El Presidente constitucional de Bolivia Evo Morales asistirá como invitado de honor al XVI Congreso Mundial Biológico (ORGANIC WORL CONGRESS) que se llevará a cabo en la ciudad italiana de Módena del

El Presidente constitucional de Bolivia Evo Morales asistirá como invitado de honor al XVI Congreso Mundial Biológico (ORGANIC WORL CONGRESS) que se llevará a cabo en la ciudad italiana de Módena del 16 al 20 de Junio próximos.

Junto a Morales estarán presentes representantes de movimientos biológicos de más de cien Países de todo el mundo, científicos y activistas de fama mundial con el único objetivo de construir un futuro sano, ecuo y solidario. Organizado por la IFOAM (International Federation of Organic Agricolture Movements) que reúne a 108 países de todo el mundo, MódenaBio2008 un consorcio creado por la Provincia de Módena y por la Asociación Italiana de Agricultura Biológica, el Congreso reunirá a los protagonistas internacionales de la agricultura biológica, de la economia y de la cultura sostenible, para garantizar a las generaciones futuras un ambiente sano.Durante los cinco días que durará Congreso, Módena se convertirá en la capital mundial de la agricultura biológica confrontándose sobre salud, ecología y responsabilidad, y presentando las novedades más recientes de la investigación científica. Con 30,4 millones de hectáreas certificadas y un mercado del valor de 26 mil millones de Euros, la agricultura biológica está creciendo siempre más y a discutir de agricultura biológica serán los protagonistas más calificados: técnicos, expertos y productores del Norte y del Sur del mundo como la indú Vandana Shiva, una de las mayores representantes del movimiento "altermondista", activista social y política, depositaria de la biodiversidad y una de las fundadoras de "World Social Forum". El italiano Carlo Petrini fundador de “Slow Food”, desde 1986 se  ha dedicado a  re-descubrir de nuevo los alimentos tradicionales y a la producción artesanal. Es el ideador de “TerraMadre”. En 2008 el cotidiano inglés “The Guardian” lo ha insertado entre las 50 personalidades que podrían salvar el mundo. Miguel Altieri, profesor de Agroecología en la Universidad de Berkeley (U.S.A.)., y coordinador general del programa de desarrollo de la agricultura sostenible de las Naciones Unidas. Hoy es consultor del programa de la FAO destinado a la conservación de los sistemas tradicionales de cultivo. Tewolde Berhan Gabre Egziabher, ganador del "Right Livelihood Award", en 2006 ha sido nombrado uno de los "Champions Of The World" por las Naciones Unidas por su empeño ligado al ambiente. Evo Morales, presidente constitucional de Bolivia, desde siempre atento al ambiente y a la justicia social. Sostenidor convencido de la agricultura tradicional de su tierra como el cultivo de la hoja de coca, considerada sagrada por los bolivianos y usada como producto médico, apoya con convinción a los movimientos biológicos. Wolfgang Sachs profesor e investigador. Tiene a su activo numerosas publicaciones, actualmente trabaja en el Wuppertal Istitute siguiendo proyectos importantes sobre la globalización sostenible. Achim Steiner director general de la UNEP (United Nations Evironment Programme), el programa ambiental de las Naciones Unidas.Principal argumento del Congreso será la segunda conferencia IFOAM "Cultivating the future based on scienze" dedicado especialmente a profundizar los tres principios fundamentales de la agricultura biológica: salud, ecología y equidad. Todo se desarrollará siguiendo un hilo conductor divulgativo  (Systems Values Track), que servirá a presentar e intercambiar experiencias prácticas y otro científico (Scientific Research Track), donde serán ilustradas las investigaciones más importantes que se están llevando a cabo.Los temas que se discutirán serán de los más variados e importantes en la vida de estos tiempos e irán de la producción de vegetales a la zootecnía, de la política agrícola y agraria internacional a la política de desarrollo, de la energía renovable a los derechos humanos y justicia social, de la cooperación internacional al uso de fertlizantes, del método de cultivo orgánico a la biodiversidad, de la seguridad y calidad de los productos biológicos y sobretodo al peso de la agricultura que podrían tener los países en vía de desarrollo.Todo esto para sensibilizar un estilo de vida sano y sostenible.

Edition INFORMATIONS GENERALES

Depuis un siècle, l'agriculture s'est concentrée sur trois produits de base, riz, blé et maïs, au détriment de tous les autres, une dépendance qui augmente les risques de crise, souligne Ahmed Djoghlaf, secrétaire exécutif de la CDB. De leur côté, les pays en développement exigent un partage plus équitable des ressources naturelles.

(Photograph) - MARINE dead zones, where fish and other sea life can suffocate from lack of oxygen, are spreading across the world's tropical oceans, a study has warned.

Researchers found that the warming of sea water through climate change is reducing its ability to carry dissolved oxygen, potentially turning swathes of the world's oceans into marine graveyards.

The study, by scientists from some of the world's most prestigious marine research institutes, warns that if global temperatures keep rising there could be "dramatic consequences" for marine life and for humans in communities that depend on the sea for a living.

Organisms such as fish, crabs, lobsters and prawns will die in such zones, warned Lothar Stramma of the Leibniz Institute of Marine Sciences in Kiel, Germany, who co-wrote the research paper with Janet Sprintall, a physical oceanographer at Scripps Institution of Oceanography in California.

In the study, published in the journal Science, they collated hundreds of oxygen concentration readings taken over the past 50 years in the Atlantic and Pacific over depths ranging from 985ft to 2,500ft.

"In the central and eastern tropical Atlantic and equatorial Pacific the oxygen-minimum zones appear to have expanded and intensified during the past 50 years," Stramma said.

The researchers found that such regions now extend deeper into the oceans and closer to the surface. Fish and other sea life cannot survive in such waters, said Sprintall.

The researchers say the change is closely linked to rising sea water temperature. At 0C, one kilogram of sea water can hold about 10ml of dissolved oxygen but at 25C this falls to just 4ml.

This impact is amplified by a host of other factors. One of the most important is that parts of the eastern Atlantic, eastern Pacific and the Indian Ocean are naturally low in oxygen - so a small additional decline has a disproportionately greater effect.

Examples of partly dead zones include a stretch of the Pacific about 5,000 miles wide off the west coast of South America. Others are found off the west coasts of Africa and India.

Additionally, as surface water heats up it becomes less dense and forms an insulating layer that stops oxygen percolating into the colder layers beneath.

Climate change is also suspected of altering the direction and strength of ocean currents, causing dead zones such as the one that suddenly appeared off Oregon, in America's Pacific Northwest, six years ago and which appears to have become an annual event, killing marine life at every level from plankton to salmon, seals and sea birds. Lisa Levin, professor of biological oceanography at Scripps, and a world expert on the expansion of oxygen depletion in the oceans, predicted that similar zones would eventually appear off California.

"Around the world there are already around 150 areas suffering from low or declining oxygen levels," she said.

Many of these are close to coastlines where the main cause is not climate change but pollution, especially agricultural chemicals washed off the land. The nitrogen in such run-off effectively fertilises the sea, causing a sudden "bloom" of algae and other planktonic life.

As such organisms die they are decomposed by bacteria that multiply so fast they suck all the oxygen from the water.

A report by the United Nations Environment Programme found that such coastal dead zones have doubled in number since 1995, with some extending over 27,000 square miles, about the size of the Republic of Ireland.

Among the worst affected are the Baltic Sea, the Black Sea, and parts of the Mediterranean. Perhaps the biggest of all is found in the Gulf of Mexico, where the Mississippi carries thousands of tons of agrochemicals into the sea every year.

Recent research has revealed that about 250m years ago average oxygen levels in oceans fell almost to zero - a reduction associated with dramatic changes in climate that resulted in the extinction of 95% of the world's species.
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The Observer Magazine (UK): Ethical Living: THE GREEN GAUGE

May 18, 2008
GOING UP:

By 2020, 1.6bn people will be on the move as tourists with a hulking eco impact. Get your green steps in first with

Green Passport , the UN's new eco travel site, at www.unep.fr/greenpassport

Danish conservationists are celebrating the opening of the first of five new national parks . Thy National Park is a 24.3-hectare haven of dunes and sand heaths, all now protected from development

The festival season is almost upon us, so a moment's silence please for abandoned tents (2,000 are left behind each year after Reading, for example). This year try renting a recycled cardboard (waterproof) tent by booking at www.myhab.com

GOING DOWN:

There is a problem with the Puerto Rican Parrot Recovery Programme. . . er, it doesn't seem to work. Despite their best efforts, the population is most at threat from hurricanes

The Empire State Building was lit green for the Rainforest Foundation 's Annual Benefit, but Sting's concern has been rated one of the worst New York City charities by watchdog Charity Navigator

When Lindsay Lohan allegedly pilfered an $11,000 blonde mink coat from a fellow reveller in New York, Peta must have hoped she was just taking it out of circulation. Unfortunately she wore it and then returned it
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Emirates News Agency: Zayed International Prize for Environment announced

WAM Dubai, May 19th, 2008 (WAM): HE Dr. Rashid Ahmed bin Fahd, Minister of Environment and Water announced today the winners of the Zayed International Prize for Environment in its fourth cycle. Dr. Klaus Topfer, former Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Programme and the chairman of the international jury for the Zayed Prize, and Dr. Habib Al Hibr, regional Director for the UN Environment Programme were present.

Dr. Gro Harlem Brundtland of Norway won the Zayed Prize for Global leadership in environment.

Dr. Brundtland is a Norwegian politician, diplomat and physician and an international leader in sustainable development and public health. She is a former Prime Minister of Norway and has served as the Director General of the World Health Organization. She now serves as a Special Envoy on Climate Change for the United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon.

She was Chair of the World Commission on Environment and Development (WCED), widely referred to as the Brundtland Commission, developing the broad political concept of sustainable development in the course of extensive public hearings that were distinguished by their inclusiveness and published its report Our Common Future in April 1987. The Brundtland Commission provided the momentum for the 1992 Earth Summit/UNCED and for the Agenda 21.

Dr. Brundtland was elected Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO) in May 1998. In this capacity, She adopted a far-reaching approach to public health, establishing a Commission on Macroeconomics and Health, and addressing violence as a major public health issue. She spearheaded the movement, now worldwide, to achieve the abolition of cigarette smoking by education and persuasion.

Under her leadership, WHO was one of the first major employers to require freedom from tobacco addiction as a condition for employment. Dr. Brundtland was recognized in 2003 by Scientific American as their Policy Leader of the Year for coordination a rapid worldwide response to stem outbreaks of SARS. In 1994, Dr. Brundtland was awarded the Charlemagne Prize of the City of Aachen.

In 2004 the British newspaper, The Financial Times, listed her as the 4th most influential European over the last 25 years, behind Pope John Paul II, Mikhail Gorbachev and Margaret Thatcher.

In May 2007, the UN Secretary General, Ban Ki Moon named Dr. Brundtland, as well as Ricardo Lagos (the former president of Chile), and Han Seung-soo (the former Minister of South Korea), to serve as UN Special Envoys for Climate Change.

Professors Jane Lubchenco from the United States of America and V. Ramanathan from India shared the Zayed Prize for Scientific and technological achievements in environment .

Prof. Jane Lubchenco is a world leader in environmental sciences. She discovered fundamental ecological and evolutionary relationships among animals and plants in complex coastal systems. She has studied the effect of aquaculture on world fish supplies and how biotic and abiotic local interactions can have a strong influence on the large-scale properties of ecosystems. Her recent work has shown how coastal oceanographic features can affect local community structure and dynamics. Such studies have led to a general understanding of factors affecting the distribution abundance and biodiversity of species. Author of several Citation Classics papers, she is a fellow of the US National Academy of Sciences, American Philosophical Society, and European Academy of Sciences, TWAS, and the Royal Society of the UK.

Prof. V. Ramanathan is among the most distinguished climatologists in the world. He identified the famous chlorofluorocarbons, stratospheric ozone and other pollutants as significant factors in the anthropogenic greenhouse effect (man made factors leading to global warming). He also demonstrated the positive amplifying effect of water vapor absorption on global warming, the global cooling effects of clouds on climate. More recently, he made significant contributions to the discovery of the widespread Atmospheric Brown Clouds (ABC) phenomenon. He showed that soot in the clouds led to a reduction in the solar radiation at the ocean surface, heating of the atmosphere and regional climate changed in South Asia. He is a member of the US National Academy of Sciences, the American Philosophical Society, The Academy of Sciences for Developing Countries (TWAS), and the Pontifical Academy of Sciences. For his outstanding contribution to the environment he received the Rosby Award and the Volvo Prize.

Zayed Prize for Environmental action leading to positive change in society was awarded to two Non-Governmental Organizations. The two NGOs are Environment Development Action in the Third World (ENDA) in Senegal and Tierramrica in Latin America.

Environment Development Action in the Third World was established in the Senegal in 1972. For more than 30 years it has demonstrated success in improving the environment and people's lives throughout the Continent of Africa. It has successfully transferred leadership through three generations of excellent leaders.

ENDA has established itself as one of the leading sustainable development organizations in the world. It is a member of RING, the world network of leading sustainable development organizations.

ENDA has a positive impact at local, national and regional levels. Working with the poorest of the poor in rural and urban areas, ENDA has achieved great success under very difficult circumstances. It is one of the very few successful pan-African Environment and Development Organizations that works throughout Francophone and Anglophone Africa and in North Africa.

ENDA is highly regarded by national governments and by the international community for its rigor in "research-action-learning", development impact, financial accountability and transparency. It is successful in a range of projects and activities from environmental action research, combating desertification, sustainable energy, working with women, youth and children, education training and awareness programs, and grassroots community self-help programs.

Tierramrica is a specialized information service on Environment and Development, produced by the international news agency, Inter Press Service (IPS). It is sponsored by the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP), the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and The World Bank (WB). The Tierramrica Administrative Board includes the UNEP, UNDP, WB and IPS.

The history of Tierramrica began in 1995. In its first phase the project produced a bi-monthly supplement distributed by 12 newspapers in 11 countries, achieving a circulation of one million. With its attractive design, Tierramrica received the award for excellence of The Society of Newspaper Design in 1996. Since 2000, the weekly print edition of Tierramrica is published in newspapers and magazines in Belize, Brazil, Bolivia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Honduras, Mexico, United States, Uruguay and Venezuela. Today, the general and technology headquarters located in Uruguay, while editorial coordination is based in Mexico, with Internet, radio and Portuguese edition based in Chile, Venezuela and Brazil, respectively. The multimedia presence of Tierramrica includes a weekly page published in a network of 20 newspapers and selected news broadcast by 400 radio stations in 10 countries throughout Latin America. Tierramrica news, reports and interviews are published weekly on its website in Spanish, English and Portuguese.

Tierramrica serves as a space for debate, drawing a wide range of social actors from Latin America and the world. Its editorial board includes Carlos Fuentes, Jos Roberto Marinho, Rigoberta Mench, Maurice Strong, Elena Poniatowska and C'sar Gaviria, among other personalities.

A statement from the Award committee said that the Jury decided that their achievements do fulfill the objectives of the Zayed Prize, in line with the philosophy of the late Sheikh Zayed and the vision of the H.H. the Patron, and they are worth the award.

The winners will be honored by the Patron, Vice President and Prime Minister of UAE and Ruler of Dubai HH Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum at a special Award Ceremony on June 9th 2008 at the Jumeirah Beach Hotel. The Ceremony will be attended by Environment Ministers from different parts of the world, heads of regional and international organizations, Gulf dignitaries and international media; in addition to the Jury and Technical Advisory Committee members. Several publications will be distributed during the ceremony including the Society and Environment Magazine in its new look, an Arabic refereed book on 'Environmental Planning' and the Zayed Prize Nomination Guide for the 5th Cycle.

The ceremony will be preceded by the 'Dubai International Conference on Sustainable Construction' and exhibition on Green Construction Technology to be held on June 8th 2008 at the Dubai Police Academy. The conference will be opened by the Chairman of the Higher Committee, Dr. Mohamed Bin Fahad and the Chairman of the International Jury, Dr. Klaus Topfer. The conference is a one day, three panels meeting which will be addressed by 13 speakers, mainly from the Private Sector.

WAM/AB
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Afrique en Ligne: UNEP/ICRAF launch seven billion tree planting campaign
Nairobi, Kenya - The UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and the World Agrofo restry Centre (ICRAF) have launched a worldwide tree planting initiative aimed a t empowering corporations and people to embrace the climate change challenge.

The campaign now targets the planting of seven billion trees, up from the one b illion target unveiled in 2006 as one of the responses to the threat of global warming, as well as to the wider sustainability challenges from water supplies t o biodiversity loss.

To date the 2006 initiative, which is under the patronage of Nobel Peace Prize L aureate and Kenyan Green Belt Movement founder Professor Wangari Maathai and His Serene Highness Prince Albert II of Monaco, has broken every target set and has c atalysed tree planting in close to 155 countries.

Achim Steiner, UNEP Executive Director, lauded the move and called on individual s, communities, business and industry, civil society organisations and governmen t s to evolve the initiative "onto a new and even higher level by the crucial clim a te change conference in Copenhagen, capital of Denmark, in late 2009".

"When the billion tree campaign was launched at the Climate Convention meeting i n Nairobi in 2006, no one could have imagined it could have flowered so fast and so far. But it has given expression to the frustrations but also the hopes of mi l lions of people around the world", Steiner said.

He recalled that in 2006 there were doubts that the target of planting some one billion trees would be achieved, but was happy that skeptics had to date been p roved wrong.

"The goal of two billion trees has proven to be an underestimate. The goal of pl anting seven billion trees is equivalent to just over a tree per person alive on the planet, and can be done, given the campaign's extraordinary track record and the self-evident worldwide support," he added.

The billion tree campaign has become a practical expression of private and public concern over global warming, with Heads of State as well as businesses; cities, faith, youth and community groups and individuals enthusiastically taking part in its activities.

It has also attracted the support of multilateral organisations including the Convention on Biological Diversity whose new Green Wave initiative was launched in advance of its important conference being held in Bonn, Germany, later this month, and which supports the Billion, now Seven Billion Tree Campaign.

"The Billion Tree Campaign has not only helped to mobilise millions of people to respond to the challenges of climate change, it has also opened the door, especially for the rural poor, to benefit from the valuable products and services the trees provide," said Dennis Garrity, Director General of the Nairobi-based World Agroforestry Centre.

"Smallholder farmers could also benefit from the rapidly growing global carbon m arket by planting and nurturing trees," he added.
 
Nairobi - 19/05/2008
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