Southeast Asia a center for illegal wildlife trade

I'm going to Indonesia soon, to write about the current plight of orangutans who are losing habitat to palm oil plantations. And to learn more about the illegal trade in wildlife, especially endangered primates.

If you regularly read the website of "Traffic: The Wildlife Trade Monitoring Network, you know that southeast Asia is the epicenter of the illegal trade in protected wildlife. The Chatuchak weekend market in Bangkok is said to be the single largest market on the planet where wildlife is traded illegally. That's one place I'm going.

Sally Kneidel Ph.D.--

http://www.basilandspice.com/living-green/great-apes-are-losing-ground-32010.html

10/03/2010
Click here to read on...

Over a third of the carbon emissions related to the consumption of goods in wealthy nations actually occur in developing countries, according to a new analysis by researchers with the Carnegie Institution. Annually, each person if the United States outsources 2.5 tons of carbon due to consumption habits, most frequently in China. In Europe the figure of 'outsourced' emissions rises to 4 tons per person.

"Instead of looking at carbon dioxide emissions only in terms of what is released inside our borders, we also looked at the amount of carbon dioxide released during the production of the things that we consume," co-author Ken Caldeira said in a press release. Caldeira is a researcher in the Carnegie Institution's Department of Global Ecology.

http://news.mongabay.com/2010/0308-hance_outsource.html

08/03/2010
Click here to read on...

Brazil and the United States have signed an agreement to worth together to reduce deforestation as part of an effort to slow climate change.

The memorandum of understanding signed by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in Brasilia last Wednesday comes as talks on REDD, a proposed climate change mitigation mechanism that would pay tropical countries for reducing emissions from deforestation and degradation, move forward despite the lack of a formal climate treaty.

http://news.mongabay.com/2010/0307-brazil_us_mou.html

07/03/2010
Click here to read on...

Union Minister for Environment and Forest Jairam Ramesh has announced that the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) will launch a dedicated forestry satellite in all likelihood in the year 2013.

Against the biennial exercise in vogue, the facility will help to continuously monitor the forest cover, health and diversity. Similarly, efforts are on to launch an indigenous satellite for monitoring greenhouse gases and aerosol emissions next year, which will place India on a rung occupied by a select few in the world.

http://beta.thehindu.com/sci-tech/energy-and-environment/article202431.ece?homepage=true

07/03/2010
Click here to read on...

Australia has joined forces with its neighbor, Indonesia, to aid beleaguered forests in the Jambi province on the island of Sumatra, reports Reuters.

The A$30 million ($27 m) project aims to address the underlying drives of deforestation in Jambi, a province that has lost more than two-thirds of its forest as a result of logging, conversion for oil palm and pulp plantations, and subsistence agriculture. The initiative would fight deforestation, rehabilitate and reforest degraded land, and provide alternative incomes to locals, thereby raising the province's capacity to store carbon in its rainforests and peatlands.

http://news.mongabay.com/2010/0303-australia_jambi.html

03/03/2010
Click here to read on...

By Ben Webster, Enviromental Editor, The Times

Using fossil fuel in vehicles is better for the environment than so-called green fuels made from crops, according to a government study seen by The Times.

The findings show that the Department for Transport's target for raising the level of biofuel in all fuel sold in Britain will result in millions of acres of forest being logged or burnt down and converted to plantations. The study, likely to force a review of the target, concludes that some of the most commonly-used biofuel crops fail to meet the minimum sustainability standard set by the European Commission.

Under the standard, each litre of biofuel should reduce emissions by at least 35 per cent compared with burning a litre of fossil fuel. Yet the study shows that palm oil increases emissions by 31 per cent because of the carbon released when forest and grassland is turned into plantations. Rape seed and soy also fail to meet the standard.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article7044708.ece

01/03/2010
Click here to read on...