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Thread: Environmental concerns

  1. #51
    Kevster
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    Default Re: Environmental concerns

    'Arctic orcas highly contaminated
    By Paddy Clark
    BBC News

    Killer whales have become the most contaminated mammals in the Arctic, new research indicates.

    Norwegian scientists have found that killer whales - or orcas, as they are sometimes known - have overtaken polar bears at the head of the toxic table.'

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4520104.stm

  2. #52
    coconut's Avatar
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    Default Re: Environmental concerns

    'Driven to extinction: cuts threaten Large Blue'

    http://news.independent.co.uk/enviro...icle337399.ece

  3. #53

    Default Re: Environmental concerns

    The Vegan Society is looking to make people more aware of the great environmental benefit of going vegan. Many environmentalists are still unaware of this, so it could have a fantastic veganising effect to inform them.

    If you know anyone who would be a great part of what the Vegan Society are doing, then please tell them about the 3 jobs going at the Vegan Society office in the UK.

    More on these jobs at:
    http://www.veganforum.com/forums/sho...206#post131206
    (read to the end of the thread for the latest)

  4. #54
    Kevster
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    Default Re: Environmental concerns

    'Animal Aid's criticism of charities that donate farmed animals to impoverished communities in the 'Third World' has received powerful backing from a leading environmental group. As we have argued, goats and other farmed animals do not alleviate poverty but add to it because of the cost of the animals' upkeep and the damage they do to landscapes that are invariably already environmentally stressed.'

    http://www.animalaid.org.uk/news/2006/0602times2.htm

  5. #55

    Default Re: Environmental concerns

    oooohhh this is a good one Piggy!

  6. #56

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    Default Re: Johns Hopkins Uni recommends vegan diet to combat global warming

    Quote gertvegan

    Put high pressure on those in power to change their destructive ways. You put the change in climate change.
    We can do this by contacting an environmental group like Greenpeace and asking to be put on their mailing list. Then lobby our MP or elected government rep by writing letters and emailing. We can do this with more than one organisation.
    Consider joining a local campaigning group.
    Look at our own contributions to environmental degradation!

    1. Stop using our cars so much.
    2. Use public transport.
    3. Don't buy things we don't need.
    4.Don't buy stuff with built in obselecence
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planned_obsolescence
    5.Change our energy suppliers to an environmentally friendly ones.
    6. Think about selling our second homes or holiday homes and moving to a more energy efficient home (detached homes use more energy than any others).
    7. Think carefully before you fly anywhere. Flying is the most environmentally damaging means of transport.
    8. Go Vegan.
    9. Reduce packaging.
    10. Replace conventional lightbulbs with energy efficient ones.
    11. Turn appliances off when not in use
    See my local diary ... http://herbwormwood.blogspot.com/

  7. #57
    Kevster
    Guest

    Default Re: Environmental concerns

    'Britain now 'eating the planet'

    By Mark Kinver
    BBC News science and nature reporter

    Consumer societies: Good for business or bad for the planet?
    The UK is about to run out of its own natural resources and become dependent on supplies from abroad, a report says.

    A study by the New Economics Foundation (Nef) and the Open University says 16 April is the day when the nation goes into "ecological debt" this year.

    It warns if annual global consumption levels matched the UK's, it would take 3.1 Earths to meet the demand.

    In 1961, the symbolic "ecological debt day" was 9 July; in 1981, it had shifted forward two months to 14 May.

    The authors of the UK Interdependence Report hope to highlight the need to curb rising consumption levels.'

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4897252.stm

  8. #58
    Seaside
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    Default Re: Environmental concerns

    Today there are over 6.5 billion people in the world.

    Over the last 100 years, the world's human population has quadrupled. And at current rates of growth we will add more people to the planet in the next 50 years than we did during the first 500,000 years of human history!

    Human population growth is a critical environmental issue. It places enormous pressure on limited natural resources and exacerbates many environmental problems including deforestation, water scarcity, pollution and loss of biodiversity and habitat.
    Ask Congress to take action.

    By providing access to basic healthcare and education, international family planning is one of most cost-effective ways to help countries voluntarily reduce population pressures, improve maternal and child health, protect the health of our environment, and ensure our children’s future well-being.

    The world is at a critical juncture. Across the globe over one billion teenagers are now entering their reproductive years. This is the largest group of teenagers in history, and their level of access to basic family planning services will shape the world for generations to come. Take action.

    Unfortunately, as unmet need for family planning programs continues to rise drastically, U.S. funding has plummeted.

    This Mother’s Day is a great opportunity to show your support for international family planning. Mothers represent a promise for the future of our children – a future with love, a clean environment, good health and education.

    Please ask Congress to support increased funding for U.S. international family planning programs – such programs are essential for protecting the health of families, wildlife and the planet, now and for generations to come.

  9. #59
    veggiewoman
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    Default Re: Environmental concerns

    well done greenpeace:
    http://www.greenpeace.org.uk/

    Illegal Amazon soya export facility closed



    Greenpeace campaigners block an illegal depot in Brazil owned by Cargill, one of the main culprits of the soya plantations that are destroying the Amazon rainforest.

    Cargill are a US multi-national, supplying companies like KFC with the chicken they sell in their restaurants

    Tell KFC to stop buying chicken from Cargill, because fast food shouldn't cost the Earth.
    more
    take action


    Finger lickin' good?

    Greenpeace campaigner Belinda Fletcher reports from the Amazon on the efforts to finger the latest target in our soya campaign and discovers that the Colonel has some very uncouth friends.
    more
    take action

  10. #60
    Kevster
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    Default Re: Environmental concerns

    'In Burma, the ancient teak forests are being ripped apart. In Chelsea, the banned wood is sold at the UK's top flower show

    By Martin Hickman, Consumer Affairs Correspondent
    Published: 27 May 2006

    Exhibitors at Britain's biggest garden show, the Chelsea Flower Show, are selling hardwood from the unprotected rainforests of Asia, a trade that has been condemned by one of the country's leading environmental bodies.

    Secret tape-recordings made during an undercover investigation by Greenpeace and The Independent found sales staff taking orders for teak garden furniture logged in Burma, whose brutal military regime is condemned globally. One trader said a teak table tucked at the back of his stand - behind more regular timber - had come from Burma because of "corruption". To the outrage of environmental groups, the Burmese military junta allows widespread logging of endangered rainforest. [...]'

    http://news.independent.co.uk/enviro...icle620185.ece

  11. #61
    veggiewoman
    Guest

    Default Re: Environmental concerns

    I was just reading this on the news aswell, wonder if Chelsea Flower show stopped to think :

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/5018336.stm


    Rainforests 'still at great risk'

    The survey studied 814 million hectares of managed rainforest

    Most of the world's managed rainforests are still in great jeopardy with only 5% being treated in a sustainable way, a new report has said.
    Each year 12m hectares of the forests are cleared for agriculture and other development, the International Tropical Timber Organisation report says.
    Forests will continue to be lost unless there is better management, it adds.
    But it also points to many improvements and says an area about the size of Germany is now being well managed.
    'Collective failure'
    The report surveyed 814 million hectares (two billion acres) of rainforest designated by governments in 33 nations as being under sustainable management.
    Illegal logging is blamed for degrading millions of hectares


    It says in addition to agriculture and development problems, millions more hectares are being degraded through illegal logging and poor land use.
    The report, Status of Tropical Forest Management 2005, says there has been a collective failure to understand that forests can generate considerable economic value without being destroyed.
    In countries like Nigeria and the Philippines there is now relatively little natural forest left, the report says.
    In other countries like Liberia and the Democratic Republic of Congo, progress to protect the rainforests has been disrupted by armed conflicts.
    Too often, say the authors, government promises to protect these tropical forests have not been matched by actions on the ground.
    On the plus side, the report says in countries like Bolivia, Ghana and Brazil notable improvements have been made to develop sustainable practices such as harvesting timber in a way that does not destroy the forest.
    Report co-author Duncan Poore said there was "good news" but it was "very fragile". "It is a starting point. It shows where things ought to go. But there is no knowing if they will," he said. Another author, Alastair Sarre, said it was a major improvement that 36m hectares of rainforest were now being properly managed compared to less than one million in 1988.

  12. #62
    I eve's Avatar
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    Default Re: Environmental concerns

    here in Australia, especially in the State of Queensland where I live, trees are felled like there is no tomorrow, yet when John Howard was in the US this week, he planted TWO trees! big deal.
    Eve

  13. #63

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    Default Re: Environmental concerns

    Kudos for writing the article. As a writer, I've also been blasted for writing pro-environmental, pro-vegan, etc. pieces. But don't get discouraged; I've found that often it's the dissenters that make the most noise; those that are on your side don't take the time to thank you! So keep up the good work!

  14. #64

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    Default Re: Environmental concerns--wetlands

    Given the arrival of hurricane season here in the United States and after the devastation of Hurricane Katrina last year, I was thinking about the demise of the wetlands around Louisiana and then learned that the wetlands are the number one threatened ecosystem in the world. They make up 6% of the Earth's surface, and many countries have already lost half or more of their wetlands.

    There's much debate about how much the destruction of the wetlands around Louisiana actually contributed to the losses experienced in the US. But there should be no debate about the need to save these precious regions, wherever they are.

  15. #65
    Kevster
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    Default Re: Environmental concerns

    'New homes drive out rare wildlife

    Survey reveals the devastating effect on species and habitats as land is swallowed up

    Juliette Jowit, environment editor
    Sunday June 18, 2006
    The Observer

    Government plans to build hundreds of thousands of new houses across Britain are a greater threat to the country's most at-risk species and habitats than climate change.

    A report this week on more than 500 of the most vulnerable plants, animals, birds and reptiles will admit that the majority are still declining or not recovering, 10 years after a national plan was launched to save them. Conservationists are also planning to add many more species to the list because they have slipped to dangerously low population levels, calling into question the government's key target to 'halt' biodiversity loss by the end of the decade. [...]'

    http://observer.guardian.co.uk/uk_ne...800279,00.html

  16. #66

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    Default Re: Environmental concerns

    THe UK government has a policy of encouraging a huge number of new buiild homes built by the private sector of course and encouraging home ownership, or rather mortgages, and doing nothing at all about buy to let. To have this policy and at the same time have a policy on protecting biodiversity makes them look like they want to please both the environmentalists and the aspiring middle classes, and also the property companies and property speculators. What makes it even worse is that a lot of the new developments are outside urban areas and off decent transport routes and so anyone who wants to live there will have to drive a car, possibly on a new road. To encourage biodiversity along the side of motorways and on motorway roundabouts will not address the problem of habitat destruction.
    See my local diary ... http://herbwormwood.blogspot.com/

  17. #67
    veggiewoman
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    Default Re: Environmental concerns

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/st...814673,00.html

    Disease, habitat loss and climate change threatens amphibians

    · Third of species at risk, say scientists
    · Rescue breeding urged to counter extinctions


    Ian Sample, science correspondent
    Friday July 7, 2006
    The Guardian

    Fifty of the world's leading conservation experts are calling for an urgent rescue mission to save frogs, newts and other amphibians from extinction. They believe fast action is needed to save the planet's 5,743 amphibian species after research showing that 32.5% are threatened.
    Up to 122 amphibian species have become extinct since 1980. Since the 1960s these vertebrates have gone into sharp decline as humans have encroached on their habitat. Climate change and infectious diseases have also taken their toll.
    Writing today in the US journal Science, the conservationists propose a $400m (£217m) initiative, the Amphibian Survival Alliance, to dispatch "rapid response" teams to collect endangered amphibians for captive breeding. The alliance is also to investigate lethal amphibian diseases and environmental changes.
    The alliance is expected to become part of the World Conservation Union, which monitors endangered species and which has developed international treaties to urge governments to fund conservation.
    Amphibians are considered delicate sentinels of environmental change. Sudden collapses in their populations in the 1980s and 1990s sparked research. Some scientists believe the fungal disease chytridiomycosis, which has spread round the globe, may be to blame in many cases.
    Last year, English Nature said the disease was found in Britain for the first time, after infected bullfrogs, imported from North America, had escaped. The organisation destroyed 11,000 infected frogs and is investigating to see if the disease is established here. Predictions suggest that the fungus - which can wipe out 50%-80% of amphibians within four to six months of its appearance - emerged from South African toads but is spreading steadily, by about 17 miles a year.
    The alliance will boost existing conservation efforts to protect species such as the dyeing poison frog, the splash-backed poison frog, and the poison arrow frog. Native to South and Central America, these brightly coloured animals are extremely sensitive to logging and building infringing on their homes.
    Tim Halliday, an Open University biologist and author of the proposal, said poor waterways protection had seen freshwater biodiversity fall by half in the past 20 years. There were no treaties to protect small streams and ponds. Mark Stanley Price, of the Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust in Jersey, a co-author of the proposal, has invited conservationists to train in amphibian conservation to help the alliance. "You can say that this is conservationists firefighting but the truth is this is incredibly urgent ... here we have a major group of animals facing serious decline."





    Special reports
    Conservation and endangered species
    Animal rights
    Global fishing crisis
    Waste and pollution

    Useful links
    WWF UK: endangered species
    Greenpeace UK
    IUCN - the world conservation union
    RSPB
    Joint Nature Conservation Committee
    Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (Cites)
    Marine Conservation Society


  18. #68
    I eve's Avatar
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    Default Re: Environmental concerns

    Railway poses new dangers to fragile Tibetan plateau AFP [Friday, 7/7/06] from phayul.com

    While China is keen to stress the environmentally friendly aspects of the new railway to Tibet, many are concerned about the line's impact on Himalayan region's fragile ecosystem. Engineers have modified parts of the route along the Qinghai-Tibet plateau because it passed too close to the habitats of certain species, such as the black-necked crane.

    Global warming was also taken into account to stabilise the track, with systems installed to ensure the ground remains frozen along the 550km where the line is anchored in permafrost.

    However, this means little for critics who point to China's notoriously bad environmental record across the rest of the country, and see the train line as opening the flood gates to similarly bad practices in Tibet. Nearly three decades of economic "development" has seen China become home to many of the world's most polluted cities, with the environment consistently sacrificed in the drive to modernise. The government conceded last month that the nation's environmental woes were steadily growing and costing the economy around $200-billion each year.

    The report listed excessive logging, degraded pasture land, shrinking wetlands and overuse of fertilisers and pesticides as major problems.

    Tibet, located mostly at an altitude of more than 4 000m above sea level and cut off from the rest of China by high mountains, has largely avoided the devastation because of its inaccessibility. The opening of the train line, which runs 1 142km from the mountain outpost of Golmud in China's far N-W Qinghai province to the Tibetan capital Lhasa, has changed all that.
    Eve

  19. #69
    Ex-admin Korn's Avatar
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    Default Re: Environmental concerns

    Hi,
    I'm closing this thread now, as we just have created a new subforum with the same name as this thread. Please continue to post environmental related news and info in separate threads!
    Thanks,
    Korn
    I will not eat anything that walks, swims, flies, runs, skips, hops or crawls.

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