03 Environmental Degradation – Page 41 – Public Intelligence Blog

The Great Green Wall Of Africa — A 4,000 Mile Defense Against Climate Change

One of the most unique large-scale international climate change projects is underway in Africa. A 4,000 mile “wall of trees” is being constructed across the east-west axis of the continent as a defense against rapid, expanding desertification of the Sahara.

11 nations — Mauritania, Senegal, Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger, Nigeria, Chad, Sudan, Ethiopia, Eritrea, and Djibouti — have agreed to participate in The Great Green Wall initiative (GGW), planting a contiguous “wall of trees” stretching 4,300 miles long and 9 miles wide, across the entire width of the African continent from Djibouti in the east to Senegal on the west.

The project was approved by the African Union in 2007, under the umbrella of the Community of the Sahel-Saharan States (CEN-SAD). In 2008, the first trees were planted along the wall’s path.

Progress (and reporting) currently varies from nation to nation; the process is still in its infancy and will take several years to complete. Nevertheless, the project is already showing some success: a World Food Program (WFP) report from Senegal details how villages in Widou Thiengoli are now harvesting fresh fruits and vegetables from the dry desert sands, a by-product of the Wall initiative. Some 50,000 acres of trees have already been planted in Senegal, according to press reports.

Desertification has emerged as a “major planetary threat” with particularly daunting challenges for Africa. Climate change has led to prolonged periods of drought and other symptoms of desertification, which are being experienced by a growing number of countries. The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) reports that two-thirds of the African continent is classified as desert or dry lands. Rainy seasons and other weather patterns — long consistent – are now changing across the region. In Senegal, for example, the rainy season now begins in September — it traditionally started in July.

The UN estimates that two-thirds of Africa’s arable land could be lost by 2025 if this trend continues.

According to the Great Green Wall website, the goal is to help mitigate the environmental effects of climate change, including the expansion of desertification. The trees will act as a barrier against desert winds, help to hold moisture in the air and soil, reduce erosion, enhance biodiversity, provide new grazing land and be a source of vegetation. The project is also recognized for the role it will play in local agriculture and employment.

“People used to go to towns to seek paid work during the lean season, but since the project started, that has changed,” says Papa Sarr, Technical Director of the Senegal National Agency of the Great Green Wall.

The Great Green Wall initiative is supported by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP), the World Food Programme, the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) and the UN-backed Global Environment Facility (GEF) – the largest public funder of UN environmental projects.

The Great Green Wall has received a total of $1.8 billion dollars from the World Bank and another $108 million from the Global Environment Facility.

Ulrich Apel, a forestry expert with GEF, said the program could serve as a model for similar projects around the world in areas, such as central Asia, which face similar challenges in adapting to a rapidly changing climate.

The Green Wall, said Apel, “is off to a promising start.” Standing near a row of waist-high trees in Widou village – one of Senegal’s Green Wall locations — he said: ”In 10 to 15 years this will be a forest. The trees will be big and this region will be completely transformed.”

2013/04/172013/04/17

SchwartzReport: GMO Poison, Nuclear Seepage, Eat Less Die Less, Obama’s Three Failures

01 Agriculture, 03 Environmental Degradation, 05 Energy, 06 Family, 07 Health, 07 Other Atrocities, 08 Proliferation, 11 Society

BioTech Lies Exposed: Genetically Modified Corn Is Loaded With Chemical Poisons
JONATHAN BENSON – Global Research

The more I learn about GMOs (See The Great Experiment: Genetically Modified Organisms, Scientific Integrity, and National Wellness http://www.explorejournal.com/article/S1550-8307%2812%2900222-4/fulltext) the more I am convinced that this is a vast planet wide animal study, and we are the animals. We must label the presence of these organisms in our foods. ! Sign every petition you can, donate, lobby. We are up against a very powerful corporate force, but our health depends upon our behavior

This is the latest on a slow motion nuclear accident taking place with almost no public awareness.

Seepage From an Aging Nuclear Site
GINA MASON – Consortiumnews.com

An unintended mass population experiment reveals a great deal that you may find useful in your own life. Click through to see the graphic.

The Cuban Diet: Eat Less, Exercise More – and Preventable Deaths Are Halved
JEREMY LAURANCE – The Independent (UK)

Obama has been a disappointment in many ways. The big three, in my view, are the failure to address climate change in a meaningful way; the failure to hold the corrupt financial sector accountable; and the failure to develop a foreign policy that was not just an extension of the Bush-Cheney policies.

Losing Pakistan: An Insider’s Look at How the U.S. Deals With Its Ally
OMAR WARAICH – Time

2013/04/102013/04/10

John Robb: The Future of Food — Total Transparency & The Beginning of True Cost Economics

01 Agriculture, 03 Economy, 03 Environmental Degradation, 07 Health, 11 Society, Advanced Cyber/IO, Civil Society, Commerce, Commercial Intelligence, Ethics, Liberation Technology, True Cost Meme

Here's How to Build a More Resilient Food System…

By John Robb

Want to get a glimpse of the future of food?

This is the page from Gulf Wild program. When you buy a fish that has a Gulf Wild ID number on it, you can find out everything about it.

Simply enter this ID number on their website or (cell phone) and it will provide you with:

The bio and history of the fisherman who caught the fish.
What the fish is, where the fish was caught (with a map) down to 10 miles, and when it was caught.
Info on fishing practices (e.g. was it caught as part of a sustainable fisheries program?).

NOTE: Canada has a similar program called “This Fish”

I believe we're going to see programs like this for all of the food (and an increasing number of products) we buy, from meats to vegetables.

Why? Info like this is addicting. Once you get it, you want it on everything.

Fortunately, it's also really easy to put a service like this together for local producers, and that's a good thing.

Here's why: This type of insight would positively differentiate fresh, high quality local produce from the generic products of indefinite age, quality, and origin we get from the global industrial system.

That would be a good thing, since it would help make local food more plentiful and that makes us ALL more resilient.

Resiliently Yours,
JOHN ROBB

2013/04/042013/04/04

Greg Palast: BP Failure in Gulf Preceded by Identical Failure for Known Reasons in Caspiuan Sea — BP Covered It Up, US Department of State ALSO Covered It Up. Manning and Truth the Enemy, Crime by BP and Treason by State “Not” the Enemy. Say What?

03 Economy, 03 Environmental Degradation, 05 Energy, 07 Health, 09 Justice, 11 Society, 12 Water, Civil Society, Commerce, Corruption, Government, Law Enforcement, Media

Bradley Manning & The Deepwater Horizon
By Greg Palast for Vice Magazine
Wednesday, 3. April 2013

Three years ago this month, on the 20th of April, 2010, the BP Deepwater Horizon drilling rig blew itself to kingdom come.

Soon thereafter, a message came in to our office's chief of investigations, Ms Badpenny, from a person I dare not name, who was floating somewhere in the Caspian Sea along the coast of Baku, Central Asia.

The source was in mortal fear he’d be identified – and with good reason. Once we agreed on a safe method of communication, he revealed this: 17 months before BP’s Deepwater Horizon blew out and exploded in the Gulf of Mexico, another BP rig suffered an identical blow-out in the Caspian Sea.

Crucially, both the Gulf and Caspian Sea blow-outs had the same identical cause: the failure of the cement “plug”.

To prevent blow-outs, drilled wells must be capped with cement. BP insisted on lacing its cement with nitrogen gas – the same stuff used in laughing gas – because it speeds up drying.

Time is money, and mixing some nitrogen gas into the cement saves a lot of money.

However, because BP’s penny-pinching method is so damn dangerous, they are nearly alone in using it in deep, high-pressure offshore wells.

The reason: nitrogen gas can create gaps in the cement, allow methane gas to go up the borehole, fill the drilling platform with explosive gas – and boom, you’re dead.

So, when its Caspian Sea rig blew out in 2008, rather than change its ways, BP simply covered it up.

Our investigators discovered that the company hid the information from its own shareholders, from British regulators and from the US Securities Exchange Commission. The Vice-President of BP USA, David Rainey, withheld the information from the US Senate in a testimony he gave six months before the Gulf deaths. (Rainey was later charged with obstruction of justice on a spill-related matter.)

Britain's Channel 4 agreed to send me to the benighted nation of Azerbaijan, whose waters the earlier BP blow-out occurred in, to locate witnesses who would be willing to talk to me without getting “disappeared”. (They didn’t talk, but they still disappeared.)

And I was arrested. Some rat had tipped off the Security Ministry (the official name of the Department of Torture here in this Islamic Republic of BP). I knew I’d get out quick, because throwing a reporter of Her Majesty’s Empire into a dungeon would embarrass both BP and the Azeri oil-o-crats.

The gendarmes demanded our film, but I wasn’t overly concerned: Before I left London, Badpenny handed me one of those Austin Powers camera-in-pens, on which I’d loaded all I needed. But I did fear for my witnesses left behind in Azerbaijan – and for my source in a tiger cage in the USA: Pvt Bradley Manning.

Manning could have saved their lives

Only after I dove into deep water in Baku did I discover, trolling through the so-called “WikiLeaks” documents, secret State Department cables released by Manning. The information was stunning: the US State Department knew about the BP blow-out in the Caspian and joined in the cover-up.

Continue reading “Greg Palast: BP Failure in Gulf Preceded by Identical Failure for Known Reasons in Caspiuan Sea — BP Covered It Up, US Department of State ALSO Covered It Up. Manning and Truth the Enemy, Crime by BP and Treason by State “Not” the Enemy. Say What?”

2013/04/04

SchwartzReport: Almost Half in US Find USG Environmental Efforts Lacking — With Solution from Earth Intelligence Network

01 Agriculture, 02 Diplomacy, 03 Economy, 03 Environmental Degradation, 04 Education, 05 Energy, 06 Family, 07 Health, 09 Justice, 10 Security, 11 Society, 12 Water

Here, again, we have an example of the disconnect between what the American people understand and want, and what the corporate owned Congress is focused on.

The only thing that is going to change this equation is a massive voter turnout that supports compassionate life-affirming policies and politicians prepared to act on those wishes. We did it with Elizabeth Warren, we can do it in other districts.

Click through to see the charts and tables that will help you understand this report better.

Nearly Half in U.S. Say Gov't Environmental Efforts Lacking
FRANK NEWPORT – The Gallup Organization

PRINCETON, NJ — Americans tilt toward the view that the government is doing too little to protect the environment — at 47% — while 16% say it is doing too much. Another 35% say the government's efforts on the environment are about right. These views have not changed much since 2010, although Americans in most years between 1992 and 2006 were more likely than they are today to say the government was doing too little to protect the environment.

Read full article.

Continue reading “SchwartzReport: Almost Half in US Find USG Environmental Efforts Lacking — With Solution from Earth Intelligence Network”

2013/03/302013/03/30

SchwartzReport: Respecting Climate Change, Fraudulent Geo-Engineering

03 Environmental Degradation

I take this to be very good news. Despite the well-financed disinformation campaign designed and paid for by carbon energy interests, and the craven failure of the U.S. Congress to address the issue, personal experience, and conversations with friends and neighbors appears to have overcome the miasma of false information to produce a growing national consensus that climate change, extreme weather, and sea rise are real.

Now if we can just elect replacements for the Congressional buffoons, perhaps something meaningful can finally be done to prepare us for what is coming.

Americans Back Preparation for Extreme Weather and Sea-Level Rise
Science Daily

. . . . . . . . . .

In my view geoengineering is a lot like Fracking. The companies who support and practice these technologies think they know what they are doing but, in fact, their understanding is simplistic and partial at best. As a result there are always unintended consequences that they did not anticipate or understand. In this case the result could be catastrophic.

Clive Hamilton professor of public ethics at Charles Sturt University in Canberra and the author of Earthmasters: The dawn of the age of climate engineering, just published by Yale University Press.

Why Geoengineering Has Immediate Appeal to China
CLIVE HAMILTON , Professor of Public Ethics at Charles Sturt University – The Guardian (U.K.)

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SchwartzReport Home

2013/03/292013/03/29

Dolphin: 5 Lawmakers in Mississippi Die — and 10 Related to BP Oil Spill Dead….

03 Environmental Degradation, 07 Other Atrocities

Some of these seem a stretch, but obviously the FBI is choosing not to notice the larger pattern.

5 Mississippi Lawmakers Die In Months; Pro-Agenda 21 Legislator Jessica Upshaw Found Dead Of Gunshot Wound

The Baker's Dozen of BP Whistle-Blowing Victims

5 Mississippi state lawmakers have died within the past few months, including the recent death of Jessica Upshaw who recently took a great deal of blame for not allowing a vote to kill Agenda 21 in Mississippi. Upshaw represented a district that included the coast of the Gulf of Mexico and was said to have committed suicide. Could this have something to do with the BP oil spill and all of the mysterious deaths surrounding that? I find it strange that 5 politicians from the same state have died within the last few months. What else is going on down there? Is there an ‘Agenda 21' hit list? Are the Feds mad that she brought Agenda 21 to this level of attention? From the Daily Mail.

Category: 03 Environmental Degradation

Jean Lievins: Africa’s Great Green Wall