BUNKER ROY: Green Personality for April 2019

NAME: BUNKER ROY

DATE OF BIRTH: AUGUST 2, 1945

NATIONALITY: INDIAN

“We have shown that solar-electrified villages can be technically and financially self-sufficient.”

— Bunker Roy

EDUCATION

He attended The Doon School from 1956 to 1962, and St. Stephen's College, Delhi from 1962 to 1967. Roy was the National Runner-up in squash in 1964, and participated in three world squash championships representing India.

OCCUPATION/CAREER

Bunker is a founder of what is now called Barefoot College. After conducting a survey of water supplies in 100 drought prone areas, Roy established the Social Work and Research Center in 1972. Its mission soon changed from a focus on water and irrigation to empowerment and sustainability. The programs focused on siting water pumps near villages and training the local population to maintain them without dependence on outside mechanics, providing training as paramedics for local medical treatment, and on solar power to decrease dependence and time spent on kerosene lighting.

ADVOCACY/ACHIEVEMENTS

He was recognized in 2010 in Time for the programs of the college which have trained more than 3 million people in skills including solar engineers, teachers, midwives, weavers, architects and doctors. Roy was appointed by Rajiv Gandhi to the government's Planning Commission. He recommended that legislation be created that would apply a "code of conduct" for non-governmental organizations. He also proposed that a national council be created that would recommend "legitimate" organizations to the government and monitor their activities. Both of these recommendations were "fiercely" opposed as mechanisms that could be used to promote patronage of favored groups and quell organizations that were not supportive of a particular government or party.

In 1983, he was the plaintiff in Roy v State of Rajasthan in which the Supreme Court struck down an emergency policy which had allowed women famine relief workers to be paid less than male workers.

Roy has spoken at the TED conference;in which he talks about how the Barefoot College "helps rural communities becomes self-sufficient."

RESOURCES

•  Mortenson, Greg. (29 April 2010) Sanjit 'Bunker' Roy The 2010 TIME 100. TIME. Retrieved on 2 June 2012.

• Jump up to bunker Roy (1 February 2006). Verghese, B. G., ed. Tomorrow's India: Another Tryst with Destiny. Penguin Books India.pp. 347–. ISBN 9780670058631. Retrieved 23 November 2012.

• TY – BOOK T1 – Youth A1 – India. Ministry of Education IS – v. 8–11 Page 16 SN – 0513-3289 UR – https://books.google.com/books?id=tC1qqQd6l5wC Y1 – 1964 PB – Ministry of Education of India

• Elkington, John; Hartigan, Pamela (1 February 2008). The Power of Unreasonable People: How Social Entrepreneurs Create Markets That Change the World. Harvard Business Press. pp. 52–. ISBN 9781422104064. Retrieved 23 November 2012.

• Jump up to John, Mary (2003). Children's Rights and Power: Charging Up for a New Century. Jessica Kingsley Publishers. pp. 232–. ISBN 9781853026584. Retrieved 23 November2012.

• Sumit Ganguly; Larry Diamond; Marc F. Plattner, eds. (13 August 2007). "The Role of Civil Society". The State of India's Democracy. Johns Hopkins University Press. pp. 157–. ISBN 9780801887918. Retrieved 23 November 2012.

• Epp, Charles R. (15 October 1998). The Rights Revolution: Lawyers, Activists, and Supreme Courts in Comparative Perspective. University of Chicago Press. pp. 253–. ISBN 9780226211619. Retrieved 23 November 2012.

• TNN (28 October 2012). "'Students untapped forces of social change'". Times of India. Retrieved 23 November 2012.

• Bunker Roy. "Bunker Roy: Learning from a barefoot movement". TED. Retrieved 23 November 2012.

• "Archives – 1985 Science and Technology". Jamnalal Bajaj Foundation. Retrieved 23 November 2012.

• "Swiss award for Bunker Roy". The Hindu. 22 September 2002. Retrieved 23 November2012.

• "Memorable Points – National". Pratiyogita Darpan. Pratiyogita Darpan. November 2009. pp. 34–.Retrieved 23 November 2012.

LEONARDO DICAPRIO: Green Personality for March 2019

NAME: LEONARDO WILHELM DICAPRIO

DATE OF BIRTH: NOVEMBER 11, 1974

NATIONALITY: AMERICAN

“Raising awareness on the most pressing environmental issues of our time is more important than ever.
”

— Leornardo Dicaprio

EDUCATION

DiCaprio attended Seeds Elementary School (now UCLA Lab School) and John Marshall High School a few blocks away, after attending the Los Angeles Center for Enriched Studies for four years. He dropped out of high school following his third year, eventually earning his general equivalency diploma (GED). DiCaprio spent part of his childhood in Germany with his maternal grandparents, Wilhelm and Helene. He is conversant in German and Italian.

OCCUPATION/CAREER

In 1979, DiCaprio was removed, at the age of five, from the set of the children's television series Romper Room for being disruptive. He began his career by appearing in several commercials and educational films, following his older stepbrother Adam Farrar into television commercials, and landing an ad at age 14 for Matchbox cars by Mattel, which he considered his first role. Throughout his teens he was seen in commercials for Kraft Foods, Bubble Yum, Apple Jacks, and many more. In 1989, he played the role of Glen in two episodes of the television show The New Lassie.

In 1990, he started acting regularly on television. This started with a role in the pilot of The Outsiders, and one episode of the soap opera Santa Barbara, playing the young Mason Capwell. That same year, DiCaprio got a break on television when he was cast in Parenthood. A series based on a successful comedy film by the same name. His works that year earned him two nominations at the Young Artist Award in Best Young Actor in a Daytime Series (Santa Barbara) and Best Young Actor Starring in a New Television Series (Parenthood). DiCaprio was also a celebrity contestant on the children's game show Fun House. One of the stunts he performed on the show was going fishing in a small pool of water by catching the fish only with his 

ADVOCACY/ACHIEVEMENTS

Following the success of Titanic in 1997 along with earlier films, 24-year-old DiCaprio established the Leonardo DiCaprio Foundation in 1998, a non-profit organization devoted to promoting environmental awareness.Although concerned with all areas of the environment, it focuses on global warming, preserving Earth's biodiversity and supporting renewable energy. It has worked on projects in over 40 countries and has produced two short web documentaries, Water Planet and Global Warning. The foundation has also funded debt-for-nature swaps. Because of his active involvement in those causes, he has received praise from environmental groups. Among the accolades received were the Martin Litton Environment Award, in 2001, from Environment Now, and the Environmental Leadership Award in 2003 from Global Green USA. He has been an active supporter of numerous environmental organizations and has sat on the board of the World Wildlife Fund, Global Green USA, International Fund for Animal Welfare and the Natural Resources Defense Council.

DiCaprio is a vegetarian, rumored to even be vegan, and in 2014 he backed the documentary Cowspiracy about the impact of animal agriculture on the environment and the positions of several environmental organizations on the issue. By taking the role of executive producer, DiCaprio helped the documentary get released on Netflix. DiCaprio has owned environment-friendly electric-hybrid vehicles and his home is powered by solar panels, although his use of private jets and large yachts has attracted criticism due to their large carbon footprints.

RESOURCES

•  "Celebrities' Political Affiliations". Us Weekly. October 23, 2012. Retrieved August 12, 2017.

• "Leonardo DiCaprio". Encyclopædia Britannica. Archived from the original on July 19, 2015. Retrieved July 29, 2015.

• Letran, Vivan (August 19, 2000). "DiCaprio Boosts Artist's Show". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on October 13, 2015. Retrieved July 29, 2015.

•  Jump up to:a b c Catalano, Grace (February 1997). Leonardo DiCaprio: Modern-Day Romeo. New York City: Dell Publishing Group. pp. 7–15. ISBN 0-440-22701-1.

• "Leonardo DiCaprio; Scumsville superstar; His Parents Were Hippies and He Grew Up in the Poorest Part of Town – The People (London, England) – Questia Online Library". Questia Online Library. April 19, 1998. Retrieved January 13, 2009.

• ·"Poverty and family split spurred Leo to pounds 3m a film Titanic stardom; Gran tells of screen idol's battle". Questia Online Library. January 28, 1998. Retrieved January 13, 2009.

• Slavicek, Louise Chipley (2012). Leonardo DiCaprio. Infobase Learning. p. 78. ISBN 978-1-4381-4133-6.

• ·Nickel Anhalt, Karen (August 6, 2008). "Leonardo DiCaprio's Grandmother Dies". People. Archived from the original on September 21, 2015. Retrieved August 11, 2015.

• Silverman, Stephen M. (April 22, 2003). "Russians Lift Vodka Glasses to DiCaprio". People. Archived from the original on July 22, 2015. Retrieved August 12, 2015.

• "Vladimir Putin: Leonardo DiCaprio is a 'real man'". The Daily Telegraph. November 24, 2010. Archived from the original on January 16, 2012. Retrieved August 8, 2011.

• ·"Vladimir Putin: Leonardo DiCaprio is a 'real man'". The Daily Telegraph. November 24, 2010. Archived from the original on July 14, 2015. Retrieved August 12, 2015.

• “Leonardo Dicaprio". E!. Archived from the original on March 28, 2009. Retrieved January 13, 2009.

• · Green, Jesse (February 12, 1995). "FRESH BLOOD; LEONARDO DiCAPRIO". The New York Times. Archived from the original on August 9, 2016. Retrieved June 14, 2016.

• "Los Angeles Center For Enriched Studies: Facts about LACES". Los Angeles Center for Enriched Studies. Archived from the original on January 15, 2014. Retrieved May 15, 2013.

• Slavicek, Louise Chipley (2012). Leonardo DiCaprio. New York: InfoBase Learning. ISBN 9781438141336. Archived from the original on April 4, 2017. Retrieved September 26, 2014.

• "Leonardo DiCaprio from High School Dropouts". E!. Archived from the original on October 22, 2014. Retrieved September 26, 2014.

• Makarenko, Denis, Leonardo DiCaprio: I would love to read books in Spanish as it is an amazing culture, America Reads Spanish, archivedfrom the original on January 30, 2016, retrieved January 13, 2016
  

WANGARI MAATHAI: Green Personality of January 2019

Name: Wangarĩ Muta Maathai 

Date of Birth: 1st April 1940

Nationality: kenyan

“Until you dig a hole, you plant a tree, you water it and make it survive, you haven’t done a thing. You are just talking.”

— Wangari Maathai

EDUCATION

At age eleven, Maathai moved to St. Cecilia's Intermediate Primary School, a boarding school at the Mathari Catholic Mission in Nyeri. Maathai studied at St. Cecilia's for four years. During this time, she became fluent in English and converted to Catholicism. She was involved with the Legion of Mary, whose members attempted "to serve God by serving fellow human beings. "Studying at St. Cecilia's, she was sheltered from the ongoing Mau Mau uprising, which forced her mother to move from their homestead to an emergency village in Ihithe. When she completed her studies there in 1956, she was rated first in her class, and was granted admission to the only Catholic high school for girls in Kenya, Loreto High School in Limuru. She was educated in the United States at Mount St. Scholastica (Benedictine College) and the University of Pittsburgh, as well as the University of Nairobi in Kenya.

OCCUPATION/CAREER

Maathai taught at Nairobi, becoming a senior lecturer in anatomy in 1975, chair of the Department of Veterinary Anatomy in 1976 and associate professor in 1977. She was the first woman in Nairobi appointed to any of these positions.

She was a member of the Nairobi branch of the Kenya Red Cross Society, becoming its director in 1973. She was a member of the Kenya Association of University Women. Following the establishment of the Environment Liaison Centre in 1974, Maathai was asked to be a member of the local board, eventually becoming board chair. The Environment Liaison Centre worked to promote the participation of non-governmental organizations in the work of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), whose headquarters was established in Nairobi following the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment held in Stockholm in 1972. Maathai also joined the National Council of Women of Kenya (NCWK). Through her work at these various volunteer associations, it became evident to Maathai that the root of most of Kenya's problems was environmental degradation

ADVOCACY/ACHIEVEMENTS

Wangari Maathai is internationally admired for her persistence in the areas of environmental conservation, human rights, and democracy. She has taken the opportunity to address the United Nations on several occasions and has spoken at special sessions of the General Assembly on behalf of women. Maathai has been given numerous awards because of her philanthropic work with the Green Belt Movement and other organizations. The most notable award given to Wangari Maathai was the Nobel Peace Prize in 2004.

In December 2002, Professor Maathai received another honor when she was elected to the Kenyan Parliament with 98% of the vote. After winning the election she was appointed, by President Mwai Kibaki, as Assistant Minister for Environment, Natural Resources and Wildlife in Kenya’s ninth parliament.

Wangarĩ Maathai was awarded the 2004 Nobel Peace Prize for her "contribution to sustainable development, democracy and peace". She had received a call from Ole Danbolt Mjos, chair of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, on 8 October informing her of the news. She became the first African woman, and the first environmentalist, to win the prize.

PUBLICATIONS

• The Green Belt Movement: Sharing the Approach and the Experience. Lantern Books. 2004. ISBN 978-1-59056-040-2.; (1985)

• The bottom is heavy too: even with the Green Belt Movement : the Fifth Edinburgh Medal Address (1994)

• Bottle-necks of development in Africa (1995)

• The Canopy of Hope: My Life Campaigning for Africa, Women, and the Environment (2002)

• Unbowed: A Memoir (2006) ISBN 9780307492333

• Reclaiming rights and resources women, poverty and environment (2007)

• Rainwater Harvesting (2008)

• State of the world's minorities 2008: events of 2007 (2008)

• The Challenge for Africa. Anchor Books. 2010. ISBN 978-0-307-39028-8.; (2009)

• Moral Ground: Ethical Action for a Planet in Peril. (2010) chapter Nelson, Michael P. and Kathleen Dean Moore (eds.). Trinity University Press,ISBN 9781595340665

• Replenishing the Earth (2010) ISBN 978-0-307-59114-2

DAVID SUZUKI: Green Personality of October 2018

Name: David Takayoshi Suzuki

Date of Birth: 18 March 1936

Nationality: Canadian

“If we pollute the air, water and soil that keep us alive and well, and destroy the biodiversity that allows natural systems to function, no amount of money will save us.
”

— David Suzuki

EDUCATION

Suzuki received his Bachelor of Arts degree in biology in 1958 from Amherst College in Massachusetts where he first discovered genetics study, and his Doctor of Philosophy degree in zoology from the University of Chicago in 1961.

OCCUPATION/CAREER

From 1961 to 1962, Suzuki worked at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. From 1962 to 1963, he was an assistant professor at the University of Alberta. He was a professor in the genetics department at the University of British Columbia for almost forty years, from 1963 until his retirement in 2001, and has since been professor emeritus at a university research institute.

Since the mid-1970s, Suzuki has been known for his television and radio series, documentaries and books about nature and the environment. He is best known as host of the popular and long-running CBC Television science program The Nature of Things, seen in over 40 countries. He is also well known for criticizing governments for their lack of action to protect the environment.

ADVOCACY/ACHIEVEMENTS

A longtime activist to reverse global climate change, Suzuki co-founded the David Suzuki Foundation in 1990, to work "to find ways for society to live in balance with the natural world that does sustain us". The Foundation's priorities are: oceans and sustainable fishing, climate change and clean energy, sustainability, and Suzuki's Nature Challenge. The Foundation also works on ways to help protect the oceans from large oil spills such as the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Suzuki has also served as a director of the Canadian Civil Liberties Association from 1982 to 1987.

Suzuki was awarded the Right Livelihood Award in 2009. His 2011 book, The Legacy, won the Nautilus Book Award. He is a Companion of the Order of Canada. In 2004, David Suzuki ranked fifth on the list of final nominees in a CBC Television series that asked viewers to select The Greatest Canadian of all time.

PUBLICATIONS

Suzuki is the author of 52 books (nineteen for children), including David Suzuki: The Autobiography, Tree: A Life Story, The Sacred Balance, Genethics, Wisdom of the Elders, Inventing the Future, and the best-selling Looking At Senses a series of children's science books.

• Sciencescape - The Nature of Canada (1986) - with Hans Blohm and Marjorie Harris

• Pebbles to Computers: The Thread (1986) - with Hans Blohm and Stafford Beer

• Metamorphosis: Stages in a life (1987) ISBN 0-773-72139-8

• Genethics: The Clash between the New Genetics and Human Values (1990)

• It's a Matter of Survival (1991) ISBN 0-674-46970-4

• Time to Change (1994)

• The Japan We Never Knew: A Journey of Discovery (1997) - with Keibo Oiwa

• The Sacred Balance (1997)

• From Naked Ape to Superspecies: A Personal Perspective on Humanity and the Global Ecocrisis (1999) - with Holly Dressel. ISBN 0-773-73194-6

• From Naked Ape to Superspecies: Humanity and the Global Eco-Crisis, (2nd edition 2004) - with Holly Dressel. ISBN 1-553-65031-X

• Good News for a Change: Hope for a Troubled Planet (2001) - with Holly Dressel. ISBN 0-773-73307-8

• More Good News (2003)

• More Good News: Real Solutions to the Global Eco-Crisis (Revised ed. 2010) - with Holly Dressel. ISBN 1-553-65475-7

• David Suzuki: The Autobiography (2006)

• David Suzuki's Green Guide (2008) - with David Boyd

• The Big Picture: Reflections on Science, Humanity, and a Quickly Changing Planet (2009) - with David Taylor

• The Legacy: An Elder's vision for a sustainable future (2010) - with foreword by Margaret Atwood

• Letters to My Grandchildren Greystone Books (2015) ISBN 978-1771640886

• Force of Nature: The David Suzuki Movie (2010), 93 minute documentary DVD (210616DV)

Babcock University Seminar

On the 20th of September, Dr Adenike Akinsemolu honored the invitation from the Microbiology Department of Babcock University, one of the leading universities in Nigeria, where she gave a Seminar presentation titled The Role Of Microorganisms In Achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. During the presentation, she demonstrated to the students how and what a Seminar Presentation should look like, and various strategies to engage and capture the attention of the audience. The presentation lasted for about 30 minutes with the questions and answers session Inclusive.

Cradle to Cradle: The School Of Science Seminar

Summary: The Role of Microorganisms in Achieving the Sustainable Development Goals

Harmful practices such as arbitrary use of chemicals, increased usage of non-renewable energy sources and uncontrolled generation of industrial waste has posed a great threat to the sustainability of the environment. The way forward is to embrace sustainable measures, cleaner production and green technologies in order to conserve the ecology of the earth for future generations and this is achievable through the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) which is sponsored by the United Nations (UN). These goals are divided into five sub-groups namely; People, Planet, Prosperity, Peace and Partnership.

Dr Adenike Akinsemolu, in her presentation, defined microorganism as living things that cannot be seen with the ordinary eyes. Microorganism play important roles in green processes and technologies. If microorganisms are used legally and well, they can contribute to the sustainable development goals. The advantages of microorganisms in this context is, in spite of this, often underestimated. The presenter discussed how microorganisms can be deliberately used to play fundamental roles in achieving the SDGs.

The usages of some microorganisms in actualizing the SDGs were highlighted at the seminar. Production of Gobar gas, also referred to as Bio-gas, by methane-producing organisms such as Methanomonas, yogurt (using Lactobacillus delbruekii subsp bulgaricus), prebiotics and probiotics (using Lactobacillus acidophilus) and other organisms can be harnessed to achieve the goals under the people sub-group of the SDGs. Botryococcus can store up to 50% of the biomass in the form of long-chain hydrocarbons for the generation of electricity, Eremothecium ashbyii, used in riboflavin fermentation and Pseudomonas as well as Rhizobia used in the production of bio-fertilizers can facilitate the realization of the prosperity sub-group of the SDGs. Microorganisms used in bioremediation and Algae like Saccharomyces or modified Escherichia coli can be used for third-generation biofuel production in actualizing the goals of the planet sub-group of the SDGs. Microbial forensics can be used to trace perpetrators and sources of biohazard in combating bioterrorism while capacity building on trade-related aspects of microbes and microbial technology can help in achieving the goals of peace and partnership sub-groups of the SDGs respectively.

Dr Akinsemolu recommends that, to effectually achieve the targets of sustainable development, the most important actions are to be taken by the government through legislations and policies. Government should improve funding for research and development in order to promote micro-based industries. She also recommends that researchers should not only focus on the health benefits of using microorganisms, but also on other significant applications like production of fermented foods, microbial electricity and biocontrol agents among others.

Mr Kafaru Simileoluwa

Summary: Cradle to Cradle

The second speaker Mr Kafaru Simileoluwa spoke on the need to rethink the way we make things. He established the fact that Recycling, Reducing, Reuse and Regulating is not enough to solve the present environmental threats faced by the world today; ranging from Climate Change, to pollution and also resource depletion. He stated that the mother earth should not be treated as merely a tool for mans progress, but man should see a need to actively interact with nature in a mutually benefitting manner.

He emphasized that there is a need to go back to the very foundation of all products and bring out a design that would interact safely with the environment, a world where the word WASTE only exists as a source of natural resource for man and equally nutrient for the environment.

DAVID BELLAMY: Green Personality of August 2018

Full name: David James Bellamy

Date of birth: 18 January, 1933

Nationality: British

Residence: County Durham, England

Family: He married Rosemary Froy in 1959 and they had 5 children together

“Global warming is part of natural cycle and there’s nothing we can actually do to stop these cycles. The world is now facing spending a vast amount of money in tax to try to solve a problem that doesn’t actually exist.”

— David J. Bellamy

EDUCATION

He attended Chatsworth Road Primary School, Cheam; Cheam Road Junior School and Sulton County Grammar School; all in England.
He originally wanted to study English Literature and History but later changed to study Botany, Physics and Chemistry in the sixth form. Thus he studied Botany for a bachelor degree at Chelsea college of science and Technology which is now part of University College, London. Also, he got his PhD at Bedford College (now part of the University of London) in 1960.

OCCUPATION/CAREER

In 1960, David Bellamy became a lecturer in Botany Department of Durham University, after having worked as a laboratory assistant at Ewell Technical College, London and before becoming a graduate. However, it was his environmental consultancy work on the Torrey Canyon oil spillage in 1967 that brought him into prominence as a result of his write up in a leading scientific journal named “Nature”.

Also, he wrote many books for TV series in the 1980’s, especially for children’s enjoyment and education. In 1980, he released a musical single entitled ‘Brontosaurus Will You Wait For Me?’. It reached number 88 in the charts then.
Besides, Bellamy worked for the New Zealand Tourism department’s unique program for foreign journalists. While in New Zealand, he also worked on a documentary series known as “Noah’s Ark” which was released in 1990.

Moreover, he is one of the originators of the Ford European Conservation Awards. Significantly, David Bellamy has worked on and presented hundreds of television programs on Botany, ecology, environmental and other issues. Examples of such include “Bellamy on Botany”, “Bellamy Britain”; “Bellamy Europe”; and “Bellamy Backyard Safari”.

ADVOCACY/ACHIEVEMENTS

In 1983, Bellamy was jailed for blockading the Australian Franklin River in a protest against a proposed dam. On the 18th of August, 1984, he jumped from the pier at St. Abbs Harbor into the North Sea and thereby Voluntary Marine Reserve, the St. Abbs and Eyemouth Voluntary Marine Reserve.

In the late 1980’s, he staged a campaign in Jersey, Channel Islands, to save Queen Valley from being turned into a reservoir because of the presence of a rare type of snail, but he was unable to stop it. Besides, David Bellamy is the President of the British Institute of Cleaning Service (BICSc) and a strong supporter of the BICSc plan to educate young people to care for and protect the environment. Also, he runs the David Bellamy Awards program as a competition designed to encourage schools to be aware of and act positively towards environmental cleanliness.

In 2004, David Bellamy wrote an article in the Daily Mail in which he described the theory of human-made global warming as ‘poppycock’. He also expressed his opinions on global warming in other newspapers magazines and scientific journals, particularly between 2005 and 2007.

PUBLICATIONS

• Bellamy on Botany (1972) ISBN 0-563-10666-2
• Peatlands (1973)
• Bellamy's Britain (1974)
• Life Giving Sea (1975)
• Green Worlds (1975)
• The World of Plants (1975)
• It's Life (1976)
• Bellamy's Europe (1976)
• Botanic Action (1978)
• Botanic Man (1978)
• Half of Paradise (1978)
• Forces of Life (1979)
• Bellamy's Backyard Safari (1981)
• The Great Seasons (with Sheila Mackie, illustrator; Hodder & Stoughton, 1981)
• Il Libro Verde (1981)
• The Mouse Book (1983)
• Bellamy's New World (1983)
• The Queen's Hidden Garden (1984)
• I Spy (1985)
• Bellamy's Bugle (1986)
• Bellamy's Ireland (1986)
• Turning The Tide (1986)
• Bellamy's Changing Countryside (1987)
• England's Last Wilderness (1989)
• England's Lost Wilderness (1990)
• Wilderness Britain? (1990, Oxford Illustrated Press, ISBN 1-85509-225-5)
• Moa's Ark (with Brian Springett and Peter Hayden, 1990)
• How Green Are You? (1991)
• Tomorrow's Earth (1991)
• World Medicine: Plants, Patients and People (1992)
• Blooming Bellamy (1993)
• Trees of the World (1993)
• The Bellamy Herbal(2003)
• Fabric Live: Bellamy Sessions (2004)
• Jolly Green Giant (autobiography, 2002, Century, ISBN 0-7126-8359-3)
• A Natural Life (autobiography, 2002, Arrow, ISBN 0-09-941496-1)
• Conflicts in the Countryside: The New Battle for Britain (2005), Shaw & Sons, ISBN 0-7219-1670-8

RESOURCES

• “Honorary Graduates of Bournemouth University” (PDF), Bournemouth University. Document no longer available online.
• “Open Letter from World Scientists to All Governments Summary,” Institute of Science in Society. Archived November 30, 2010. Archive.is URL: https://archive.is/oWSVw
• “Has David Bellamy gone mad?”, Marklynas.org, July 14, 2004. Archived February 11, 2006. Archive.is URL: https://archive.is/7uou2
• “Junk Science,” Monbiot.com, May 10, 2005. Archive.is URL: https://archive.is/R7idZ
• “Wildlife groups axe Bellamy as global warming 'heretic',” Times Online, May 15, 2005. Archived September 6, 2008. Archive.is URL: https://archive.is/S9XeG
• “The Global Warming Myth,” The New Zealand Centre for Political Research, June 24, 2007. Archived October 14, 2008. Archive.is URL: https://archive.is/gBAPY
• David Bellamy. “Glaciers are cool,” New Scientist, issue 2495 (April 16, 2005). Archived October 18, 2017. Archive.is URL: https://archive.is/MBf6a
• “With all due respect Mr. President, that is not true.” Cato.org. Archived October 19,2 009. Archive.is URL: https://archive.is/pbJvP
• “The Fraser Institute: Media Advisory; Independent Summary of UN Climate Change Report to be Released in London on Monday, 5th February,” (Press Release), Marketwire, February 2, 2007. Archived January 29, 2013. Archive.is URL: https://archive.is/7THb1
• “Climate Weekly Special Report: Apocalypse No: Assessing Catastrophic Climate Change,” Proceedings of the Scientific Alliance Conference, Royal Institution, January 27, 2005. Republished by Frontiers of Freedom. Archived January 30, 2006. Archive.is URL: https://archive.is/tP2Zo
• “Bellamy warms to scientists' scepticism on climate change,” The New Zealand Herald, Oct 19, 2006. Archive.is URL: https://archive.is/geZhz
• “David Bellamy, former trustee of the World Land Trust,” World Land Trust. Archived January 6, 2009.  Archive.is URL: https://archive.is/muXlJ
• “David Bellamy,” The Heartland Institute. Archived October 18, 2017. Archive.is URL: https://archive.is/qf9ZC
• “David Bellamy,” SourceWatch.
• “About the wildlife trusts,” Wildlifetrusts.org. Archived August 3, 2004. Archive.is URL: https://archive.is/0p50U
• “Our history,” Plantlife. Archived November 14, 2011. Archive.is URL: https://archive.is/bDPsw 
• David Hasemyer. “Documents Reveal Fossil Fuel Fingerprints on Contrarian Climate Research,” InsideClimate News, February 21, 2015. Archived December 15, 2015.
• Google Scholar search for articles containing “Climate” or “Global Warming” by author “David Bellamy.” Search performed October 18, 2017.
• Jessica Salter. “Eco hero: David Bellamy, botanist and campaigner,” The Telegraph, November 19, 2009. Archived October 18, 2017. Archive.is URL: https://archive.is/tMavl
• Boyle, Stewart; Ardill, John (1989), The Greenhouse Effect, London: New English Library.
• “What a Load of Poppycock!” The Daily Mail. Retrieved from Junksciencearchive.com. Archived .png on file at DeSmog.
• “16mm sound film “POWER FROM THE WIND” GB 1989” YouTube video uploaded by user “95filmforver,” October 2, 2017. Archived .mp4 on file at DeSmog.
• The 2008 International Conference on Climate Change: Global Warming is not a crisis! (PDF), Archived July 25, 2015. Archived .pdf on file at DeSmogBlog. 
• “In an adverse climate,” The Sunday Times, Mary 29, 2006. Archive.is URL: https://archive.is/cr1aA
• “David Bellamy speaks out against wind farms,” The Journal, October 26, 2011. Archied October 18, 2017. Archive.is URL: https://archive.is/3k1FB
• “David Bellamy denounces man-made climate change,” 3 News, September 9, 2009. Archived July 22, 2013. Archived .mp4 on file at DeSmog.
• George Monbiot.”Bellamy the Bearded Bungler doesn't disappoint,” The Guardian, March 16, 2009.

World Migratory Bird Day!

Today is World Migratory Bird day (WMBD)! 

“2018 is an important transition year in the history of World Migratory Bird Day - unifying the planet’s major migratory bird corridors, or flyways: the African-Eurasian flyway, the East Asian-Australasian flyway, and the Americas flyways. Celebrated from now on twice a year, on the Second Saturday in May and in October, WMBD aims to reach out to a broader audience and amplify its message for bird conservation. As a new global platform that unifies efforts worldwide, WMBD will be reinforcing education and awareness-raising about the need to protect migratory birds and their habitats - at all different levels, in all parts of the world.”

— www.worldmigratorybirdday.org

Rufous Hummingbird / Selasphorus rufus

• This tiny migratory pollinator breeds in western Canada and the U.S. It spends the non-breeding season primarily in Mexico, but has also have been increasingly documented as wintering in the southeastern U.S.
• The Rufous Hummingbird is known as one of the “feistiest” hummingbirds in North America, aggressively defending nectar at feeders and flowers.
• This species breeds farther north than any other hummingbird, all the way to Alaska. Its migratory pattern is unusual, with most following the Pacific Coast north and the Rocky Mountains south, as one of the earliest fall migrants at backyard feeders.
• Their declining population may be due to changes in the timing of flowering as temperatures warm, pesticide applications, or loss of habitat. To help these brilliantly colored birds, plant native flowers that bloom throughout the season.

Golden-winged Warbler / Vermivora chrysoptera

• Changing habitats are impacting this striking bird with bright yellow markings.
• The Golden-winged Warbler prefers nesting sites with sparse shrubs and trees in wetlands or in upland areas. As this habitat matures to forest or is developed, numbers of this species have declined steeply.
• This species usually nests on the ground.
• Conservation efforts are focused on implementing management practices to increase breeding habitat in wetlands and shrublands, and on collaborating with partners to protect their wintering grounds in Central and South Am

Red Knot / Calidris canutus

• Traveling as many as 19,000 miles each year from non-breeding sites in South America to nesting sites in Canada, in as few as six days, it faces challenges throughout its journey.
• During spring migration this species stops over in Delaware Bay to feed on the eggs of horseshoe crabs. Such sites where they refuel for their long flights are important to protect.
• One of the biggest contributors to the declines in Red Knot populations is a warming climate, which is reducing the tundra where they nest, intensifying storms during their migration, and warming sea waters which affects the shellfish they need to survive.
• Helping to protect migratory birds from climate change impacts starts at home. Weatherizing your home, using energy-efficient lights and appliances, and reducing your use of fuel are small steps, but when multiplied across the planet they can have a big impact.

Jeffrey Sachs: Lessons from the Millennium Villages Project: a personal perspective

The Millennium Village Project (MVP) was initiated in 2005 as a means to implement the recommendations of the UN Millennium Project at a local scale in rural Africa. The main conclusion of the UN Millennium Project was that the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) could be achieved if the high-income donor nations increased their official development assistance (ODA) to the long-standing UN target of 0·7% of gross national income (GNI). The evaluation of the MVP published in The Lancet Global Health reinforces the main message of the UN Millennium Project, and is relevant for the era of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs): a small amount of funding goes far to achieve bold goals to alleviate the multidimensional burdens of rural poverty.

The MVP was implemented under three over-riding principles: (1) an integrated rural development approach, with interventions spanning agriculture, environmental restoration, primary education, primary health care, and local infrastructure (water, sanitation, energy, and connectivity); (2) an incremental donor investment aiming at $60 per person per year; and (3) community- based delivery, with a focus on inclusive services for the community (farmer cooperatives, health systems, public education, and local infrastructure) rather than private income transfers or credits for individuals or for businesses. The focus, in short, was on grant financing for community-based capital. The project was undertaken in impoverished rural areas in 10 countries in sub- Saharan Africa with the cooperation of national and local governments and the communities.

All ten Millennium Village (MV) sites operated for the entire 10 years of the project, during which investments and systems were successfully implemented in a phased manner. A multisector approach proved to be feasible in all the sites and a small lead team of around five local staff ensured support and continuity across hundreds of interventions spanning the major categories of farming, environment, health, education, and infrastructure. In no cases did the complexity of the project prove to be logistically or procedurally overwhelming. This was true even as donor funding for the MVP was limited to a mere $25 per person per year during the second phase.

The project achieved significant gains in MDG-related outcomes, and significant impacts compared with matched sites on 30 of the 40 MDG-related targets. When grouped by major MDG-related category (poverty, nutrition, education, health, and infrastructure), significant impacts were found for every major category. The largest consistent gains were in health and agriculture.

The outcomes on poverty were mixed, with no discernible impact on consumption-based poverty, and yet a positive effect on asset ownership. One plausible explanation for this finding is that most farm families seem to have directed increased incomes— from practices  such as  increased use of  fertilisers and improved seeds, and strengthening of farmer-based organisations and cooperatives—mainly into durable assets (eg, latrines, piped water, better roofing or flooring materials) rather than non-durable consumption. We observed this same outcome in another project setting (northern Ghana) outside of the ten sites. In that site, too, households saved their incremental income as durable assets.

This explanation is necessarily provisional given uncertainties in the data. As is typical in rural settings, we had difficulty for several reasons in obtaining precise measurements of household income and consumption: inaccuracy of recall on surveys, high seasonality of consumption flows, irregular purchases of capital assets, and under-reporting of incomes by households. We regard the data on assets to be more reliable than the data on incomes and consumption spending, as household assets were directly observed by the survey teams.

The project achieved around a third of the MDG- related targets and fell short on two-thirds, although with at least some progress towards most of the targets. However, even when impacts were favourable, they were often insufficient to reach the ambitious targets. I suspect that there are four main reasons for this shortfall.

First, the MVP inherently lacked economies of scale—a point we of course recognised from the start. Because of the lack of scale economies, the benefits to an MVP site of receiving $60 per person per year were smaller for the MVP community than if the entire nation had received the same $60 per person per year. The MVP could build a local road, or a local micro-grid, but without the benefit of a national road network and power grid, the impact was restricted. The MVP could control a local disease outbreak, but not prevent its reintroduction from a neighbouring community.

Furthermore, the international community utterly failed to follow through on its commitment to raise ODA to 0·7% of GNI. For the 29 donor countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) taken as a group, the total ODA as of 2016 was a mere 0·32% of the combined GNI, signifying a shortfall in aid from these donor countries of roughly US$170 billion per year. Lacking adequate ODA, the interventions advocated by the UN Millennium Project could not be implemented at national scale in low-income Africa, and Africa as a whole fell short on the MDGs, with inevitable adverse consequences within the MVs as well. The MVP was meant to offer guidance on national scale-up, but the national scale-ups were generally constrained by limited ODA.

Second, and related, the MVP focused on only one of the three pillars of national poverty reduction. The MVP focused on rural development, not on urban development nor on national infrastructure (roads, rail, power, fibre) connecting rural and urban areas. Most importantly, the MVs did not benefit from complementary donor spending to boost urban jobs and incomes. Given the tiny sizes of many rural farms (often below 1 hectare), and the still rapidly growing rural populations, rural poverty will not end without the rapid growth of urban job opportunities alongside the higher productivity and incomes of farm households.

Third, as an island of relative prosperity in the midst of poverty, the MVP’s resources inevitably were shared beyond the MVs to the neighbouring areas, thus diminishing the spending per person and impact within the MVs. Partly, this sharing occurred as individuals from neighbouring communities came to the MVs to use the clinics, schools, and other expanded facilities. Partly it resulted from the tendency of local authorities to direct incremental budgetary resources towards non-MVP areas. This dilution of the MVP investments was natural, unpreventable, and inevitable.

Fourth, the MVP was underfunded in the second phase. In 2005, the project began as a 5-year effort, but by 2007 the MVP leadership team realised that the communities would need the full 10 years to 2015 to achieve the MDGs. Yet the MVP was able to raise only half of the $60 per capita for the second phase, and thus per force implemented a ramp-down of project funding between 2011 and 2015, which averaged $25 per person per year during the second 5-year interval.

As is widely recognised, there are important synergies across investments in health, education, agriculture, and infrastructure. Healthier children learn better and attend school more reliably; schools teach health-promoting activities; infrastructure such as electrification and clean water enhance both health and education. It used to be supposed that complex, multisector projects might be too hard to implement. We found that this was not the case: there were not only synergies in outcomes, but also important synergies in implementation across sectors. One of the most important means by which the MVP achieved such synergies was by instituting an effective real-time information platform. The MVP built a monthly information system based on local vital events reporting (births, deaths, and cause of death), reports from health workers and clinics, reports from schools, and additional data. Building a common information platform took time, and gained a high degree of performance only after the widespread uptake of smartphones (2012 in the MVs).

Other synergies emerged in the project’s interactions with the local and national governments, local and foreign universities, the business sector, and UN agencies. These counterparts were themselves working across several sectors, so the MVP, as an integrated development project, found an important multisector interface with these counterparts regarding information exchanges, partnerships, staffing, funding, and technical support to and from the project.

The MVP looked very different in 2015 from its launch in 2005. Fortunately, the project was not based on testing the effects of a specific and fixed set of interventions. It was instead based on reaching a specific set of targets. Throughout the project, the available technologies to achieve those targets improved rapidly. The project adjusted accordingly, regularly upgrading the interventions deployed in the MVs in line with the global technological progress. Consider briefly the case of malaria, one of the priority targets of the MVP. At the start of the MVP, malaria diagnoses and treatment were largely facility-based, with trained microscopists reading blood smears. The newly available artemisinin-based treatments were gradually being introduced via clinics. Mothers had to carry febrile children long distances to reach the clinic, and many did not make it in time. Most bednets as of 2005 still required frequent retreatments with insecticides in order to maintain their efficacy, and many nets were left untreated. Overall bednet coverage was very low. By 2015, all this had changed. Rapid diagnostic tests for malaria were now available. Community health workers (CHWs) used these at the household level, and carried artemisinin-based treatments. The CHWs were supported by supervisors and by expert systems on smartphones. The bednets were redesigned to maintain the insecticide for the lifetime of the net. The MVP was an early adopter of each new antimalarial technology (long-lasting insecticidal bednets, rapid diagnostic tests, artemisinin-based treatments at household level, CHW deployments, smartphone applications, real-time data- based adaptation of interventions and management), and the MVP experience accelerated the adoption of these effective control measures at both national and global levels.

Similar ongoing advances are now available for other aspects of rural health care (telemedicine, teledentistry, remote monitoring, expert systems), education (online curriculum, linked classrooms), infrastructure (solar and wind microgrids, solar-powered irrigation, remote monitoring  of  infrastructure),  agriculture  (precision farming, soil moisture monitoring, etc). In all cases, the MVP endeavoured to keep abreast of the latest technologies and to provide a base for their rapid uptake.

The SDGs call for bold advances in living standards by 2030, including the end of poverty (SDG 1) and hunger (SDG 2), universal health coverage (SDG 3), universal completion of secondary education (SDG 4),
gender equality (SDG 5), universal access to water and sanitation (SDG 6) and electricity (SDG 7), as well as several environmental goals related to climate (SDG 13), pollutants (SDG 12), urban environment (SDG 11) and biodiversity (SDG 14, 15). To achieve these bold goals, governments will need to implement integrated rural and urban development plans over a period of a decade or more, and to do so at all levels of government, from local communities to the national government.

The lessons from the MVP are highly pertinent. Multisector planning, budgeting, implementation, monitoring, and evaluation are feasible and necessary. Information platforms can be created for multisector plans and programmes. Computer technologies, including artificial intelligence and big data (responsibly managed), offer new cutting-edge solutions.

The lessons of the MVP suggest the following key steps. (1) Set clear targets to 2030. (2) Identify key interventions and budgetary needs. (3) Form teams from national to local level prepared to work in an integrated manner. (4) Establish real-time information systems. And (5) don’t expect a quiet life! Rapid changes in technology, and even in geopolitics, will force considerable innovations, systems changes, and improvisation, between now and 2030.
 
Jeffrey D. Sachs
Earth Institute, Columbia University, New York, NY 10025, USA sachs@columbia.edu
I was the Director of the Millennium Project

1. UN Millennium Project. Investing in development: a practical plan to achieve the Millennium Development Goals. http://csd.columbia.edu/publications/un-millennium-project-reports/      

2. Mitchell S, Gelman A, Ross R, et al. The Millennium Villages Project:
a retrospective, observational, endline evaluation. Lancet Glob Health 2018;6: e500–13.
http://www.thelancet.com/pdfs/journals/langlo/PIIS2214-109X(18)30065-2.pdf

3. Jeffrey D. Sachs. Lessons from the Millennium Villages Project: a personal perspective.

Source: UNSDSN

JAMES LOVELOCK: Green Personality of the Month of May 2018

Originator, Gaia theory and inventor of the electron capture detector

Names: James Ephraim Lovelock

Birth: He was born on 26 July, 1919

Place of Birth: Letchworth Garden City, in Hertfordshire, England.

Nationality: British

“I don’t think we’re yet evolved to the point where we’re clever enough to handle a complex a situation as climate change.”

— The Guardian (2010)

Education

He attended Strand School, London, and Birkbeck College as a part-time evening student as a result of having started work early in life in a photography firm. He later studied Chemistry at the University of Manchester and also had his PhD in Medicine from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Also, he worked as a research fellow in both the College of Medicine, Yale University, and the Medical School, Harvard University, USA.

Occupation/Career

Lovelock is best described as ‘an independent scientist, inventor, and author’, because he has invented and made copious science tools and materials, such as electron capture detector, an instrument for the creation of microwave oven, instruments for NASA’s planetary expeditions, etc. He is most reputed for his development of the Gaia hypothesis.

Residence

Lovelock lives in Dorset, England.

Advocacy

Lovelock initially postulated that, as a result of global warming, ‘billions of us will die and the few breeding pairs of people that survive will be in the Arctic where the climate remains tolerable’ by the end of this century. However, in April 2012, interview which was aired on MSNBC, he eventually agreed that he had been ‘alarmist’. That was due to emerging facts and developments on what he had predicted would happen. Now, Lovelock advocates what he terms ‘sustainable development’ which he does not directly support. By ‘retreat’, he means ‘… changing where we live and how we get our food;… making plans for the migration of people from low-lying regions like Bangladesh into Europe … admitting that New Orleans is a goner and moving the people to cities better positioned for the future.’ The concept promotes the use of resources in such a way as to meet human needs with lower levels and environmentally harmful types of resources.

Achievements on Sustainable Development and Environmentalism

In September 2007, Lovelock and Chris Rapley suggested constructing oceans pumps to pump water up from below the thermocline to ‘fertilize algae in the surface waters and encourage them to bloom ‘. The purpose was to cause the acceleration of the transfer of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere to the ocean by increasing primary production and enhancing the export of organic carbon to the deep ocean. It is noteworthy that despite widespread media attention and criticism on this proposal by Lovelock, a commercial company was already working independently on similar ideas as at that time. This idea is now known as Geo-engineering or Climate engineering. Also, Lovelock now favours ‘fracking’ as a low-polluting alternative to coal.

Publications/Awards and Honours

1. Fellow of the Royal Society (1974)
2. Tswett Medal (1975)
3. American Chemical Society Award in Chromatography (1980)
4. Norbert Gerbier – MUMM Award (1988)
5. Dr AH. Heineken Prize for Environmental Sciences (1990)
6. Commander of the Order of the British Empire (1990)
7. Volvo Environment Prize (1996)
8. Companion of Honour (2003)
9. Wollaston Medal (2006)
10. Arne Naess  Chair in Global Justice and Environment (2007)
11. Lovelock has copious articles in leading science journals.

Official Website

http://www.jameslovelock.org/

PUBLICATION: Ecotoxicological Dynamics of the Coastal Soil Ecosystem of Oil Producing Regions of Ondo State, Nigeria

Authors: Adenike A. Akinsemolu, Felix A. Akinyosoye, Daniel J. Arotupin

Abstract

The industrial revolution marked the beginning of unprecedented anthropogenic growth and technological advancement that also inadvertently led to acute environmental degradation. This technological advancement was driven by the use fossil fuels such as crude oil. Crude oil extraction through drilling has resulted in widespread environmental pollution and deterioration of natural habitats. The Ondo State region in Nigeria presents one such expanse where large scale crude extraction operations have caused hazardous environmental pollution and toxic substance contamination. This study is a comprehensive and holistic study of the terrestrial soil ecosystem aimed towards elucidating the potential ecotoxicity that may have adversely affected the area. The results indicated that the terrestrial soil ecosystem was largely acidic (~pH6) and the organic matter content ranged from 6% to 12% indicating the soil was hydric. The results also indicated that the terrestrial soil environment was contaminated with toxic heavy metals including cadmium (Cd), chromium (Cr), lead (Pb) and arsenic (As). The toxic heavy metal concentration of the soil ecosystem was higher during the dry season. The Cr concentration in the soil samples was >3 ppm in most of the sampling sites, which exceeded WHO maximum permissible limit. Mean concentrations of the heavy metals in the soil samples in both seasons were of the order: Cr > Pb > Cd > As. The soil ecosystem was also characterized by a diverse and large population of microorganisms including bacteria like Enterobacter, Escherichia coli, and several species of fungi.

Keywords

• Anthropogenic Growth;
• Crude Oil Extraction;
• Ecotoxicity;
• Toxic Heavy Metals;
• Ilaje.

Introduction

Over the past several decades, uncontrolled anthropogenic growth has led to overutilization and exploitation of natural resources as well as widespread environmental pollution and degradation. One of the more significant damaging effects of this unrestrained growth has been the uncontrolled assembly of excess waste materials, which is contaminated with a wide range of noxious substances as well as toxic heavy metals and various detrimental materials [1] [2] [3]. Reckless discharge practices for such waste products added an additional environmental burden to natural ecosystems and had resulted in hazardous consequences [4] [5]. This waste disposal has mostly affected terrestrial soil ecosystems, turning the useful soil systems into wastelands [6]. According to a report published by the United Nations Environment Program [7] on the Environmental Assessment of Ogoniland, such soil contamination not only affects the socio-economic life of the inhabitants of the affected region but also it has an adverse effect on the drinking water quality. Therefore, regulation and reversal of this colossal degradation of natural ecosystems necessitate an appropriate socioeconomic valuation of natural resources, along with an efficient and sustainable utilization of these natural resources and employment of responsible waste treatment technologies [8].

The extraction of crude oil and natural gases has had hazardous consequences on natural environments. Kvenvolden and Cooper [9] reported that crude-oil seepage is about 600,000 metric tons per year. Crude oil extraction through drilling in terrestrial, marine or coastal environments has been a source of significant concern. This drilling often leads to industrial accidents such as spillage and acute environmental degradation due to irresponsible waste expulsion practices.

This study has focused on the terrestrial soil ecosystem of the Ondo state region in Nigeria. This region is a major site for offshore and mainland crude oil drilling operations that are carried out by several multinational oil corporations [10]. Furthermore, due to the lack of adequate wastewater treatment facilities in the region, a substantial amount of the wastewater produced in the region flows through the network of rivers into the area under investigation and frequently contaminates the surrounding natural environment [11].

Soil samples were collected and studied to examine the nature and degree of potential environmental pollution in the natural environment of the region. To this end, several standard soil quality parameters, as well as physicochemical parameters, were analyzed in samples that were collected from several different sampling regions. Toxic heavy metals are generally defined as metals or metalloids that have relatively high density, occur in multiple oxidation states, and cause extreme toxic effects on living organisms even upon exposure to low concentrations [12] [13]. The toxic heavy metals are found either naturally in a given area or can accumulate in the region as a result of anthropogenic activities. They have the ability to interact and bind to cellular components and can inhibit metabolic functions and activities of living cells [14].

There have been several studies which sought to determine the extent and causes of toxic heavy metal distribution in various parts of the world [15] [16] [17] [18]. The results of Manta, Angelone, Bellanca, Neri and Sprovieri [15] demonstrated that in parts of Italy, the source of Pb, Zn, and Hg in topsoil could be traced to anthropogenic pollution, while other metals like Mn and Ni among were thought to be primarily naturally occurring metals. Lin, Teng and Chang [16] demonstrated that in Taiwan, urbanization and industrialization had led to the contamination of natural soil environments with toxic heavy metals. Arora et al. [18] , demonstrated that in parts of India, use of irrigation water contaminated with toxic heavy metals led to bio-accumulation within vegetables that were being consumed by the general population. Li, Ma, van der Kuijp, Yuan and Huang [17] summarized that mining activities and irresponsible mining waste discharge practices across several provinces of China led to toxic heavy metal pollution in the region.

Microorganisms are the keystone of any natural ecosystem as they regulate vital nutrient cycles in a natural environment and hence the microbial population dynamics of the terrestrial soil environment were also analyzed. Therefore, this study presents a comprehensive picture of the terrestrial soil ecosystem and reveals several facets of the natural environment that can lead to widespread pollution and environmental degradation with devastatingly hazardous consequences.

'The water's not going anywhere' - Louisiana confronts climate threats

In storm-battered New Orleans, preparation for disasters "has become the norm, not the exception"

Sitting on his porch in the Lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans, Otis Tucker cuts a lone figure on a street punctuated with large empty spaces - the shadows of homes lost to Hurricane Katrina.

Tucker lives in the part of the Louisiana city most devastated by the powerful storm and its aftermath in 2005, when levees designed to protect the city from flooding failed.

Many residents of the poor neighbourhood have struggled to return after fleeing Katrina.

Lack of funds to come home and rebuild, coupled with developers swiftly moving in, and gentrification of this predominantly black, lower-income area, have left scars.

Today, broken windows and overgrown weeds pepper abandoned homes, and the angry barking of a dog interrupts the silence.

"There were families here, there were kids in the street playing football, and there were neighbours," said Tucker, who was born and bred in the neighbourhood. "And that went away overnight. It just got washed away."

Since being battered by Katrina – which killed more than 1,800 people and destroyed or damaged about 800,000 homes - New Orleans has started adapting to extreme weather, which scientists predict will worsen as the planet warms.

Arthur Johnson, chief executive officer of the Center for Sustainable Engagement and Development in the Lower Ninth Ward, said disaster preparation "has become the norm, not the exception".

Evacuation centres have been built, homes have been raised higher, and solar panels installed on roofs.

The center teaches the community here to create "rain gardens" that capture rainwater for re-use. And with much of the soil still contaminated by toxic chemicals such as arsenic post-Katrina, local people are shown how to grow orchards and plant seeds in troughs above the ground.

WORKING WITH WATER

On a larger scale, New Orleans-based architects Waggonner and Ball have played a lead role in developing the Greater New Orleans Urban Water Plan.

Funded by the Louisiana Office of Community Development, the plan addresses flooding from heavy rainfall, as well as ground subsidence caused by pumping out storm water.

Company president David Waggonner, who travels extensively to share his experiences, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation the city has much to learn from Amsterdam.

New Orleans has relied on an outdated method of pumping out excess water, and needs to rethink if it is to survive, he explained at his desk, which sports a model of the city's streets and extensive pump stations.

"The city needs to learn to live with water - creating a space for water to fall and gradually go into the soil and back into the sky," he said.

One way to do this is by creating "aesthetic blue ways and green ways", he added.

These include the Mirabeau Water Garden in Gentilly district - 25 acres (10 hectares) that will be designed to divert water from canals and capture storm runoff - as well as other green infrastructure such as new parks and redesigned streets with trees, grassy areas and ponds.

COASTAL MASTER PLAN

New Orleans is the state's largest city, with a population of just under 400,000, but Louisiana as a whole is responding rapidly to ongoing land loss and an increased risk of flooding.

According to a study released by the U.S. Geological Society, Louisiana is suffering loss of its wetlands at a rate of a football field an hour.

"After Hurricane Katrina, people started to get really serious about coastal issues," said Denise Reed, research professor at the University of New Orleans and a key technical advisor on the state-led Coastal Master Plan.

The first such master plan was mandated by the state legislature following Katrina, but earlier versions were more of a "wish list", Reed said.

The latest plan - drawn up by the Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority and approved in 2017 - outlines priority projects requiring investment of $50 billion.

The money is needed to rebuild barrier islands and wetlands, move water and sediment from the Mississippi River to make new marshes, construct levees and flood gates, raise houses, and in some cases buy property so homeowners can move to a safer place.

"We all have to be creative with expenditure," Reed told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

"In the area where I live, we've passed a sales tax, so every time you go to the store to buy something, a penny or two goes into a pot used for building a levee."

SINKING LAND, RISING SEAS

In a boat heading to the marshlands off the coast of Cocodrie, a shrimping and crabbing village in southeast Louisiana, Alex Kolker, associate professor at the Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium, pointed to large industrial structures protruding from the water.

"Something in the order of 20 to 30 percent of the nation's oil infrastructure is in the Gulf of Mexico," said the oceanologist and coastal geologist. "It's a multi-billion, if not multi-trillion investment - and much of it is at, or very near, sea level."

The extractive industry is at risk from rising seas and storms, but is also a key reason why Louisiana is subsiding, he explained. When oil and gas are taken from the ground, a vacuum is created and the land sinks into it.

Research by Kolker and others shows that much of the subsidence affecting Louisiana's coast relates to these patterns of oil and gas withdrawal.

In the last century, most of the increase in the water level was due to the ground sinking, but as global sea levels rise, that is changing.

"The biggest variable for the future of Louisiana is sea level rise," said Kolker. He pointed to predictions the United States will see an average increase of about 1 cm (0.39 inches) a year by 2050.

"Those are the kind of rates that we experienced at the end of last Ice Age. That would be very, very disruptive - to New York, to London and Tokyo," he said.

Against that background, lessons being learned in Louisiana will be invaluable for the rest of the world, Kolker believes.

Back in New Orleans, Tucker's community has already experienced the full force of wild weather.

Even though he is aware that those with fewer means may struggle to be as resilient as wealthier residents, he is determined not to be cowed by the growing threat.

"I know that the water's not going anywhere," he said. "But politicians, developers, poor people, rich people, people with many resources, people with little - we're all in this together."

Source: Thomson Reuters Foundation News

Michael Bloomberg to write $4.5 mln check for Paris climate pact

President Donald Trump last year pulled the United States out of the agreement, making the country the only one opposed to the pact.

Former New York mayor and billionaire Michael Bloomberg said on Sunday he will write a $4.5 million check to cover this year's U.S. financial commitment to the Paris Climate Agreement.

President Donald Trump last year pulled the United States out of the pact, making the country the only one opposed to it.

Bloomberg, in a CBS interview, said he hopes by next year Trump will have changed his mind.

Bloomberg will continue to provide money for the pact if the United States does not rejoin the agreement, according to a news release from Bloomberg Philanthropies, the charity he founded.

"Our foundation will uphold our promise to cover any cuts to UN climate funding by the federal government," Bloomberg said in the statement.

Trump staunchly opposes the agreement and his administration has rolled back a number of environmental regulations. (Reporting by Yasmeen Abutaleb Editing by James Dalgleish)

Source: Thomson Reuters Foundation News

Malaria in conflict zones threatens global progress against the disease

Africa accounts for about nine in ten deaths and cases, with more than a third concentrated in two countries - Nigeria and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Global gains in the fight against malaria could be reversed unless countries control the disease in conflict zones, where deaths and infections are rising, experts said on Tuesday.

The number of malaria cases worldwide increased in 2016 after 15 years of decline, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).

Global leaders seek to reignite fight against deadly malaria

Royals, celebrities, scientists join renewed call to tackle malaria

Africa accounts for about nine in ten deaths and cases, with more than a third concentrated in two countries - Nigeria and the Democratic Republic of Congo - where conflict has forced millions to flee their homes, WHO data shows.

Tackling malaria in such places requires new strategies since those used elsewhere - such as distributing bed nets - do not work, said Richard Allen, head of The Mentor Initiative, an organisation focused on disease control in humanitarian crises.

"All too often we try to make the wrong tool fit the context," Allen said in an interview ahead of the Multilateral Initiative on Malaria's (MIM) pan-African conference this week.

"Where is a displaced person going to hang a net?" he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

Researchers presented possible solutions at the conference in Senegal's capital Dakar, such as insecticide-treated plastic sheeting that can be used for shelters, and giving health workers mini malaria kits in a backpack.

WHO's global malaria programme director, Pedro Alonso, said the right tools were being used but noted that malaria surged in conflict zones for other reasons.

"Whenever there is an emergency, if the country is endemic for malaria (then) disruption of health services, movement of people and malnutrition ... all lead to malaria," he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

Malaria killed twice as many people as Ebola during West Africa's Ebola crisis, and is responsible for the majority of deaths in war-torn South Sudan and in parts of Nigeria battling Boko Haram, Alonso said.

Global funding for the disease has levelled off while populations have grown, meaning the amount of money per capita to fight malaria in at-risk countries has dropped, he added.

Alonso said urgent action was needed.

"We either remain where we are or we start going backwards," he said.

Source: Thomson Reuters Foundation

How a Bizarre Nazi Military Machine Left a Lasting Mark on the Environment

VIENNA —The Tirpitz was the Nazis' most imposing warship and the largest battleship ever built by a European navy. It should have been an easy target for bombers, but this massive vessel could hide in plain sight.

Hitler's navy used a toxic artificial fog to conceal the ship when it was stationed in a Norwegian fjord. And, according to new research, this ephemeral smoke left a lasting mark on some of the living witnesses of World War II: the trees.

"The effects of one military engagement during World War II are still evident in the forests of Norway, 70 years later," said Claudia Hartl, a tree-ring researcher at the Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz, Germany.

Hartl, who presented her findings here during the annual meeting of the European Geosciences Union, didn't set out to study "war dendrochronology." Rather, she was taking core samples from pine trees around Kåfjord, near the northern edge of Scandinavia, to reconstruct a record of yearly temperatures for the past 2,000 years. (The trees can live for dozens or hundreds of years, and even older stumps can be found preserved in frigid lakes.)

"Trees are limited by temperature there, so if you have a cold year, trees form a narrow ring, and if you have a warm year, then you have wide ring," Hartl explained.

At a site near the fjord, Hartl and her colleagues found trees that didn't produce rings in 1945. This "exceptional stress response" didn't fit with the researchers' climate reconstructions, so they had to look for another explanation. And they learned that the Tirpitz had been stationed at Kåfjord, and was finally sunk by Allied bombs, in 1944.

Nicknamed "The Lonely Queen of the North" by Norwegians and "The Beast" by Winston Churchill, the battleship had been moored at Kåfjord to threaten Allied ships bringing supplies to the Soviet Union. Part of the Nazis' defense was to release chlorosulfuric acid into the air, which attracts moisture and can create a smoke screen. Hartl said there is not much in historical records about the environmental impact of the fake fog. The substance is known to be corrosive, and the group of soldiers responsible for producing this smoke had to wear special protection suits.

The researchers sampled pine trees from six sites near the fjord. Trees farther away from the Tirpitz's mooring were less affected by the fog. But at the site closest to the location of the battleship, 60 percent of the trees didn't produce a ring in 1945, and some of the trees didn't grow for several years after the war. Hartl's team thinks the trees lost their needles due to the fog, which harmed their ability to photosynthesize.

War dendrochronology could join other nascent fields like "bombturbation" (the study of how bombs alter landscapes) as scientists begin to investigate the environmental impact of war.

"What I think is very interesting is the human impact on ecosystems," Hartl told Live Science. "If you have a drought event, the trees also show a growth decline, but you can also see that these trees recover, and usually, it doesn't take longer than five years. But in northern Scandinavia, through this Second World War impact, it took the trees 12 years to recover. That's a really strong impact."

Source: Live Science.

Call for Abstracts, 6th International Conference on Sustainable Development (ICSD)

The Global Association of Master's in Development Practice Programs (MDP), in collaboration with the Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN), will hold the Sixth Annual International Conference on Sustainable Development (ICSD) on 26-28 September, 2018, at Columbia University in New York City.

If you would like to present at the conference, please submit an abstract as directed below. The deadline for submission is May 1, 2018. The conference is also open to observers (i.e. non-presenters). Simply register on the conference website to join us!

The conference theme is Breaking Down Silos: Fostering Collaborative Action on the SDGs. The aim of the conference is to bring together persons involved in research, policy, practice, and business. Participants will share practical solutions for achieving the SDGs at local and national levels. Abstracts should be directly relevant to one of the following Topics:

1. Linking Policy, Operations, and Workforce toward Meeting Global Health Goals
2. Opportunities of Marine Natural Capital for Sustainable Blue Growth
3. Metrics and frameworks for assessing Sustainable Urban Development
4. Ensuring Public Engagement and Accountability for Sustainable Urban Development
5. Climate Change Adaptation in Coastal Towns and Small Cities
6. Climate Change Adaptation and Resilience Building in Agriculture
7. Economics and Demography of Natural Disasters
8. Clean and Affordable Energy as a Keystone for Sustainable Development
9. Globalization, Value Chains and Decent Work
10. Indigenous Approaches to Understanding and Practicing Sustainable Development
11. Mainstreaming Gender in Agenda 2030: Interlinkages between Sustainable Development Goals
12. Breaking Down Silos in Government Administration
13. Breaking Down Silos in Universities: Imaginative Interdisciplinary Approaches to Sustainable Development Research, Education, and Practice
14. Collaborative Arts & Culture to Help Achieve the SDGs
15. What's Law Got to Do With It? Legal Preparedness for Delivering the SDGs

Interested presenters should submit an abstract of at least 300 words but not exceeding 500 words, in English, by 1 May, 2018, via the conference website. Each abstract may only be submitted once and under one Topic. Failure to answer questions on the submission form or the submission of the same abstract under multiple topics is likely to result in the abstract being declined.

We're here for you if you have questions! Write to info@ic-sd.org. 

The Pioneers Class of 2018 Seminar Presentation for a Nanodegree in Early Childhood Education for Sustainability

The Pioneer set of the Early Childhood Education Nanodegree program presented their seminar topics at the Green Institute Auditorium, Ondo kingdom. The Keynote address was delivered by Dr F.O Afolabi on the theme of the seminar, Early Childhood Education for Sustainability.  The event was witnessed by over fifty individuals across the country.

The presentation was moderated by erudite scholars from various universities across Nigeria.

The graduating students, Adeyemo Elizabeth and Adegbite Temilade spoke on “Teaching Children with Learning Disabilities for Sustainable Development” and “Inculcating Early Childhood Education Curriculum into Prenatal Care Program: A Suggestive Approach” respectively.

The moderators applauded the students for a job well done and urge the students to make necessary corrections to strengthen the credibility of their work further. Dr Afolabi commended the Green Institute member of staff for educating young people to be social and environmental change-makers in their communities.

Isaac Omoyele: Green Personality of the Month of April 2018

Isaac Omoyele is a passionate young man who will inspire you to pursue your dream and live a life of impact. He has helped hundreds of children living in slums back to school, build healthy self-esteem, to realise their dreams and aspirations and also empowered the ‘vulnerables’ in the society to be self sustainable. He is one of the few people the world needs, he is a world changer. We had an interview session with him, here is what he said.

If you had one minute to sell yourself to a potential investor, how would you introduce yourself?

My name is Isaac Success Omoyele, I make the dreams of people living in the slum to become a reality through an initiative I founded “dreams from the slum empowerment initiative”

DREAMS FROM THE SLUM, how did you come about that name?

I grew up in the slum and my dreams and aspiration almost crashed when I dropped out of school while growing up; hence I was inspired to make dreams of people living in the slum to become a reality, making the world know that people who live in the slum have got valid dreams.

How long have you been running this programme and what inspired you to start?

Dreams From The Slum (DFTS) was established in 2013 based on three convictions.

1. To ensure that regardless of social status ; every child has access to quality education.
2. That whoever ‘CHASES’ his/her dream, no matter how or where you are born, either in the slum, rural community or a remote and desolate area; you will definitely become it.
3. Your background doesn’t have the right to make your back be on the ground. “You may be born in the slum, but the slum is not born in you”.

Since its inception, DFTS has pioneered innovative strategies to achieve this through the following approach:

• Education
• Empowerment
• Mentoring.

Through our approach on Education, we provide children with the opportunity to borrow books and read in our library facility and we have adopted over 1000 out of school children back into school in Nigeria by providing scholarship opportunities and access to basic school materials such as notebooks, bags, shoes etc.

Also, to enhance the quality of education in the slum , our teachers readiness program trains educators in low cost primary schools in rural communities, and we are extremely excited about the effect this is having on learners through their academic performance.

Through our approach via Empowerment, we provide teenage pregnant girls with livelihood skills so that they can be self reliant and live purpose driven lives; knowing that they have the potential to contribute meaningfully in our society, not minding their dreams and aspirations been delayed due to their misinformed choices. However, we make them realize they have a second chance to rewrite the outcome of their life through our ‘Young mothers Academy’

Other women are not left behind especially the parents of the beneficiaries as we get them engaged through livelihood skills so they can be self employed and meet the basic needs of their children.

Through our Mentoring approach, we provide career guidance to children and teenagers by helping them discover their unique abilities and passion, revolutionize the way they learn and get them exposed.

They are also exposed to self discovery and leadership training programmes as we are committed in developing their self esteem.

What are some of your achievements so far?

We have reduce the high number of “out of school” children living in the slum area of Ajegunle by adopting then back to school. We have held the government accountable on educational policy by reporting corrupt head teachers which reduced the high extortion rate in government schools in Lagos State.  We have empowered women with no income to be self employed so they will better cater for the needs of their children and we also set up a library in the slum to enable children have access to books because we believe that “Readers are Leaders”.

What are the major challenges and how have you been able to pull through?

The major challenge we have faced and still facing is funding.  

We leverage on individual donors to access funding for our projects.

How do you get people to support you especially non-family members?

We sell the vision, share our story and how we are changing lives.

What other areas do you think you need support?

We want to acquire a property where we can have our centre for children which will include a standard school for them but we need support to make this dream come to reality.

If you have the opportunity to change anything about the Nigerian Education System what would it be?

To ensure children go to school without monetary restrictions.

What is it about you that people do not know?

I have loads of children and I am not married, I call them my adopted kids.

What's your advice to young people aspiring to contribute positively to their community?

When you find your place, everything will fall in place for you and you will become the master of that place – FIND YOUR PLACE

How can people reach you and learn more about your work?

www.dreamsfromtheslum.org

info@dreamsfromtheslum.org

08064222169 , 08179586733

www.facebook.com/dreamsfromtheslum

www.instagram.com/dreamsfromtheslum

Land degradation drives mass migration, climate change - experts

By Anastasia Moloney

Land degradation could force hundreds of millions of people to migrate in the coming decades

BOGOTA, March 26 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Billions of people live on farmland that is deteriorating and producing less food, and this situation could force hundreds of millions of people to migrate over the next three decades, a major report said on Monday.

The study, which is backed by the United Nations, said climate change and worsening land quality could see crop yields halve in some regions by 2050, and warned that larger tracts of degraded land meant conflict over resources was more likely.

"Decreasing land productivity also makes societies more vulnerable to social instability – particularly in dryland areas, where years with extremely low rainfall have been associated with an increase of up to 45 percent in violent conflict," said Robert Scholes, the report's co-author.

The report was written by more than 100 experts from the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES), a global scientific group.

The body said that as degraded land becomes less productive - through deforestation, overgrazing, flash floods or drought - people, many of them poor farmers, are forced to migrate to cities or abroad.

And, it warned, when arid, semi-dry or dryland areas degrade further, deserts spread - which means lower crop yields.

"In just over three decades from now, an estimated 4 billion people will live in drylands," Scholes said in a statement.

"By then it is likely that land degradation, together with the closely related problems of climate change, will have forced 50-700 million people to migrate," he said

Read more

Source: Thomson Reuters Foundation News

Launching the 2018 Youth Solutions Report’s Call for Submissions

About

We are in the midst of an era of unprecedented transformation. Be it in the context of the rapid modifications of the global economy, in the difficulties our societies face in coping with massive technological and other societal changes, or in the dramatic ways in which our ecosystems are adapting and reacting to increased anthropogenic pressures, the world is calling for solutions that can embark us upon a trajectory of sustainable development.

Yet, worryingly, we seem to have lost the notion that it is young people who are the best positioned to analyze and solve this sort of novel challenges. Young men and women between the ages of 15 and 30 today represent the best-educated generation ever; are more intelligent than the average of the adult population, and are far more knowledgeable about new technologies. In addition, and mainly as a consequence of these other characteristics, younger generations also have a grasp of uncertainty and complexity that other age groups often lack. On the one hand, this leads to a better understanding of the synergies and trade-offs involved in addressing the cross-sectoral challenges enshrined in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. On the other, it allows young people to think of institutional arrangements and innovations that confront the many forms of path dependency which exist in international organizations, governments, and businesses and usually lead to inefficient, inequitable and unsustainable outcomes.

For the first time in history, young people from different countries and regions often share the same objectives and grievances, usually linked with the negative impacts of globalization and poor governance, and are increasingly part of a common culture as well. This goes beyond the usual notion that “all young people are idealistic”, even though idealism itself is everything but a negative word, in the context of the major challenges we are facing. Rather, it speaks of the incredible, untapped potential of 1.8 billion global citizens who largely hold the same ideas about how to transform our societies for the better through innovative forms of problem-solving along the four dimensions of sustainable development.

At SDSN Youth, we believe that failing to partner with young innovators and change-makers would represent the biggest waste of human capital in the history of mankind. This is why we are proud to announce that we will be launching the second edition of our Youth Solutions Report in July 2018.

Like its 2017 predecessor, this year’s Report also seeks to identify and celebrate 50 youth-led solutions that are succesfully contributing towards the achievement of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development in business, charity, education and research. However, the new Report comes with a wider scope and greater ambitions, aiming to inform the policies and actions of all stakeholders through in-depth research and analysis, with a view to substantially increase the support that young innovators receive in their countries and communities.

In 2017, with the first edition of the Youth Solutions Report, we offered young innovators the opportunity to present their solutions and take part in international conferences and events, including the UN High-Level Political Forum, the International Conference on Sustainable Development (ICSD), EXPO 2017 Astana, COP23, the Youth Assembly at the United Nations, and UNLEASH Lab 2017. We also helped youth-led solutions become more visible online, not just through our media channels but also with collaborations with websites and media outlets including National Geographic, Impakter, Virgin Unite, and Connect4Climate, among others. Lastly, we shared funding and mentoring opportunities, matched innovators with interested experts and supporters, and launched the first edition of our Investment Readiness Program in collaboration with Babele.co in January 2018.

With this year’s Report, we are confident that we will significantly build on our past successes, establish new meaningful partnerships with UN Agencies, NGOs, companies and media outlets, and overall step up our support to youth-led initiatives in their quest to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) through holistic and innovative approaches.

“Young people not only have a stake because they will be the ones implementing the SDGs and because their well-being will depend on achieving them. They also have a stake because they are part of the most educated generation in the history of the world, and through their skills, creativity, and enthusiasm they are uniquely positioned to deliver transformative change across multiple sectors of society.”

Submissions to the 2018 Youth Solutions Report are open until April 30, 2018, at this link.  

Source: Youth Solution Blog