Lit by a kerosene lamp, the two-room hut just outside a sleepy hamlet in Odisha’s Rayagada district can easily pass off as any other farmer’s house in this tribal region. Step inside it, and one is taken aback by the hundreds of earthen pots labelled with coded stickers stacked in a corner as well as under the bed.
These pots treasure over 750 varieties of rice grains, some on the verge of extinction. Keeper of the seed bank, Debal Deb, has been collecting and conserving these rare native varieties for over 16 years. His only help are the farmers who still depend on heirloom seeds.
Keeper of grains | Down To Earth
Friday, December 7, 2012
Thursday, December 6, 2012
“Green” Economic Development Can Hurt the World’s Poor
There is a dark side to the green economy. Or so say researchers with the STEPS Centre, a U.K.-based interdisciplinary research and policy center that unites development studies with science and technology studies.
The group’s observations in Africa and elsewhere suggest that land and resources in developing countries are increasingly being appropriated—transferred from the poor to the powerful—in the name of “green” economic development, ranging from efforts to promote biofuels, to carbon-offset schemes, to conservation and ecotourism initiatives. This rapidly growing practice, known informally as “green grabbing,” is forcing people to leave their homes and their land, and is responsible for increasing poverty worldwide, they say.
“Across the world, ecosystems are for sale,” writes Melissa Leach, director of the STEPS Centre, in an op-ed published last June by the news network Al Jazeera. She notes that businesses, environmental organizations, and governments are buying up huge tracts of land for “green” initiatives worldwide, often with unsettling consequences. Leach writes that in Mozambique, for example, “a company with British capital is negotiating a lease with the government for 15 million hectares, or 19 percent, of the country’s surface,” in order to capitalize on the “carbon credits” that can be derived from trees grown on the land and traded internationally.
In some cases, the sale of land for “green” purposes excludes local populations from accessing the natural resources on which they depend. In other cases, the sale of land for such purposes excludes residents from their land and homes altogether. Leach notes, “green grabbing builds on well-known histories of colonial and neo-colonial resource alienation in the name of the environment.”
“Green grabbing” is likely to further impoverish the world’s poor, according to 17 case studies recently published in a massive special issue of the Journal of Peasant Studies. When farmers and pastoralists are excluded from their land, they are excluded from their livelihoods, the studies argue. And such exclusion can stall and reverse indigenous economic development.
According to Leach, both environmental principles and principles of fairness should guide the development of the green economy: “If market-based mechanisms are to contribute to sustainable development and the building of economies that are not only green but also fair, then fostering an agenda focused on distribution, equity, and justice in green market arrangements is vital.”
This perspective mirrors other recent criticisms of the green economy as being just another route to the “financialization of nature,” to the detriment of “commonly shared” resources such as water, forests, and fish.
Leach concludes by noting that true sustainable development must incorporate an emphasis on “nurturing and legitimizing more interconnected human-ecological relationships and understandings,” so that nature is recaptured “from the market’s grasp.”
“Green” Economic Development Can Hurt the World’s Poor
The group’s observations in Africa and elsewhere suggest that land and resources in developing countries are increasingly being appropriated—transferred from the poor to the powerful—in the name of “green” economic development, ranging from efforts to promote biofuels, to carbon-offset schemes, to conservation and ecotourism initiatives. This rapidly growing practice, known informally as “green grabbing,” is forcing people to leave their homes and their land, and is responsible for increasing poverty worldwide, they say.
“Across the world, ecosystems are for sale,” writes Melissa Leach, director of the STEPS Centre, in an op-ed published last June by the news network Al Jazeera. She notes that businesses, environmental organizations, and governments are buying up huge tracts of land for “green” initiatives worldwide, often with unsettling consequences. Leach writes that in Mozambique, for example, “a company with British capital is negotiating a lease with the government for 15 million hectares, or 19 percent, of the country’s surface,” in order to capitalize on the “carbon credits” that can be derived from trees grown on the land and traded internationally.
In some cases, the sale of land for “green” purposes excludes local populations from accessing the natural resources on which they depend. In other cases, the sale of land for such purposes excludes residents from their land and homes altogether. Leach notes, “green grabbing builds on well-known histories of colonial and neo-colonial resource alienation in the name of the environment.”
“Green grabbing” is likely to further impoverish the world’s poor, according to 17 case studies recently published in a massive special issue of the Journal of Peasant Studies. When farmers and pastoralists are excluded from their land, they are excluded from their livelihoods, the studies argue. And such exclusion can stall and reverse indigenous economic development.
According to Leach, both environmental principles and principles of fairness should guide the development of the green economy: “If market-based mechanisms are to contribute to sustainable development and the building of economies that are not only green but also fair, then fostering an agenda focused on distribution, equity, and justice in green market arrangements is vital.”
This perspective mirrors other recent criticisms of the green economy as being just another route to the “financialization of nature,” to the detriment of “commonly shared” resources such as water, forests, and fish.
Leach concludes by noting that true sustainable development must incorporate an emphasis on “nurturing and legitimizing more interconnected human-ecological relationships and understandings,” so that nature is recaptured “from the market’s grasp.”
“Green” Economic Development Can Hurt the World’s Poor
Wednesday, December 5, 2012
Pablo Solon: Right not to migrate fundamental to climate debate | RTCC - Responding to Climate Change
Climate related events have always been a cause for migration in the history of humanity.
This was the story of Egypt, Mesopotamia and other ancient societies. But in modern times the scale has been unprecedented. In 1995 there were at least 25 million climate refugees.
Only 15 years later, in 2010, 50 million were displaced. In 2050 the estimations are between 200 million to one billion people that can be forced to migrate.
Some will have to migrate because of direct impacts of natural disasters like floods, droughts, water shortage, health and others, and some because of indirect impacts that can happen thousand of miles away due to, for example, the scarcity in food and increase in food prices.
Forced migration due to climate change will increase the pressure on infrastructure and urban services, especially in sanitation, education and social sectors, as a result increasing also the risk of conflicts even among migrants.
As we have seen recently in Haiti with hurricane Sandy, climate change will impact more the poor and what the United Nations calls the developing countries.
Asia will be the region with the majority of climate migrants. The countries that have least contributed green house gas emissions like Bangladesh will be probably the ones that will be most affected.
The “Peoples World Conference on Climate Change and Mother Earth Rights” held in 2010 in Cochabamba Bolivia said: “There is a close relation between the occidental development model and ecology and consequently with migration, and this is why developed countries are the ones that have to assume a responsibility according to what they have done.”
The first measure that developed countries have to adopt is to reduce their GHG emissions by at least 40 to 50 percent of the levels of 1990 until 2020. If the historical emitters don’t do this, we are going to face series of increasing calamities.
We must try to reduce as much as possible the increase in temperature to ease climate forced migration.
But also, emerging economies have to follow a different path of development. If governments in developing countries keep promoting the unsustainable model of consumption and production of capitalism, there will be no way to reduce the impact of this new wave of migration.
The approach to address climate migration has to be first focused on mitigation and the reduction of emissions of green house gases. Proposals like the ones from the Special Rapporteur on the human rights of migrants in the 2012 General Assembly (Report A/67/299) are a resignation to calamity.
Pablo Solon: Right not to migrate fundamental to climate debate | RTCC - Responding to Climate Change
This was the story of Egypt, Mesopotamia and other ancient societies. But in modern times the scale has been unprecedented. In 1995 there were at least 25 million climate refugees.
Only 15 years later, in 2010, 50 million were displaced. In 2050 the estimations are between 200 million to one billion people that can be forced to migrate.
Some will have to migrate because of direct impacts of natural disasters like floods, droughts, water shortage, health and others, and some because of indirect impacts that can happen thousand of miles away due to, for example, the scarcity in food and increase in food prices.
Forced migration due to climate change will increase the pressure on infrastructure and urban services, especially in sanitation, education and social sectors, as a result increasing also the risk of conflicts even among migrants.
As we have seen recently in Haiti with hurricane Sandy, climate change will impact more the poor and what the United Nations calls the developing countries.
Asia will be the region with the majority of climate migrants. The countries that have least contributed green house gas emissions like Bangladesh will be probably the ones that will be most affected.
The “Peoples World Conference on Climate Change and Mother Earth Rights” held in 2010 in Cochabamba Bolivia said: “There is a close relation between the occidental development model and ecology and consequently with migration, and this is why developed countries are the ones that have to assume a responsibility according to what they have done.”
The first measure that developed countries have to adopt is to reduce their GHG emissions by at least 40 to 50 percent of the levels of 1990 until 2020. If the historical emitters don’t do this, we are going to face series of increasing calamities.
We must try to reduce as much as possible the increase in temperature to ease climate forced migration.
But also, emerging economies have to follow a different path of development. If governments in developing countries keep promoting the unsustainable model of consumption and production of capitalism, there will be no way to reduce the impact of this new wave of migration.
The approach to address climate migration has to be first focused on mitigation and the reduction of emissions of green house gases. Proposals like the ones from the Special Rapporteur on the human rights of migrants in the 2012 General Assembly (Report A/67/299) are a resignation to calamity.
Pablo Solon: Right not to migrate fundamental to climate debate | RTCC - Responding to Climate Change
Tuesday, December 4, 2012
A low carbon future is the one we must all fight for
An innocent observer could be forgiven for thinking that the United Nations climate talks, now hotting up in the Qatar capital of Doha, would be the focus of the international fight to combat global warming. But the innocent observer would be wrong. There is indeed a battle going on, one that will determine the planet's future, but it is not between the negotiators finding new ways to disagree over the implementation of decisions they have already made.
The battle is being waged in energy and finance ministries around the world, and in the boardrooms of energy companies and their bankers. It is the battle between a high-carbon and a low-carbon energy future. And the outcome is unclear.
On the one hand, global investment in renewable technologies, particularly wind and solar, has been racing ahead: for the past three years it has exceeded investment in generation from fossil fuels. Last year, fully 70% of all European power investment was in renewables.
Leading Europe's drive towards decarbonisation is Germany, whose national "energy transition" will reduce emissions by 40% by 2020 and by 80% by 2050 without use of nuclear power – using renewables and energy efficiency alone. Meanwhile, China has become the world's largest producer of both wind and solar power. In California, South Korea and Australia new emissions-trading schemes have recently put a price on carbon.
Yet at the same time the world is also going in the opposite direction. More coal – the dirtiest fossil fuel – was used to produce electricity last year than for 40 years. As the International Energy Agency warned this month, this is driving up global carbon emissions, which rose by an alarming 3% in 2011. Coal burning now represents almost a third of all power generation; it is rising even in Europe, as the economic slump slashes the carbon price. And there is more to come: the World Resources Institute reports that globally no fewer than 1,200 new coal plants are currently proposed, two-thirds of them in India and China. Meanwhile, Canada leads the countries exploiting highly carbon-polluting tar sands, and the oil majors eye up the Arctic for new oil.
A low carbon future is the one we must all fight for
The battle is being waged in energy and finance ministries around the world, and in the boardrooms of energy companies and their bankers. It is the battle between a high-carbon and a low-carbon energy future. And the outcome is unclear.
On the one hand, global investment in renewable technologies, particularly wind and solar, has been racing ahead: for the past three years it has exceeded investment in generation from fossil fuels. Last year, fully 70% of all European power investment was in renewables.
Leading Europe's drive towards decarbonisation is Germany, whose national "energy transition" will reduce emissions by 40% by 2020 and by 80% by 2050 without use of nuclear power – using renewables and energy efficiency alone. Meanwhile, China has become the world's largest producer of both wind and solar power. In California, South Korea and Australia new emissions-trading schemes have recently put a price on carbon.
Yet at the same time the world is also going in the opposite direction. More coal – the dirtiest fossil fuel – was used to produce electricity last year than for 40 years. As the International Energy Agency warned this month, this is driving up global carbon emissions, which rose by an alarming 3% in 2011. Coal burning now represents almost a third of all power generation; it is rising even in Europe, as the economic slump slashes the carbon price. And there is more to come: the World Resources Institute reports that globally no fewer than 1,200 new coal plants are currently proposed, two-thirds of them in India and China. Meanwhile, Canada leads the countries exploiting highly carbon-polluting tar sands, and the oil majors eye up the Arctic for new oil.
A low carbon future is the one we must all fight for
Monday, December 3, 2012
Africa expert: 'Sustainable living is a luxury' | Globalization | DW.DE | 30.11.2012
Sustainability and green economy have nothing to do with the reality of African people, says Kenyan sociologist Auma Obama, founder of the aid organisation Sauti Kuu and half sister of US President Barack Obama.
"Green economy is a western term meaning that the economy has to become more environmentally friendly. However, often that doesn't come up in African countries. The majority of people struggle for survival every single day. If you talk to these people about green economy they will ask 'what is in it for me? In what way will my life change?' Often these questions are left unanswered."Africa expert: 'Sustainable living is a luxury' | Globalization | DW.DE | 30.11.2012
Sunday, December 2, 2012
OECD-GGGI Workshop Discusses Green Growth Opportunities in Developing Countries - Sustainable Development Policy & Practice
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI) have organized a workshop, titled “Green Growth Development Paths for a Better Future,” which brought together policy makers and experts from developing countries to discuss the creation of an enabling framework and effective policies to support inclusive green growth opportunities.
The workshop took place on 22 November in the context the 2012 Green Growth and Sustainable Development Forum (GG-SD). The workshop featured two sessions, which covered a range of topics, including: A global green growth architecture; innovations in green technologies and options for developing countries; the role of public policies in leveraging private financing for green growth; green growth in Africa; the role of development cooperation in supporting green growth; and case studies from Ethiopia, Cambodia, Mongolia, the Philippines, and Kyrgyzstan.
All the presentations are available on the OECD website
OECD-GGGI Workshop Discusses Green Growth Opportunities in Developing Countries - Sustainable Development Policy & Practice
The workshop took place on 22 November in the context the 2012 Green Growth and Sustainable Development Forum (GG-SD). The workshop featured two sessions, which covered a range of topics, including: A global green growth architecture; innovations in green technologies and options for developing countries; the role of public policies in leveraging private financing for green growth; green growth in Africa; the role of development cooperation in supporting green growth; and case studies from Ethiopia, Cambodia, Mongolia, the Philippines, and Kyrgyzstan.
All the presentations are available on the OECD website
OECD-GGGI Workshop Discusses Green Growth Opportunities in Developing Countries - Sustainable Development Policy & Practice
Saturday, December 1, 2012
Lesotho: hungry and largely forgotten as donor pledges ring hollow
Lesotho has suffered a drop in agricultural production of more than 70% due to flooding, late rains and early frost. This year's crop failures follow poor harvests in 2011, making many of the country's poorest farmers even more vulnerable. In addition to the latest natural calamities, Lesotho has long-term agricultural problems: lack of access to technology and inputs, and a reduction of arable land through soil erosion by rain and overgrazing.
Most of the population live in rural areas and rely largely on subsistence farming. Normally, families sell their surplus maize for extra cash. This year, however, most had to dip into that surplus to survive. Domestic production will meet only 10% of Lesotho's cereal needs, and many cannot afford imported food.
Chronic malnutrition is already extremely high. More than one in three children under five are stunted, and the current food insecurity could increase malnutrition, especially among young children, and women who are pregnant or breastfeeding.
HIV and Aids is another complicating factor. Almost a quarter of the population is HIV positive or living with Aids. The combination of low household food production and high food costs is forcing people who have Aids to make choices between buying food or life-saving medications.
Lesotho: hungry and largely forgotten as donor pledges ring hollow
Most of the population live in rural areas and rely largely on subsistence farming. Normally, families sell their surplus maize for extra cash. This year, however, most had to dip into that surplus to survive. Domestic production will meet only 10% of Lesotho's cereal needs, and many cannot afford imported food.
Chronic malnutrition is already extremely high. More than one in three children under five are stunted, and the current food insecurity could increase malnutrition, especially among young children, and women who are pregnant or breastfeeding.
HIV and Aids is another complicating factor. Almost a quarter of the population is HIV positive or living with Aids. The combination of low household food production and high food costs is forcing people who have Aids to make choices between buying food or life-saving medications.
Lesotho: hungry and largely forgotten as donor pledges ring hollow
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