Global News Post: Sanitation

e-Toilets from Kerala in Jammu and Kashmir

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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">By M. Jacob Abraham*<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Kerala's own electronic toilets (e-toilets),
one of the prominent innovations of the state in public health, hygiene and
sanitation sector, would now be seen featured at the scenic an snow covered
valleys of Jammu and Kashmir also.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Developed by Eram Scientific Solutions, the
Thiruvananthapuram based scientific R&D firm, the e-toilets for Jammu &
Kashmir region has been customized as per the region's own geographical and
sub-zero climatic conditions in response to J&Ks tourism departments
request for setting up e-Toilets in the State. The e-Toilets would be set up at
Affarwat and Gulmarg.  Affarwat is one of
the world's highest locations which uses cable car using gondolas at a height
of over 4000 ft above sea level and the only one location in the world that
takes skiers to a height of 4,390 metres.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">In addition to the e-toilets, specifically
designed STPs (Sewage Treatment Plants) would also be set up at <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placename w:st="on">Dal</st1:placename> <st1:placetype w:st="on">Lake</st1:placetype></st1:place>
to address its waste treatment woes. A 2.5 ton container loaded with the
e-toilet and STP components would be leaving from Thiruvananthapuram to <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jammu and Kashmir</st1:place></st1:state>. Eram
Scientific has designed customized e-toilets which can function in sub-zero
temperatures, even at -55o. In order to function at this sort of extreme cold
temperatures, military grade equipments have been used in the customized
e-toilet model. Eram Scientific has successfully implemented over 400 e-toilets
in various parts of the country.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The e-toilets are designed on the lines of
the Australian National Public Toilet Map. 
The user, could view the toilet map via the Internet or the cell phone,
select the nearest toilet station, set a parking space, make payment, view the
timings and get other details on allied facilities.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The company has entered into an association
with the Indian Institute of Science, <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Bangalore</st1:place></st1:city>
for further research and development of e-toilets.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The collaborative work will focus on
structural analysis and design verification of these toilets.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Need for a
Sustainable Intervention in Sanitation sector<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Urban and Semi Urban areas -These areas face
severe problems with respect to standard public toilets, cleanliness and better
sanitation amenities in particular. The cities and towns being overpopulated
pose severe health hazards arising due to unhygienic conventional sanitation
methods being followed in these areas. The introduction of the proposed
sanitation system would radically change the plight of the existing toilets and
public sanitation system in place.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Social Relevance - Unhygienic sanitation
cause infection and related diseases especially in women and children. The
level of privacy, dignity and safety for women can be rendered in the best
possible manner by installing Electronic Public Toilets in all possible public
locations.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Unhygienic Tourist Spots - Tourism is also
facing the ill-effects of the deplorable sanitation conditions in the country.
Several tourist spots and connecting roads are a pity to the country and are
causing discomfort for the tourists. Chances of getting infected with severe
communicable diseases in the Indian streets do create doubts for the tourists
in choosing it as their destination.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">eToilet, <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">India</st1:place></st1:country-region>’s First
Electronic Public Toilet<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Through this unique product, the company has
attempted to address the inherent challenges of public sanitation. In a perfect
situation, a public toilet should have the capabilities to address waste
management, effective water usage and sustainability as core challenges among
various other issues. eToilet is positioned as the perfect solution which
addresses all these effectively; it is cost effective, appropriate and suitable
for the geographic and demographic patterns of any location. It is working on a
mission to have all Indian Cities with modern sterilized public sanitation
system. To further improve Urban Sanitation Infrastructure, such projects with
huge social relevance are inevitable.  <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The Innovation<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The idea was to develop an eco-friendly
public sanitation system for the Indian sub-continent based on a novel
convergence of electronic, mobile, web and bio technologies, for serving as an
affordable, sustainable and effective public toilet service in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">India</st1:place></st1:country-region>.  eToilet is positioned as the ultimate
solution to ensure public toilets across the country are maintained
hygienically, with the minimum of manual intervention, and substantial energy
and water savings as well. The e-Toilet works on total auto mode: The insertion
of a coin opens the door for the user, switches on the light - thus saving
energy - and even directs the user with audio commands. The toilets are
programmed to flush 1.5 liters of water if the user takes up to 3 minutes, and
4.5 liters of water if the usage is longer. They can also be programmed to
clean the platform after every 5 or 10 persons use the toilet. The e-Toilet is
the result of a convergence of electronics, web and mobile technologies,
featuring automated door opening, power flushing, automatic closet washing and
sterilization, and automatic platform cleaning mechanism, all backed by SMS
alerts to inform the control room about the status of water tank and bio gas
plant in the event of any errors or failures through which the downtime can be
minimized. The solid and liquid wastes are treated scientifically. A
bio-membrane reactor is used to treat solid wastes and the water used is
purified for reuse. The uniqueness of the solution lies in the built-in
electronic innovations that will facilitate self cleaning of the toilets with
minimum water usage, and treatment of solid waste and water with an environment
friendly sewage treatment solution. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">  <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">eToilet covers all the three aspects of
quality of life, efficiency and environment protection. eToilet is aimed at
improving the quality of life of the public; i.e. the wellness of the people by
providing clean, hygienic state-of-the-art sanitation facilities which
overrides the traditional public toilets. Though the unit is fully automated,
it does not create any kind of usage barrier to the normal user. Efficiency is
brought into practice through its unique futuristic approach woven with an
intention to preserve our precious resources such as water, electricity and
managing waste through effective and efficient sewage treatment techniques. It
is also a cost-effective mechanism to ensure proper public sanitation facility
in highly populated regions. The average life of a unit is estimated to be
around 7-10 years and thus it offers durability. Also the deployment of such
units will provide employment opportunities for many. This will help many
people to earn their livelihood. Environment is protected through eToilet’s
Green technology focus and is all set to emerge with a matchless ‘green model’
through a linkage with Indian Institute of Science.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">400+ units of eToilet are installed in
various locations of our country. The commercial production of the same started
during the first quarter of 2010 to provide world class sanitation facility for
tourists.  Eram has installed e-toilets
in various parts of Kerala and Greater Noida. 
Another 300 is under implementation and will be operational within next
two months.  Each system is used by an
average of 130 peoples per day.  The
company has now entered into technology transfer agreement with <st1:country-region w:st="on">South Africa</st1:country-region> and marketing arrangement with <st1:country-region w:st="on">Nigeria</st1:country-region> and <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Botswana</st1:place></st1:country-region>.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">High Impact
Projects<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">eToilet is now evolving as a sustainable
project for providing clean and hygienic urban infrastructure. Various
Government Departments in Kerala have been implementing large scale projects
for providing sustainable technology based urban sanitation projects.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Connected e-Toilets would communicate over a
GPRS system and they are accessible over a mobile or internet for locating
them.  The e-Toilets can provide
information about its working status, whether for male or female, whether
changing stations for babies are available and other facilities and the
distance from the location specified can be provided.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The company has recently won a whopping
grant of over $ 4,50,000 from the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation to set up
eco friendly and hygienic e-Toilets making public conveniences more accessible
to the urban poor.  The prototyped
e-toilet was developed under Technopreneur promotion programme (Tepp) of Department
of Scientific and Industrial Research of Government of India by Technopark,
Thiruvananthapuram promoted by Government of Kerala. The innovation got grant
in aid from Government of India for the prototype development and after
completing the working models, this technology has been transferred to Eram
Scientific Solutions for comercialising the technology. (PIB Features.)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">*Deputy Director, PIB, Thiruvananthapuram.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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e-Toilets from Kerala in Jammu and Kashmir

By M. Jacob Abraham* Kerala's own electronic toilets (e-toilets), one of the prominent innovations of the state in public hea...

India: Bio-toilets to Bring about Rural Revolution in the Country, Says Rural Development Minister

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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">The Union Minister of Rural Development, Drinking Water and Sanitation, Jairam Ramesh, the Defence Minister, A. K. Antony and the Minister of State for Chemicals and Fertilizers, Srikant Kumar Jena visiting the Bio-Digester based toilets, during the MoU Exchange function between DRDO & Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation for Implementation of Bio-Digester based Eco-friendly Toilets in Gram Panchayats, in New Delhi on July 26, 2012. Photo © PIB<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing"><br />
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</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">NEW DELHI (PIB) --- The Minister for Rural Development and Drinking Water and Sanitation Jairam Ramesh said that one lakh bio-toilets will be installed in about 300 backward Gram Pachayats of the country in the next two years to make them open defecation free. He said, the project will entail a cost of 150 crore rupees in the first phase.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">He was speaking here after the signing of an MoU between DRDO and Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation for Bio-Digester based Eco-friendly toilets developed by DRDO.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Ramesh said, his Ministry has also offered to install with DRDO built bio-toilets in all new railways coaches and to share half the cost of retrofitting all existing 50,000 coaches in the next four to five years. He informed that the whole project will cost about 500 crore rupees and offered to share the burden on a 50-50 basis with the Railways. He said, the measure will not only prevent the corrosion of tracks but will also provide odourless toilets to passengers. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">The Minister said there are three dimensions to sanitation challenge in India and the solution must be found with an obsession to tackle the same. Referring to the fact that 60 percent of all open defecations in the world happen in India, Ramesh promised to make the country open defecation free in the next ten years. He said 11 million passengers travel every day by train and at present waste is dumped directly on to the tracks because of the existing toilet system in trains. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">The Minister said the third aspect of the sanitation problem is that there are still 15 lakh in-sanitary latrines in the country, where manual scavenging is widely prevalent.  Ramesh said, the DRDO technology is an important route and not a magic bullet, but he expressed the hope that in the long run it will bring about a revolution in the rural areas, if pursued in a mission mode manner.</span><span dir="RTL" lang="AR-SA" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><o:p></o:p></span></div></div>

India: Bio-toilets to Bring about Rural Revolution in the Country, Says Rural Development Minister

The Union Minister of Rural Development, Drinking Water and Sanitation, Jairam Ramesh, the Defence Minister, A. K. Antony and the Ministe...

YEMEN: Water fights spark concern over refugee influx

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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">Water woes for residents and refugees <o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">alike in Yemen s capital</span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;"> Photo ©</span> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">IRIN <o:p></o:p></span></div></td></tr>
</tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; text-justify: kashida; text-kashida: 0%; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">SANA’A  (IRIN) - Somali refugee Asmaa Abdullah, 35, and her three children, have been struggling to get water for more than a year in the run-down Safia neighbourhood of the Yemeni capital, Sana’a.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
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“We arrive at al-Usaimi water tap [supported by a charity] before locals, but are pushed to the end of the queue. Sometimes I queue for three or four hours to fill my container.”<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
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But Abdullah says she dares not argue for fear that she might get beaten up.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
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Water shortages, which have been worsening since serious political unrest began in February 2011, are causing friction between locals and refugees in Sana’a, according to the police.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; text-justify: kashida; text-kashida: 0%; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">“Arguments and scuffles between African refugees and local citizens over water have become a daily scene in this slum [Safia],” said Mohammed al-Behish, head of Safia police station, adding that many water disputes go unreported.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
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“Last week, a Somali woman came to us, bleeding from her nose, claiming she was beaten up by three Yemeni women. In the same week, a local resident reported to us that his daughter was hit by two Ethiopian women at the tap,” al-Behish said.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
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The slum-dwellers queue at the tap to get water free: Most cannot afford trucked-in water, the price of which has doubled in the last 14 months, Yahya al-Sanabani, a long-term adviser to parliament’s utilities’ committee, told IRIN.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
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In Safia, where it is estimated a quarter of the 65,000 residents are Africans, the state water supply system gets cut off for more than 10 days at a time, said Khalid al-Kharbi, a local water company official.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; text-justify: kashida; text-kashida: 0%; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br />
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<tr>   <td style="background: black; border-bottom: solid white 2.25pt; border: none; mso-background-themecolor: text1; mso-border-bottom-themecolor: background1; padding: 0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt;" valign="top">   <div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><v:shapetype coordsize="21600,21600" filled="f" id="_x0000_t75" o:preferrelative="t" o:spt="75" path="m@4@5l@4@11@9@11@9@5xe" stroked="f"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">    <v:stroke joinstyle="miter">    <v:formulas>     <v:f eqn="if lineDrawn pixelLineWidth 0">     <v:f eqn="sum @0 1 0">     <v:f eqn="sum 0 0 @1">     <v:f eqn="prod @2 1 2">     <v:f eqn="prod @3 21600 pixelWidth">     <v:f eqn="prod @3 21600 pixelHeight">     <v:f eqn="sum @0 0 1">     <v:f eqn="prod @6 1 2">     <v:f eqn="prod @7 21600 pixelWidth">     <v:f eqn="sum @8 21600 0">     <v:f eqn="prod @7 21600 pixelHeight">     <v:f eqn="sum @10 21600 0">    </v:f></v:f></v:f></v:f></v:f></v:f></v:f></v:f></v:f></v:f></v:f></v:f></v:formulas>    <v:path gradientshapeok="t" o:connecttype="rect" o:extrusionok="f">    <o:lock aspectratio="t" v:ext="edit">   </o:lock></v:path></v:stroke></span></v:shapetype><v:shape alt="''" id="Picture_x0020_3" o:allowoverlap="f" o:spid="_x0000_s1026" style="height: 13.5pt; left: 0; margin-left: 0; margin-top: 0; mso-position-horizontal-relative: text; mso-position-horizontal: absolute; mso-position-vertical-relative: line; mso-position-vertical: absolute; mso-wrap-distance-bottom: 0; mso-wrap-distance-left: 0; mso-wrap-distance-right: 0; mso-wrap-distance-top: 0; mso-wrap-style: square; position: absolute; text-align: left; visibility: visible; width: 17.25pt; z-index: 1;" type="#_x0000_t75">    <v:imagedata o:title="''" src="file:///C:\Users\GHAZAN~1\AppData\Local\Temp\msohtmlclip1\01\clip_image001.jpg"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">    <w:wrap anchory="line" type="square">   </w:wrap></span></v:imagedata></v:shape><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><strong><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">The worst thing is that these   African refugees or immigrants concentrate in densely populated cities such   as Sana’a, which is expected to run out of water in less than a decade</span></strong><b><span style="color: white; font-size: 12pt;"><v:shape alt="''" id="Picture_x0020_42" o:spid="_x0000_i1025" style="height: 13.5pt; mso-wrap-style: square; visibility: visible; width: 17.25pt;" type="#_x0000_t75">    <v:imagedata o:title="''" src="file:///C:\Users\GHAZAN~1\AppData\Local\Temp\msohtmlclip1\01\clip_image002.jpg">   </v:imagedata></v:shape></span></b><b><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></span></div></td>  </tr>
</tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; text-justify: kashida; text-kashida: 0%; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Residents receive water for a few hours every 10 days, al-Kharbi told IRIN. “Many women and children are sneaking into mosques at prayer times to fill their containers,” he added.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
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<strong>Government concern</strong><span class="apple-converted-space"> <o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; text-justify: kashida; text-kashida: 0%; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><br />
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The government recently expressed concern<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>about overburdened public services caused by the daily arrival of 160-200 refugees and immigrants from the Horn of Africa.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
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The Interior Ministry said the number of African immigrants and refugees in Yemen exceeded one million, and that more than 50,000 new arrivals, mostly from Ethiopia and Somalia, entered Yemen in the first half of 2012.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
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The UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR), however, put the total number of refugees officially recognized by the government at<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>220,000.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
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In 2011, some 75,651 Ethiopians, 27,350 Somalis, and 153 persons from other countries arrived in Yemen by boat, said Edward Leposky, an external relations officer with the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) in Yemen. “This trend has continued in 2012,” he added.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
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“The worst thing is that these African refugees or immigrants concentrate in densely populated cities such as Sana’a, which is expected to run out of water in less than a decade,” said parliament committee adviser al-Sanabani.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
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Ame Abdi Shaboo, chairman of the Oromo Refugee Committee, told IRIN that refugees and immigrants from the Horn of Africa have no choice but to head for the cities. “Most of them work as domestic helpers or car cleaners to earn a living; this work cannot be found in rural areas,” he said.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
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Yemen is one of the most water-scarce countries in the world. A 2012 Rural Water Sector Survey showed that 30 percent of water supply systems were not working said a report<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
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“On average, 140 cubic metres of water are available per person per year in Yemen, compared to an average 1,000 cubic metres per person in the Middle East and North Africa region,” it said.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; text-justify: kashida; text-kashida: 0%; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"> </span></span><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><br />
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Sana’a has been predicted to run out of economically viable water<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>by 2017.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;"><o:p></o:p></span></div></div>

YEMEN: Water fights spark concern over refugee influx

Water woes for residents and refugees alike in Yemen s capital Photo © IRIN SANA’A (IRIN) - Somali refugee Asmaa Abdullah, 35, and he...

MALI: Beyond the drought - “Families will disappear”

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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: xx-small;">Photo: Chris Simpson/IRIN<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: xx-small;">Chronic drought means some families in Kayes have nothing left to share<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><br />
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<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 18px;">KAYES (IRIN) - “It was the drought that made people move away from here,” Ousmane Touré said in Kayes, 450km northwest of Bamako, the capital of Mali, and a 10-hour bus ride across the scorched scrubland of the western Sahel. “There had been a tradition of emigration, but it was when the harvests failed in the 1970s that we saw a real surge in emigration. There was simply not enough to eat, so people took off for France, Germany and the United States. They knew it was only the way of feeding their families back home in Kayes. The same thing is happening this year.”</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Touré heads the Association of Returning Migrants of Kayes (AMRK), a welfare organization that tries to provide short-term shelter and counselling to people coming back to this part of the country. The returnees, particularly those from the ethnic Soninké community, which spreads across Mali, Senegal, Mauritania, Gambia and Guinea-Bissau, have played a major role in developing western Mali through their remittances and other cash transfers, giving it a stronger identity and economic base. Many of them are now deportees who have fallen foul of immigration restrictions in France and other countries. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">“The emigrants have been well-organized and have always ensured money gets channelled back, building health centres, schools, even roads,” said Touré, but the economic crisis in Europe and tighter immigration controls are having a serious knock-on effect, and impoverished villages can no longer count on the same level of support. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">In Mali the three-month rainy season starts in June, with the heaviest falls in July and August. This is the time when everyone participates in the intense agricultural activity of the main cropping season, which provides most of the food for the rest of the year. The lean period occurs in the driest months, just before the next rains come. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">For Kayes, the capital of Mali’s First Region, which borders Mauritania, Senegal and Guinea, 2012 is a particularly tough year. Besides the effects of political turbulence elsewhere in the country and a rebellion in the north, serious food security problems appeared months ago, after sparse rains. Surveys by the government and international agencies identified Kayes and the surrounding areas as particularly vulnerable, and likely to be exposed to severe food shortages as an already impoverished population experienced the impact of failed harvests. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: xx-small;">Photo: Chris Simpson/IRIN<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: xx-small;">Mariam Cissoko, President of a Farmers Association in Kayes </span></span></div></span></td></tr>
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</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 18px;">By February, market prices for sorghum, millet, groundnuts and other basic foodstuffs were grossly inflated; food reserves were depleted well ahead of the usual lean season, with alarming shortages of seeds. There were complaints that the government’s emergency food rations had given temporary respite to some villages but had ignored dozens more, as well as serious nutritional concerns, particularly for children. The UN estimated that 1.6 million Malians would be food insecure in 2012.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">The events in the capital and the north have overshadowed the food crisis in the west. “A lot of things have been put on standby,” said Abdoulaye Samoura, advocacy officer for NGO Oxfam. “There have been serious delays in getting food distributed.” The dramatic price hikes at local markets in January and February have eased off, but there is no reason for complacency. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">“What do you do when there is no food and you have to take care of five, 10, 20 people?” Touré asked. The answer is an exodus of men to Bamako, or across the border into Senegal, or to the gold-mining areas 75km to the south. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Mariam Cissoko, who heads the women’s section of the Association des Organisations Professionnelles Paysannes - Association of Professional Peasant Farmers (AOPP) - in Kayes, confirms that 2012 has been markedly worse. “It rained for only month of the usual three (in 2011) and that has meant drought and everything that comes with it,” she said. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">“For us, the Bambara people, we don’t have the same tradition of emigration as the Soninké. We are agro-pastoralists. If you work the land, you will also have some livestock. But there is a strong spirit of solidarity here. In normal times, if you have something in reserve, you will give to those who don’t. But times like these, people just don’t have anything to spare.” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">The priorities are stark. “Feed us and feed our animals,” stressed Cissoko. “If NGOs come and talk to us about education, that is all well and good, but we need food first. Without that, everything falls to pieces. People will get sick. Children won’t go to school. Men may be able to take off and look for opportunities elsewhere, but women and children are stuck where they are.” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3pSssYUTrh5AwhvPiLyAHaRms_ErqVFEVTvBdOB7hM7HJgnD4GGsYcYhcZ3ngWT7I0-Cu38I8xx8kQ3kjhc9ud02pb9COFbk201nky3AL54c793qGYXXsmxSblojeG7bKCyJ7P5BvPcY/s1600/201204121310520793.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3pSssYUTrh5AwhvPiLyAHaRms_ErqVFEVTvBdOB7hM7HJgnD4GGsYcYhcZ3ngWT7I0-Cu38I8xx8kQ3kjhc9ud02pb9COFbk201nky3AL54c793qGYXXsmxSblojeG7bKCyJ7P5BvPcY/s1600/201204121310520793.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; line-height: 14px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: xx-small;">Photo: Chris Simpson/IRIN<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: xx-small;">Market gardening is increasingly important to boost food security</span></span></div></td></tr>
</tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 18px;">Kayes has been described as the second hottest place in Africa after Djibouti. “I grew up here and I remember an abundance of corn. We didn’t have droughts like we get now,” Cissoko told IRIN. “In the hottest months, the temperature normally goes to 42 or 43 degrees Celsius, but last year it was 47 or 48 at times, in the shade. The desert is advancing and the climatic changes are here for everyone to see. It has all come progressively.”</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Food aid from the UN World Food Programme (WFP) and others may ease the problem, but Cissoko says rural communities in the Kayes region are exhausted by the cycle of drought and dependency. They need long-term practical help as they confront shrinking pasture and ongoing food deficits. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">“We need proper cereal banks in villages; we need irrigation systems that protect agriculture; we need a credit system that can work, where people can afford the interest rates,” she told IRIN. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Kayes town lies on the banks of the Senegal River. In stark contrast to the dominating barrenness of the western Sahel, the riverbanks are studded with neatly tended plots yielding tomatoes, cucumbers, onions and other crops. This is all part of the maraîchage, or market gardening that provides women in particular with a livelihood. “When I was a child, people said: ‘You will never get to plant fruit and vegetables here,’” but they were wrong. That was forty years ago. It began timidly, but the gardening has really picked up.” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">But Cissoko acknowledges that cereal production is critical, and Ousmane Touré is equally blunt in demanding that the state and its international partners step up their efforts to help Kayes cope with the food deficits and the devastating drought. “What do you do when there is no food?” he asked. “People will not stay here. Families will disappear.” <o:p></o:p></span></div></div>

MALI: Beyond the drought - “Families will disappear”

Photo: Chris Simpson/IRIN Chronic drought means some families in Kayes have nothing left to share KAYES (IRIN) - “It was the drought t...

CLIMATE CHANGE: Eye on the Oceans

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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Photo: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/sudhanshugoyal/4763171330/"><span style="color: windowtext; text-decoration: none;">Sudhanshu Goyal/Flickr</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></span></div></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Hundreds of millions depend on fishing for food and income</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;"><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 18px;">JOHANNESBURG (IRIN) - The tide seems to be finally turning for the oceans. After years of neglect, there is a growing focus on the health of the oceans, which helps sustain life on earth, particularly in light of the impact of rising levels of carbon dioxide (CO2) and higher temperatures.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Higher CO2 levels are causing the oceans to acidify at rates not seen in the last 20 million years says Wendy Watson-Wright, assistant director-general and executive secretary of the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission of the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO-IOC). <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Several UN agencies led by UNESCO-IOC have developed a Blueprint for Ocean and Coastal Sustainability, to highlight the role of oceans in sustaining life. They offer suggestions ahead of the UN Conference on Sustainable Development (UNCSD, or Rio+20).  <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">The oceans not only supply the oxygen in every second breath we take, but also absorb at least 33 percent of the CO2 human beings produce. The oceans have already absorbed more than 80 percent of the heat added to the climate system over the past 200 years, says the International Programme on the State of the Ocean.  <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">As CO2 dissolves in seawater, the pH (indicator for acidity and basicity of an aqueous solution) of the water decreases - a process known as "acidification" (a lower pH value indicates an increase in acidity). <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">This can reduce the availability of calcium for plankton and shelled species, threatening their survival. This in turn could affect the entire ecosystem, as much of the marine food chain depends on these organisms for food. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Acidification impact <o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"> Studies on ocean acidification's potential impact on marine life and ecosytems have been presented regularly at side events during UN climate talks, but have never made it to the main negotiationsStudies on ocean acidification's potential impact on marine life and ecosytems have been presented regularly at side events during UN climate talks, but have never made it to the main negotiations, even though such talks frequently mention the impact of high CO2 on sea-level rise. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Mean ocean pH has decreased (which means the acidity in water has increased) by 30 percent since 1751 and if we continue to emit CO2 at the same rate, the pH could decrease by a further 150-200 percent by 2100, says a new book, Valuing the Ocean, by the Stockholm Environment Institute. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">"This rate of change is around 10 times faster than that caused by any other event experienced by the ocean in the last 65 million years," it says. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Yet only one percent of the oceans are protected, according to UNESCO-IOC. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Proposals <o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">The Blueprint calls for the creation of a global “blue carbon market” similar to the proposal that led to Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation in Developing Countries (REDD), a mechanism within the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) to generate funds for the protection and conservation of forests. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">In 2009, over 80 percent of the world's fish catch was consumed by human beings, providing 4.2 billion people with more than 15 percent of their average per capita intake of animal protein, says the Blueprint. That year, fishing and aquaculture provided full or part time jobs for about 180 million people, supporting the livelihoods of over half a billion people. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">The paper calls for the launch of a global inter-disciplinary programme on ocean acidification risk assessment. "The goal is to provide global, regional, and national forecasts and to identify `point of no return’ tipping points where acidification could lead to marine ecosystem collapse." <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Sinking Islands It calls for support for small island states which are heavily dependent on the ocean - to help them use and manage marine resources sustainably. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">The Blueprint also urges UNFCCC to include the impact of CO2 on the oceans in their deliberations; calls for stronger governance of the high seas; and the promotion of responsible fishing and waste disposal. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Pollution - especially that caused by fertilizer run-off, sewage and industrial waste - causes hypoxia, a reduction of the content of dissolved oxygen which makes life unsustainable in many parts of the ocean. There are now over 500 known hypoxic “dead zones” in the world’s oceans. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">These problems were highlighted at UNCSD meetings in Rio (1992) and Johannesburg (2002). However, pledges to restore fish stocks to sustainable levels by 2015, and commitments to create networks of protected marine areas by 2012, have not got very far, say UN agencies. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Watson-Wright says she is hopeful, as the daft declaration released on 10 January by the UN, includes the proposals set out in the Blueprint. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">UNESCO-IOC has also announced the launch of a Surface Ocean CO2 Atlas (SOCAT), which provides a 40-year record of CO2 accumulation in the surface ocean. The dataset was assembled by a team of over 100 scientists from around the world, coordinated by various universities and research centres. <o:p></o:p></span></div></div>

CLIMATE CHANGE: Eye on the Oceans

Photo: Sudhanshu Goyal/Flickr Hundreds of millions depend on fishing for food and income JOHANNESBURG (IRIN) - The tide seems to be f...

CLIMATE CHANGE: Understanding Rio+20

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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2EYORG64SLrmAP25r-1ikaJfc5sDl4JN6qtshC_9h8SvZVx7hjxbRFx9Bs3EhCHP3Bf7spf0ngwQ0B8VWOXLN_o-SmufCZs7NeodNC_kTUn6CbjZXsSxDpSYM_kNG2KvPFaelQDPb6mY/s1600/201108081026210918.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="288" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2EYORG64SLrmAP25r-1ikaJfc5sDl4JN6qtshC_9h8SvZVx7hjxbRFx9Bs3EhCHP3Bf7spf0ngwQ0B8VWOXLN_o-SmufCZs7NeodNC_kTUn6CbjZXsSxDpSYM_kNG2KvPFaelQDPb6mY/s400/201108081026210918.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Photo: <a href="http://www.irinnews.org/photo/"><span style="color: windowtext; text-decoration: none;">Jason Gutierrez/IRIN</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">We have to take action now to sustain life in the coming years<o:p></o:p></span></div></span></td></tr>
</tbody></table><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 18px;">JOHANNESBURG (IRIN) - A Nobel laureate, a Swedish environmentalist’s idea, the “doughnut” concept, Scandinavia’s sense of social capital, measuring the quality of life, and valuing the oceans are just some of the things trending in the run-up to the Rio+20 UN Conference on Sustainable Development due to be held on 20-22 June 2012.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Rio+20 will look at how economies have grown at the expense of natural resources and human capital since the last Earth Summit in Rio in 1992, when the concept of “sustainable development” gained currency. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">The idea of growth meeting “the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs” has not gained much traction since the 1992 conference - largely because countries continued to equate development with economic growth, and sustainable development languished as a fringe environmental concern, says a UN-commissioned study.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">  </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Twenty years later, “sustainable development remains a generally agreed concept, rather than a day-to-day, on-the-ground, practical reality,” says a report by the UN High-level Panel on Global Sustainability.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">  </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Since 1992, alarm bells on several interconnected factors with a far-reaching impact on growth, resources and the quality of life - accelerated man-made climate change, population growth, increasing numbers of hungry people, rapidly depleting and more expensive fossil fuels, and a decline in food production - have been ringing louder. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">“Achieving sustainability requires us to transform the global economy. Tinkering on the margins will not do the job,” said the UN Panel’s report. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Optimists in the scientific and aid community hope Rio+20 will develop from an opportunity to reflect into a collective effort to plot the world’s future growth path. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">IRIN aims to make the conference more relevant and accessible by examining some of the ideas circulating ahead of it. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">1. Elinor Ostrom: Fast emerging as the moral and academic compass of the conference, Ostrom’s work, which won her the Nobel Prize for Economics in 2009, shows that growth combined with the sustainable use of natural resources is achievable. Ostrom looked at certain rural communities in Asia, Africa and Europe which have for centuries successfully managed in a sustainable way their common resources - grazing land, water and forests. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When the Scandinavian countries had to set targets to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, they did not consider the markets... but went ahead because they value the well-being of humans and environment...The communities developed while preventing problems such as overgrazing, misuse of forests or over-consumption of water. The fact that Ostrom took a multidisciplinary approach (rooted in economics, environment and social capital, successfully combining the three pillars of sustainable development), makes her the expert everyone wants to hear from. She was the chief scientific adviser to the recent Planet Under Pressure conference - an attempt by the scientific community to set the agenda for Rio+20. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">2. Planetary Boundaries and Future Earth: The concept of Planetary Boundaries proposed in 2009 by Johan Rockstrom of the Stockholm Resilience Centre and 28 scientists, posits that there are nine critical Earth-system processes and associated thresholds that we need to respect and keep within, in order to protect against the risk of irreversible or even catastrophic environmental change on a continental or global scale. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Doing so would create a safe operating space for humanity. According to the concept’s authors, three of the nine suggested thresholds have already been crossed (climate change, biodiversity and the nitrogen cycle). The threshold for the phosphorus cycle (linked, within the concept, to the nitrogen cycle) has also been crossed, according to a scientific paper in 2011.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">  </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">The status of the concept grew after being mentioned in the UN Panel report. The Boundaries concept has inspired the “nexus approach” between food, water and energy, which was also noted by the UN panel. “All three [food, water and energy] need to be fully integrated, not treated separately if we are to deal with the global food security crisis,” said the report. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Rockstrom, last week announced the launch in Rio of Future Earth, a 10-year collaborative initiative which will provide the knowledge to help societies meet their sustainable development goals. The International Council for Science, the Belmont Forum (a high-level group of donors who fund climate research), the UN Environment Programme (UNEP), the UN University, and the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) are all part of the initiative. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Tom Mitchell, head of climate change at the UK’s Overseas Development Institute (ODI), was a bit skeptical about how “10 years of science inquiry” would help. He said countries needed solutions now - embedded in governments and designed to cater for national requirements. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">3. The doughnut: In February 2012, Kate Raworth, a senior researcher with Oxfam, pointed out that human growth was glaringly absent from Rockstrom’s concept. She combined social boundaries (such as access to water, health services, food, jobs, energy and education for all) within the planetary boundaries - highlighting the need for an environmentally safe space which needed to be compatible with poverty eradication and rights for all. Between the planetary ceiling and the social foundation lay an area - shaped like a doughnut - which is a “safe and just space for humanity to thrive in”, her paper said.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">  </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Raworth said well-designed policies can promote both poverty eradication and environmental sustainability. She told IRIN the objective was to be able to take care of everyone’s minimum needs, while re-defining the meaning of prosperity, which is equated with material wealth and associated with over-consumption (e.g. food, vehicles).</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;"> “Governments need to look beyond taking care of people’s material needs and focus on quality of life, qualities of social relationships.” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“The concept of Planetary Boundaries is almost pure science,” noted Andrew Scott, researcher with ODI, while the “doughnut” concept was grounded in human reality and the need to agree on a minimum standard of living, whilst guarding against over-consumption.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">This calls for the need to review UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which were not very ambitious to begin with, he said. “Instead of calling for the eradication of poverty it [the MDGs] settled for the halving of poverty by 2015.” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Felix Dodds, eminent author and head of the Stakeholder Forum for a Sustainable Future, also enthused about the “doughnut proposal” in the Planet Under Pressure conference, and suggested the world should strive to turn everyone into a member of the middle-class. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">4. Sustainable agriculture: After years of lobbying for an agriculture system which would respect the biosystem and at the same time increase the production of quality food to keep the numbers of malnourished down, scientists feel they are making headway. The proposed draft outcome document of the Rio+20 conference makes note of their concerns. But is that good enough - will that force a change and make sustainable agriculture a part of mainstream policy in countries? <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Kenyan scientist Judi Wakhungu, a member of the Commission on Sustainable Agriculture and Climate Change, says attitudes are changing on the ground: Sustainable agriculture is now being taught in universities in developing countries; donors particularly in Scandinavian countries are more willing to fund such initiatives tailored by developing country governments; and at government levels, sectors such as water, energy and agriculture have begun to talk to each other. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Christopher Barrett, who teaches economics and agriculture at Cornell University in the USA, said: “The central issue is high-level political commitment to enacting the necessary policies.” He said the “lofty rhetoric” of the L'Aquila G-8 summit, or earlier summits such as Gleneagles, have “not been matched by significant new investments or policy innovations by the world's major economies”. Progress towards sustainable agriculture was “incremental and dwarfed by the fiscal and employment challenges faced by the OECD [Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development] countries,” he added, and we should “not hold our breath for any great breakthrough” at Rio+20. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">5. Social capital versus market-based approaches: Academically, social capital is a concept which places value on social relations and the role of cooperation to get collective results. The concept is making waves among development experts and the scientific community in the Rio+20 context, particularly as it forces societies to reflect on their value systems. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">“It [social capital] is too technical a word,” says Oxfam’s Raworth, but essentially the concept is about valuing quality of life and interpersonal relations more than material wealth. Brazilian scientist Carlos Nobre, a member of the Commission on Sustainable Agriculture and Climate Change, explained: “It is a concept followed by Scandinavian countries - where human well-being is more important than the market value of a particular resource. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFvjtPQZdNkowpb_Gestv39B_KW7-kEcFrfUxUA11I89iBVqP3jjgwJ1-9So-8VaKQj5kJsBzr6cNO25o_xE3DZZRUNxzozyyDUP8H-nJmxQE7CFROzAEN_a0lxCC7nMo7j7CaaqpqOi0/s1600/201112021203540454.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="241" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFvjtPQZdNkowpb_Gestv39B_KW7-kEcFrfUxUA11I89iBVqP3jjgwJ1-9So-8VaKQj5kJsBzr6cNO25o_xE3DZZRUNxzozyyDUP8H-nJmxQE7CFROzAEN_a0lxCC7nMo7j7CaaqpqOi0/s400/201112021203540454.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Photo: <a href="http://www.shaynerobinson.co.za/" target="_blank"><span style="color: windowtext; text-decoration: none;">Shayne Robinson/Greenpeace</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Multilateral processes to make life on earth sustainable such as the<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">UN talks on climate change have been moving at a snail's pace<o:p></o:p></span></div><div><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;"><br />
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</tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">"For instance when the Scandinavian countries had to set targets to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, they did not consider the markets and industries but went ahead because they value the well-being of humans and environment more than anything else.” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">But the reality is that most countries value markets more than human and environmental well-being, say experts, so a value has to be attributed to a natural resources to make people take care of it. As UNEP head Achim Steiner says, “we have to place ecology in economics.” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">“We need to create markets around natural resources such as provision of environmental services,” said ODI’s Mitchell. The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change did that with trees and carbon, but the process has not got very far. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Both Raworth and Nobre said that to achieve real change, attitudes to wealth needed to be changed, but this could only happen from the bottom up. "Market-based mechanisms to control and exploit the use of our natural resources should be seen as a means to get to a state of well-being and not as the goal," said Nobre. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Richard Norgaard, one of the founders of ecological economics, said at the Planet Under Pressure conference that instead of markets dictating and shaping our economies, “we need to ask what kind of economy we want to live in and then design incentives for the markets.” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">6. Measuring wellness: Putting a value on the quantity of natural resources that had to be exploited to achieve certain outcomes could help in terms of sustainability, argued Pablo Muñoz, an economist working on the Inclusive Wealth Report (IWR) project, a joint initiative of UN Univeristy-International Human Dimensions Programme on Global Climate Change (IHDP) and UNEP, aiming to measure, among other forms of wealth, the Natural Capital of countries. The report will be released at Rio+20. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">"A country can exhaust all its natural resources while posting positive GDP [Gross Domestic Product] growth," said Muñoz. The world needs "an indicator that estimates the wealth of nations - natural, human and manufactured and ideally even the social and ecological constituents of human well-being," he added. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Some findings of the reports were released at the Planet Under Pressure conference. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Between 1990 and 2008, the wealth of Brazil and India in terms of per capita GDP rose 34 percent and 120 percent respectively. Natural capital, the sum of a country's assets, from forests to fossil fuels and minerals, declined by 46 percent in Brazil and 31percent in India, according the new indicator. Brazil's "Inclusive Wealth" rose by 3 percent and India's rose by 9 percent over that time. But do not expect countries to start using the new indicator any time soon. "It took years for countries to come round to using GDP - so it will be a few years yet," said Muñoz. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">7. Valuing the oceans: Attempts to put a value on the exploitation of natural resources are ongoing globally. A new book by the Stockholm Environment Institute calculates the impact of climate change on the economic value of the oceans. It says climate change (in the last 200 years the oceans have absorbed 25-30 percent of the global accumulated emissions of carbon dioxide) alone could reduce the economic value of the oceans by up to US$2 trillion a year by 2100.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">  </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
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CLIMATE CHANGE: Understanding Rio+20

Photo: Jason Gutierrez/IRIN We have to take action now to sustain life in the coming years JOHANNESBURG (IRIN) - A Nobel laureate, a ...