturalNews) What if it was possible to eliminate much of the world's otherwise very-slowly-biodegrading plastic waste using a natural Amazonian fungus? Well, it just might be, thanks to research conducted by Jonathan Russell and colleagues from Yale University's Department of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry, who recently discovered that Pestalotiopsis microspora effectively eats away polyurethane (PUR) plastics, and is capable of using plastic as its sole food source in both aerobic and anaerobic environments.

Entitled Biodegradation of Polyester Polyurethane by Endophytic Fungi, the study aimed to find new potential plant sources of bioremediation, also known as the use of microorganisms to biodegrade and eliminate pollutants that otherwise persist in the environment. Several students attending Yale's annual Rainforest Expedition and Laboratory course collected various samples from the Yasuni National Forest in the Amazon basin, and took them home for testing.

Of all the microorganisms tested, nine of the most active came from the Pestalotiopsis genus, which represents the first time endophytic fungi have been identified as having bioremediation properties. It was discovered that a key enzyme in this fungal genus known as taxol is responsible for eating away PUR, and that this "extracellular, secreted and diffusible" substance diffuses to "a significant distance," which means it has huge potential for large-scale PUR cleanup efforts.

"This is the first study that demonstrates PUR degradation by endophytic fungi," wrote the authors in their discussion. "The broad distribution of activity suggests that endophytes might be a promising source of biodiversity in which to test for activities important for bioremediation."

Taxol, which is also derived from the bark of Pacific Yew trees, happens to be the same enzyme used in conventional medicine to treat cancer patients. Though it is now administered to patients in synthetic, patented forms created by drug companies that now produce it using genetically-modified (GM) bacterium, taxol in its natural form has demonstrable anti-cancer properties, and has been used in native cultures by herbalists to treat disease naturally.

As interesting as this new discovery about taxol's PUR bioremediation properties may be, it is more than likely that, should this substance ever be used to eat plastics on an industrial scale, it will likely be derived from synthetic, patented sources rather than from natural sources. But as it currently stands, the Pestalotiopsis genus of endophytic fungi appear to be nature's built-in remedy for helping to keep the environment clean and toxin-free, as it already appears to be performing this function in rainforests around the world.

Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/035077_fungus_plastic_bioremediation.html#ixzz1ndPKmW1R(NaturalNews) What if it was possible to eliminate much of the world's otherwise... more

rodstradamus
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1 year ago
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Anti-Cancer Fungus Found To Naturally Eat Away Plastic Waste

(NaturalNews) What if it was possible to eliminate much of the world's otherwise very-slowly-biodegrading plastic waste using a natural Amazonian fungus? Well, it just might be, thanks to research conducted by Jonathan Russell and colleagues from Yale University's Department of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry, who recently discovered that Pestalotiopsis microspora effectively eats away polyurethane (PUR) plastics, and is capable of using plastic as its sole food source in both aerobic and anaerobic environments.

Entitled Biodegradation of Polyester Polyurethane by Endophytic Fungi, the study aimed to find new potential plant sources of bioremediation, also known as the use of microorganisms to biodegrade and eliminate pollutants that otherwise persist in the environment. Several students attending Yale's annual Rainforest Expedition and Laboratory course collected various samples from the Yasuni National Forest in the Amazon basin, and took them home for testing.

Of all the microorganisms tested, nine of the most active came from the Pestalotiopsis genus, which represents the first time endophytic fungi have been identified as having bioremediation properties. It was discovered that a key enzyme in this fungal genus known as taxol is responsible for eating away PUR, and that this "extracellular, secreted and diffusible" substance diffuses to "a significant distance," which means it has huge potential for large-scale PUR cleanup efforts.

"This is the first study that demonstrates PUR degradation by endophytic fungi," wrote the authors in their discussion. "The broad distribution of activity suggests that endophytes might be a promising source of biodiversity in which to test for activities important for bioremediation."

Taxol, which is also derived from the bark of Pacific Yew trees, happens to be the same enzyme used in conventional medicine to treat cancer patients. Though it is now administered to patients in synthetic, patented forms created by drug companies that now produce it using genetically-modified (GM) bacterium, taxol in its natural form has demonstrable anti-cancer properties, and has been used in native cultures by herbalists to treat disease naturally.

As interesting as this new discovery about taxol's PUR bioremediation properties may be, it is more than likely that, should this substance ever be used to eat plastics on an industrial scale, it will likely be derived from synthetic, patented sources rather than from natural sources. But as it currently stands, the Pestalotiopsis genus of endophytic fungi appear to be nature's built-in remedy for helping to keep the environment clean and toxin-free, as it already appears to be performing this function in rainforests around the world.

Sources for this article include:

http://www.activistpost.com
http://www.herbcyclopedia.com
http://www.thepracticalherbalist.com

Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/035077_fungus_plastic_bioremediation.html#ixzz1ndNFrcfG(NaturalNews) What if it was possible to eliminate much of the world's otherwise... more

rodstradamus
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1 year ago
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Mother Orang-utan Protects Her Baby From Gang of Bounty Hunters

NineMSN At A Glance... . Orang-utan protects baby from gang AEST 11:40, Sat Jan... more

EthicalVegan
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1 year ago
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Africa Rising: Carbon credits save Sierra Leone's Gola Rainforest

Turning down mining offers, Sierra Leone has set aside the Gola Rainforest as a new... more

coolplanet
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1 year ago
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VIDEO: Rainforest Alliance "Follow the Frog"

Help support a healthier planet. During Rainforest Alliance Week and beyond, take even... more

sonalbee
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1 year ago
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US Investors want a 72,000 hectare palm oil plantation in the middle of the rainforest

Conservation groups are on a last-minute run to stop one of the world's largest... more

Ahni
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1 year ago
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Beijing's Massive National Hotel will House a 107,000 Square Foot Indoor Rainforest

Internationally acclaimed design studio Emergent is currently planning a massive 2.3... more

lordsbassman
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1 year ago
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1 comment

Article: Increased population growth rate in the Northern Region of Brazil endangers the Amazon rainforest

According to preliminary results of the 2010 Census, the growth rate of population of... more

frankpatton
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1 year ago
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Slash and burn: Brazil shreds laws protecting its rainforests

Slash and burn: Brazil shreds laws protecting its rainforests - Nature, Environmen..... more

simplynonna
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NASA satellites detect extensive drought impact on Amazon forests

Researchers at Boston University, NASA and Federal University, Vicosa, Brazil, have published a new NASA-funded study that shows widespread reductions in the greenness of forests in the vast Amazon basin in South America were caused by the record-breaking drought of 2010.

"The greenness levels of Amazonian vegetation--a measure of its health--decreased dramatically over an area more than three and one-half times the size of Texas and did not recover to normal levels, even after the drought ended in late October 2010," said Liang Xu, the study's lead author from Boston University.

The drought sensitivity of Amazon rainforests is a subject of intense study. Scientists are concerned that because computer models predict that in a changing climate with warmer temperatures and altered rainfall patterns the ensuing moisture stress could cause some of the rainforests to be replaced by grasslands or woody savannas, releasing the carbon stored in the rotting wood into the atmosphere, which could accelerate global warming. The United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has warned similar droughts could be more frequent in the Amazon region in the future.

The comprehensive study was prepared by an international team of scientists using more than a decade's worth of satellite data from NASA's Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) and Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM).

Analysis of these data produced detailed maps of vegetation greenness declines from the 2010 drought. The study has been accepted for publication in "Geophysical Research Letters," a journal of the American Geophysical Union.

The authors first developed maps of drought-affected areas using thresholds of below-average rainfall as a guide. Next they identified affected vegetation using two different greenness indexes as surrogates for green leaf area and physiological functioning.

The maps show the 2010 drought reduced the greenness of approximately 965,000 square miles of vegetation in the Amazon--more than four times the area affected by the last severe drought in 2005.

"The MODIS vegetation greenness data suggest a more widespread, severe and long-lasting impact to Amazonian vegetation than what can be inferred based solely on rainfall data," said Arindam Samanta, a co-lead author from Atmospheric and Environmental Research Inc. in Lexington, Mass.

The severity of the 2010 drought was also seen in records of water levels in rivers across the Amazon basin. Water levels started to fall in August 2010, reaching record low levels in late October. Water levels only began to rise with the arrival of rains later that winter.

"Last year was the driest year on record based on 109 years of Rio Negro water level data at the Manaus harbor. For comparison, the lowest level during the so-called once-in-a-century drought in 2005, was only eighth lowest," said Marcos Costa, coauthor from the Federal University in Vicosa, Brazil.

cont.Researchers at Boston University, NASA and Federal University, Vicosa, Brazil, have... more

JanforGore
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2 years ago
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Indigenous Ecuadoran woman humbles US oil giant

Finally! Some Justice in the world! "by Valeria Pacheco – Wed Feb 23,... more

CarlosIsDown
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2 years ago
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Article: How synthetic biology will bring us cheaper plastics by ruining the poorest nations on Earth.

The Sins of Syn Bio. How synthetic biology will bring us cheaper plastics by ruining... more

frankpatton
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2 years ago
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Song Of Rain

Beats mixed with ambient sounds. Birds, thunder & rain.

nanonarcagent
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2 years ago
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Cargill rolling in cash, relying on child labor

"Business is booming for the behemoth agricultural commodities trader Cargill. This week, the company announced a tripling of profits in the second quarter of its fiscal year. In the three months prior to November 30, Cargill's net earnings were a whopping $1.49 billion compared to $489 million during the same period a year ago. So why is this company still sourcing products made by forced and child labor?

Cargill's success is due in part to its ability to profit from the high food prices that are gripping the world. The UN's Food and Agriculture Organization and the World Bank have recently warned about the threat that continued rising prices at an all-time high pose for food security globally. From Haiti to Senegal to Bangladesh, food riots have broken out in reaction to price hikes on basic food items, echoing the protests that hit many countries throughout 2008. Recently, Algeria raised the prices of staples like flour, sugar and cooking oil by an average of 30 percent, leading to protests that left three people dead, hundreds injured and close to 1,000 people in jail.

High prices for food may be devastating for millions of people around the world, but clearly companies like Cargill have little to complain about as their corporate profits accumulate. While Cargill makes more money than ever, it is shocking that the company is somehow unable to mobilize its immense resources to stop the use of forced labor and abusive child labor by its palm oil supplier. As I wrote on Change.org last month, there are numerous cases of workers being trapped and forced to work under unsafe conditions on palm oil plantations supplying for Cargill in Malaysia and Indonesia.

Almost 200 Change.org readers have already called on Cargill to stop forced and child labor in its palm oil supply chain and they are not alone. Forty five companies have signed on to a pledge organized by the Rainforest Action Network (RAN) that specifically calls on Cargill to take action to responsibly source its palm oil to avoid environmental and human rights violations. RAN's campaign activities even helped convince General Mills to become a leader among major corporations in committing to responsible and sustainable palm oil production.

While Cargill rakes in profits from products harvested using exploited labor, it is often able to avoid public scrutiny since it is a privately-held company with little name recognition among consumers.

cont."Business is booming for the behemoth agricultural commodities trader Cargill.... more

JanforGore
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2 years ago
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African Rainforest Conservancy

Efforts to conserve Tanzania's Eastern Arc rainforest - one of the most... more

africanrainforest
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2 years ago
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