The environment in the news

Ami : Commémoration de la journée mondiale de lutte contre la désertification 

 L'évènement a donné lieu à une cérémonie à la localité de "Ghasrem" dans le département de Ouad-Naga présidée par M. Sidi Moloud Ould Brahim, secrétaire général du Ministère du développement rural et de l'environnement.

 Dans le mot qu'il a prononcé a cette occasion, le secrétaire général a précisé que le phénomène de la désertification pose de sérieux problèmes dans plusieurs zones sur notre planète en occasionnant la détérioration du sol et la réduction des ressources naturelles du fait du mouvement des dunes de sables.

 Ce phénomène conduit aussi à la diminution des potentialités agropastorales et à la raréfaction des pluies, a noté le secrétaire général.

 En terme de chiffres, M. Ould Brahim a précisé que le phénomène occupé 70% des terres sur notre globe, expliquant que cela est la conséquence de la coupe abusive des arbres, de l'urbanisation et de l'agriculture sauvages.

Au sujet des activités de lutte contre la désertification, le secrétaire général a énuméré les efforts entrepris dans ce sens dont l'implication de la société civile, l'ensemencement aérien, la construction des pare-feux et l'organisation de campagnes annuelles de reboisement.

 Enfin, M. Sidi Moloud Ould Brahim a réaffirmé que le gouvernement de transition, en application des orientations du Président du CMJD, chef de l'Etat le colonel Ely Ould Mohamed Vall a pris  les dispositions nécessaires pour inclure la problématique de l'environnement dans les politiques sectorielles pour assurer un développement durable.

Prenant la parole, au nom de la représentante résidente du PNUD à Nouakchott, Mme Sara de Pablos a précisé que la désertification, particulièrement en Afrique et notamment en Mauritanie, pose de grands problèmes pour atteindre les objectifs du millénaire pour le développement.

 Elle a ajouté que le système des nations-unies et en particulier le PNUD et le PNUE sont engagés à appuyer les efforts du gouvernement dans la lutte contre la désertification.

 Quant à Mme Moumna Mint Ely Beiba, présidente de l'Ong El Wafa qui co-organise les activités commémoratives de cette journée, elle s'est déclarée fière de la confiance placée en elle par le gouvernement et les partenaires en lui confiant la célébration de cette journée.

 Elle a aussi parlé, en détail des réalisations de son Ong, installée à Ouad-Nga, et qui intervient dans les domaines de la lutte contre la désertification, la pauvreté et la malnutrition ainsi que dans la réalisation des forges d'eau.

 La cérémonie a donné lieu à une remise de prix aux lauréats d'un concours scolaire, organisé par les Ministères du développement rural et de l'environnement et de l'enseignement fondamental et secondaire, le centre des nations-unies d'information et de documentation et l'union des artistes plasticiens de Mauritanie.

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Tagesspiegel:Die großen Fische verschwinden

Nairobi/Berlin - Große, wirtschaftlich bedeutende Speisefische wie Tunfisch, Kabeljau, Schwertfisch und Merlin sind auf dem Rückzug. Ihre Vorkommen sind im Vergleich zum vergangenen Jahrhundert um rund 90 Prozent zurückgegangen. Zu diesem Schluss kommt eine Studie des Umweltprogramms der Vereinten Nationen (Unep) und der Welt-Naturschutzunion (IUCN), die am Freitag veröffentlicht wurde. Die beiden Organisationen fordern, angesichts der massiven Überfischung vieler Fischarten, des Klimawandels, der Erwärmung und Versauerung der Ozeane schnell internationale Regeln für die Bewirtschaftung der Tiefsee und der offenen Meere zu finden. Diese müssten sich eher an den „ökologischen Grenzen“ orientieren als an politischen, fordert die Autorin der Studie, Kristina M. Gjerde von der IUCN.

Other Environment News

Source:: Sunday News

Story by: Charles Nzo Mmbaga

Date: 18.06.2006

Whichever name one wished to baptize it, the 2006/07 budget and Development Plan tabled in Parliament in Dodoma on Thursday appeared to address thorny issues associated with the 2005 CCM Election Manifesto that included improving the lives of Tanzanians, especially through the protection of the environment.

There is a lot of environmental sense for the government decision to exempt liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) and gas cylinders from paying VAT. Brilliant ideas. The VAT-less gas would automatically encourage the use of an alternative source of energy with a view to preserve the environment.

litre to 52/- per litre to encourage its use as alternative source of energy.

The minister also 'crucified' illegal timber traders by adding another nail to a ban, issued in April, on the exportation of timber to safeguard forests and water sources and the eviction of livestock keepers from riverbeds.
She indirectly 'banned' production or importation of thin plastic bags, ('Rambo' included). Some envious businessmen have started crying foul, claiming that about 5,000 jobs in related plastic industries would be compromised.

They however forgot to appreciate the budget for has paved the way for thousand more jobs, which include replacing those few affected by those few un-environment friendly plastic manufacturing businesses.

brunt are the poor developing countries, why should Tanzania be among the few which have been hit hard? That is the question.This is exactly Minister Meghji was not particularly amused last week in Dodoma.

Indeed, it would make no environmental sense at all if town, municipal and

city authorities would not help the JK government realise its environmental goal that is to return some or even all water catchments and the most spectacular natural and beautiful scenes in the country.
The government actions on environmental degradation would mean nothing, notwithstanding the environment kindly, if loggers and developers would not realise that environmental rape makes a few people rich for a few years, and then the serene environment is lost forever.

It is high time Tanzanians learnt to live in harmony with nature so the trees or forest land around are looked after. People themselves should feel it is their sacred duty to protect environment.

- Keay Davidson, Chronicle Science Writer

Friday, June 16, 2006

Global warming might be significantly worse than expected during the next century because the melting of carbon-rich permafrost in Siberia could expel hundreds of billions of tons of extra greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, scientists warn in a new study.

Experts said they can't be certain how large the impact might be, because they can't accurately estimate how much of the extra greenhouse gases will be absorbed by plants and the oceans.

One of the more frightening possibilities is that the permafrost-caused warming could feed on itself in what one scientist called a "vicious cycle": That is, it could trigger the melting of additional ice, which would unleash more greenhouse gases and thus cause more warming, in a self-repeating cycle for no one knows how long.

The melting of Siberian permafrost that has been frozen for thousands of years could eject about 500 billion tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere during the next century, scientists from Russia, Alaska and Florida report in today's issue of Science. By comparison, at present the atmosphere contains about 700 billion tons of greenhouse gases.

"I'm a scientist, so we tend to be conservative in our language. But I would say this could make global warming significantly worse" than expected, said E.A.G. "Ted" Schurr, a former UC Berkeley doctoral student who is one of the article's three authors. The other authors are Sergey A. Zimov of the Russian Academy of Sciences and Terry Chapin of the University of Alaska at Fairbanks.

Schurr, now a professor of botany at the University of Florida in Gainesville, traveled to Siberia to collect samples of permafrost -- permanently frozen ground rich in carbon-laden dust particles that have accumulated over a million and a half years. He extracted permafrost samples from up to 10 feet beneath the ground, then hauled them back to Florida in standard coolers, stopping from time to time to refreeze the samples in a fridge so they wouldn't melt en route.

When he allowed the permafrost to melt in his lab in Gainesville, microbes attacked and absorbed the carbon, transforming much of it into carbon dioxide gas. Schurr measured the rate of carbon dioxide emission by shining an infrared beam through it. The estimate of 500 billion tons in extra greenhouse emissions was derived partly from this analysis.

Carbon dioxide is the best-known greenhouse gas: It accelerates global warming by trapping infrared radiation before it can leave the atmosphere. Fossil fuels, when burned by cars and factories, are major sources of atmospheric carbon dioxide.

Leading climate models haven't incorporated the possibility of a major new greenhouse gas source from Siberia. The new report "makes it kind of scary -- it means there's a form of climate risk that we really haven't got a good handle on," said Chris Field, director of the Carnegie Institution's Department of Global Ecology at Stanford.

He was not directly connected with the study published in Science, but he and colleagues are working with the authors to incorporate their findings in improved computer models of future climate change.

In interviews Thursday, experts who aren't connected with the Science paper had varied reactions.

"It could raise temperatures dramatically beyond the current projections. Second, it could raise the rate at which temperatures rise," paleoclimatologist David Anderson of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's National Climate Prediction Center in Boulder, Colo., said in a phone interview.

Anderson noted that present-day models estimate the average planetary temperature will rise by 5.5 degrees Fahrenheit if carbon dioxide levels double. It's uncertain, though, how fast that doubling (which is driven in part by fast-spreading industrialization and car ownership) could occur.

"Conceivably, (permafrost melting) could eventually -- say within several centuries -- have as much impact as the burning of fossil fuels," raising the average planetary temperature by more than 10 degrees, Anderson said.

The Science study shows the amount of carbon frozen in permafrost around the world, not just Siberia, is much higher than previously calculated, a climate expert at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory said.

"We have known (about) the permafrost in Siberia before," explained atmospheric scientist Bala Govindasamy of the lab. "Previous estimates for global permafrost (are) between 200 and 400 (billion tons). This study has found higher carbon content in the Siberian permafrost and estimates that the total global amount could be about 1,000 (billion tons)."

The U.N.-sponsored Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change produced an original estimate for global warming of 3 to 11 degrees Fahrenheit over the next century, Govindasamy said. He added that the new permafrost data might push the estimate much higher -- to 5 to 15 degrees.

Kevin Trenberth, one of the nation's top climate modelers, said it's "hard to say" how much the findings could affect forecasts of global warming, but the effects are "likely nontrivial," he said in an e-mail.

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BBC: Japan gains key whaling victory

19 June 2006

Whaling ship
Japan has some way to go before commercial whaling can begin

Pro-whaling nations have won their first vote towards the resumption of commercial whaling for 20 years.

This is the most serious defeat the conservation cause has ever suffered at the IWC

Chris Carter,

New Zealand Environment Minister

Harpooned whales often take a long time to die, activists say

"It is clear that the intent is for the IWC to revert back to a whalers' club, which is what it was up to the 1970s," he said.
Brazil and New Zealand said they would challenge the resolution.
"This is the most serious defeat the conservation cause has ever suffered at the IWC," New Zealand Conservation Minister Chris Carter told AFP news agency.
"It has been a significant diplomatic victory for Japan."
Tokyo believes whale numbers have risen sufficiently to allow the hunting of certain species.
However, Japan's Deputy Whaling Commissioner Joji Morishita said any future commercial whaling would be on a much smaller scale than in the past.
"It's not going back to the commercial whaling, it should be the beginning of sustainable whaling, plus protection of depleted and endangered species," he said.

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Joji Morishita is a member of Japan's delegation to the International Whaling Commission. (Photo courtesy Government of Japan)

Japan then removed from the agenda a proposal to have coastal whalers be permitted to kill Bryde’s whales, knowing that it too would fail.
On Japan's proposal that the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary be abolished, the vote was only 28 for, and 33 against, with four abstentions. A two thirds majority was needed to pass the measure.
The IWC adopted a non-binding declaration proposed by 30 pro-whaling members - the St. Kitts and Nevis Declaration. The declaration supports the pro-whaling agenda and states that the IWC will collapse unless whaling resumes. It does not propose a course of action and has no effect on the workings of the commission.
A Japanese delegate called adoption of the declaration "a big step forward." Japan's chief delegate Minoru Morimoto said, "It is very satisfactory that a declaration which supports our efforts to normalize the IWC has been adopted." To Japan, "normalize" means the resumption of whaling. A global moratorium was imposed by the IWC in 1986.
But Australian Environment Minister Senator Ian Campbell, who is leading his county's IWC delegation, called the St. Kitts and Nevis Declaration, "a toothless statement of frustration."
anchovies

Anchovies found in the stomach of a Bryde's whale are examined aboard a Japanese research whaling vessel. (Photo courtesy Institute of Cetacean Research)

The declaration says the use of cetaceans in many countries contributes to food security and poverty reduction, while stressing that "the use of marine resources as an integral part of development options is critically important at this time for a number of countries experiencing the need to diversify their agriculture."
Despite having gained 33 votes in favor, 32 votes against, and one abstention, several governments are challenging the validity of the vote.
Many governments declared their opposition to the declaration, including Argentina, Australia, Belgium, Brazil, France, Germany, Italy, Mexico, Monaco, the Netherlands, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States. China abstained.
Conservationists in St. Kitts to observe the IWC meeting criticized the declaration and the process the pro-whaling nations used to bring it to a vote.
"This amounts to a sneak attack on the IWC," said Dr. Joth Singh, director of wildlife and habitat protection with the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW).
"After losing on every single proposal they brought to this meeting, the whaling countries and their supporters cooked up a non-binding statement, sprang it on the commission and pushed it to a vote," said Singh. "They want to kill whales, and they’re willing to kill the Commission to do it. But this is no death blow, just a stinging flesh wound."
Japan conducts annual whale hunts in the Southern Ocean and in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, saying they are killing whales for scientific research, which is permitted under the IWC regulations. The Japanese attempt to sell the meat from their whale research, but it is failing to move the tons of whale meat produced by the taking of up to 900 whales each year.
Each year, the pro-conservation nations condemn the practice, and they did so again this year.
Bradshaw

United Kingdom Minister for Local Environment, Marine and Animal Welfare Ben Bradshaw (Photo courtesy UK Government)

"I can't understand it," said Ben Bradshaw, Britain's Minister for Local Environment, Marine and Animal Welfare. "We are a great friend and ally of Japan in almost every other field. And it is completely inexplicable to me that Japan, Norway, and Iceland continue to push for a resumption of commercial whaling."
"That hugely damages their international reputations," Bradshaw said. "The whale meat is stacking up in huge freezers in these countries because they can't sell it. I can only think that it is about a kind of culturally nationalistic obstinacy that makes them pursue this course."
"The votes we have won at this meeting are a significant achievement for whales and whale protection," said Australian Environment Minister Campbell.
"This year we have kept the balance in favor of whale protection, however, the passage of a non-binding declaration by pro-whaling nations at today’s meeting, though toothless, is a wake-up call to the world," Campbell said.
Campbell said whale protection "is not a sprint – it is a marathon. "We need to strengthen our resolve and vigor and we need more effort, more organization and more resources to underpin our commitment to permanent global whale protection. Australia and the pro-conservation coalition will not give up the fight," he said.
whale

Minke whale (Photo by Amy Van Atten courtesy U.S. National Marine Fisheries Service)

On Friday, the IWC received new information from its Scientific Committee report on Antarctic minke whales, North Pacific common minke whales, Southern Hemisphere humpback whales, Southern Hemisphere blue whales and a number of other small populations of bowhead, right and gray whales.
There was some positive evidence of increases in abundance for several of the populations of humpback, blue and right whales in the Southern Hemisphere, although they remain at reduced levels compared to their pre-whaling numbers, the IWC said. Information remains lacking for other populations.
Special attention was paid to the status of the endangered western North Pacific gray whale, whose feeding grounds coincide with oil and gas operations off Russia's Sakhalin Island.
"The population numbers only about 122 animals," the Scientific Committee said, "and although there is evidence that it has been increasing at perhaps three percent per year over the last decade, any additional deaths, for example in fishing gear as has recently occurred, put the survival of the population in doubt."
Confrontation Over Southern Ocean Whaling Shapes Up for Austral Summer 2006-2007
Greenpeace announced on Friday that it intends to return to the Southern Ocean this year "to oppose Japan’s continued ‘scientific hunt’ which will target 935 minke whales and 10 endangered fin whales."
ships

Greenpeace ship confronts Japanese whaler in the Southern Ocean December 2005. (Photo courtesy Greenpeace)

"Whaling history may not have been rewritten this year but it was too close for comfort. The anti-whaling countries must see this as a wake-up call and add action to their rhetoric about protecting whales," said Shane Rattenbury, head of the Greenpeace International Oceans Campaign.
"This year Greenpeace will once again challenge the whalers on the high seas, the question is what are the anti-whaling countries prepared to do?" challenged Rattenbury.
The Sea Shepherd also plans to be in the Southern Ocean confronting the Japanese whalers.
Sea Shepherd Captain Paul Watson said, "Japan will not make any gains this year at the IWC and for another year at least the whales are safe on paper under the law. However the renegade illegal activities of Japan and Norway will continue and once again we must voyage to the remote and hostile waters of the Southern Oceans to search out and stop the illegal slaughter.
"Japan’s failure to control the IWC keeps the legal credibility for our intervention solidly in our court," said Watson. "Once again we will be hunting criminal whalers in Antarctic waters."
Although Greenpeace and Sea Shepherd will both send ships to block Japanese whalers, and both groups sent ships to the Southern Ocean last year, the two organizations are not cooperating in this campaign.
Watson says the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society approached Greenpeace in June 2005 with a request to work in partnership to jointly oppose Japanese whaling in the Southern Oceans. "Greenpeace refused to communicate with Sea Shepherd and took the position that Sea Shepherd crews were overly aggressive towards whaling," Watson said Friday.
"I was hoping we could play good policeman and bad policeman with the whalers," said Watson. "Greenpeace told us they were not interested in cooperation and did not support our tactics of directly interfering with the killing of whales, preferring to 'bear witness' to the killing to report it to the world."
ships

Crew members on the deck of the Sea Shepherd vessel Farley Mowat get ready to confront a Japanese research whaler. December 2005. (Photo courtesy Sea Shepherd)

"Once again, I am reaching out to Greenpeace, an organization that I co-founded with the request to work together with Sea Shepherd." said Watson. "I suspect I will once again be ignored but I guess there is no harm in asking, although it troubles me that this group that I helped to create has no time for cooperation with us."
Watson's involvement with the group that was to form Greenpeace began in 1969 when he was a Sierra Club member protesting on the U.S. and Canadian border against the nuclear testing at Alaska's Amchitka Island by the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission. He was a crew member on one of two Greenpeace ships that sailed to Alaska in protest of the testing in 1971.
In 1974, Watson, Bob Hunter and others organized the first Greenpeace campaign to oppose whaling. In June 1975, Hunter and Watson were the first people to put their lives on the line to protect whales when Watson placed his inflatable Zodiac between a Russian harpoon vessel and a pod of sperm whales.
Sea Shepherd is not officially present at the IWC meeting because it is the only organization banned from attending. Watson says "this is due to the fact that Sea Shepherd is the only organization that directly intervenes against illegal whaling."
"We don’t protest whaling," said Sea Shepherd International Director Jonny Vasic. "We intervene against illegal whaling by acting to uphold the international treaties and regulations protecting whales."
Sea Shepherd does have unofficial representation at the IWC. This year's IWC Vice Chair Horst Kleinschmidt of South Africa, is a director of the Sea Shepherd in South Africa and a member of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society's International Advisory Board.
Although the Japanese have not won any major votes at the IWC meeting, conservationists in Frigate Bay say they cannot relax.
"We are gravely concerned, but not disheartened," said Singh of IFAW. "The moratorium on commercial whaling remains and we may see further shifts in voting at this very meeting later this week. Whatever happens here in the coming days, we will continue working inside and outside the IWC to build a better world for animals and people and to protect whales for future generations to see."
The IWC meeting continues in St. Kitts through Tuesday. For next year, the commission accepted Chile’s offer to host the annual meeting.

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CHINA: June 19, 2006

BEIJING - A toxic spill in north China has contaminated water supplies for 50,000 people and poses a threat to a reservoir supplying millions more, state media reported on Friday.
Water pollution has become a major national concern since a blast at a chemical plant in November released a toxic slick into the Songhua river, affecting drinking water supplies to millions in the northeast.
Sixty tons of coal tar carried by an overturned truck spilled into the Dasha river in the northern province of Shanxi on Monday, Xinhua news agency reported.
"The spill, moving at about one km per hour, is approaching the Wangkuai reservoir about 70 km from the accident site," Xinhua said, quoted environmental protection officials.
The Wangkuai is one of two key reservoirs supplying water to 10 million people in Baoding, a city in neighbouring Hebei province.
The spill had already reached Hebei's Fuping county on Tuesday, Xinhua said, contaminating water supplies for 50,000 people.
Clean-up efforts, initially delayed by the truck driver's cover-up of the toxic cargo, had included the building of 51 dams to intercept the coal tar "so as to win time for treating polluted water", Xinhua said.
A chemical plant blast in China's booming eastern province of Zhejiang injured one person and left two missing, Xinhua said in a separate report.
A 38-year-old man and a 42-year-old woman were missing after "numerous explosions" occurred on Thursday at the Longxin Chemical Plant, which primarily produces hydrogen peroxide, Xinhua said. Another person had been injured.