Three simple steps

“Save energy by switching off and unplugging all electrical appliances when you leave your resort room;

“Reduce waste by bringing your own bag when you go out, and say no to plastic bags, straws and sachets;

 “Walk more, to enjoy the beach and lessen air pollution.”




These are three simple steps that Greenpeace is asking holiday-goers bound for the resort island of Boracay (or any other destination, for that matter) to take when they go to the island for a vacation.

Local Boracay-based groups, including Boracay Foundation Inc., and Boracay Yuppies, have thrown their support behind the “Save the Climate, Save Boracay” campaign. In addition, Seair will be announcing the three simple steps on their flights starting tomorrow (Holy Monday) to April 12, Easter Sunday, Holy Week being the height of the busiest season on the island. Resorts as well as the local boat cooperative will be displaying project posters telling tourists what they can do to help protect the island’s fragile environment.

Meanwhile, local TV cable stations Paradise Cable and Kalibo Cable will be airing videos of Richard Gutierrez and Angel Aquino enjoining visitors to help make Boracay a greener destination.

According to Greenpeace press materials, “Save the Climate, Save Boracay” is the first project of its kind in the Philippines. It was launched last June during the “Quit Coal, Save the Climate” Philippine tour of the Greenpeace ship M.Y. Rainbow Warrior.

In a manifesto signed by all the stakeholders of Boracay’s tourism industry, the signatories promised to include energy efficiency measures and the promotion of renewable energy use as part of the environmental
management plans for the island.


* * *
In particular, the manifesto mentions the need for energy efficient measures in the construction or expansion of establishments, the provision of regular energy audits, “skillshares” and workshops for establishments to ensure the continuation and replication of successful practices in the areas of energy and water conservation, as well as ecological waste management. To carry out these measures, Greenpeace has been conducting forums and dialogues with the island’s resorts and tourism organizations since the project’s inception.

Aside from tapping tourism organizations, the project also counts on the support of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, the Department of Tourism, the local government of Malay, Aklan, Task Force Boracay, Boracay Foundation Inc. (BFI), Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry-Boracay (PCCI-Boracay), and the Boracay Association of Resorts, Restaurants & Independent Allies (BARRIA). The initiative is made possible through a grant from the Foundation for the Philippine Environment.

What drew my attention to the project was the “three simple steps” suggested by Greenpeace. They are indeed simple, easy to follow and eminently doable. Greenpeace doesn’t require tourists to go out of their way and engage in “special” activities to help clean up or protect Boracay’s environment. All Greenpeace asks is for visitors to think about their activities while on the island, and leave as small a “footprint” as possible while they go about enjoying themselves.


* * *
I think the “three simple steps” are wonderfully workable in other vacation destinations as well, be they beach resorts, mountain hideaways or any quiet, hidden spot far from the hustle of the city.

In beaches and wooded areas, I would suggest that vacationers use extra reusable bags to carry their trash as well, so that they leave the beach or clear it as they found it, bringing their disposables to population centers where they could be disposed of properly, recycled or reduced to compost.

I could never understand how beach-goers, for one, could descend on a pristine stretch of beach and have no compunctions about littering their surroundings with food wrappers and discards, fruit peels and seafood shells, empty bottles (which pose a danger to those coming after them), empty soda cans, and soiled disposable diapers (I swear I saw some during one visit).

The detritus speaks not only of the deplorable sanitary habits of the vacationers, but also of their utter disrespect for nature and bad manners — who do they expect will clean up after them?

In fact, I would suggest that local government officials of beach locales hand every group an extra trash bag to take with them and then require each group to deposit these trash bags with the local trash authority for proper disposal.


* * *
Sadly, leisure-seekers often arrive at their destinations expecting they could leave all civilized behavior behind.

There’s an expectation that they can leave behind all the politically-correct, environmentally-sound practices they adopt in the everyday world, now that they have resort personnel or hotel staffers to follow their bidding.

But as the Greenpeace project in Boracay shows, even while in “paradise,” people are still expected to care about their surroundings. In fact, it is precisely because you’re in paradise, enjoying an environment of beauty and serenity that you should take extra pains to preserve that environment and work for its protection and sustainability.

 And as the “three simple steps” show, such measures don’t even have to be heroic or superhuman. It’s a simple matter of turning off appliances when you don’t need them, carrying a reusable bag around to cut down on the need for plastic (and avoid littering), and walking around and using your own energy as much as possible.

Perhaps the coming Holy Week will provide all of us enough time and leisure to reflect on just what is expected of us when it comes to doing our share to save Mother Earth.


 Save  Mother Earth, Act now its not too late... Time to bring back the cleanliness, Save our environment...

Southern Africa on alert for flash floods

 GENEVA (AFP) – Virtually every country in southern Africa is on alert for potentially disastrous flooding, the United Nations said on Friday, as exceptionally heavy rainfall was forecast to continue into March.


"We fear flash floods. It's rather common in the region and this time we are seeing heavier rainfall than in previous years," said Elisabeth Byrs, a spokeswoman for the UN's Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.


"Five countries are on alert for flooding -- Botswana, Mozambique, Namibia, Zimbabwe and Zambia, -- and South Africa will now declare a disaster."


"All neighbouring countries including Madagascar are on alert," she told journalists.


In South Africa flooding and storms have left 40 dead and forced 6,000 people to flee their homes so far, according to the UN, with reports of damage or casualties in Lesotho, Madagascar, Mozambique, Malawi, Angola and Swaziland.


Two of the biggest rivers in the region, the Zambezi and Okavango, are at about twice their normal levels early in the rainy season.


"We could have an extremely major disaster if prevention measures are not stepped up over the next six weeks," Byrs said.


The UN warned of the risk of increased cholera -- which is endemic in some countries -- and malaria in any major flood, as well as the danger of widespread destruction of crops in southern Africa's 'bread basket'.


Regional forecasts have predicted "normal to above normal" rainfall across the area in January to March.

Relief workers fear a repeat of the kind of disaster that struck Mozambique in 2000, when devastating downpours caused massive floods that killed 800 people.

Bad air cuts visibility in Hong Kong, raising death rates

HONG KONG (Reuters) – Visibility in Hong Kong has deteriorated so sharply over the last 50 years because of air pollution that variations in levels can even be used to predict mortality rates, health experts warned on Wednesday.


Visibility is now 12.6 km (7.8 miles) on an average day, well below that of cities such as Paris, Berlin, Auckland and Vancouver, where visibility stands at 20 to 25 km or beyond.


Using government data, researchers at the University of Hong Kong found that the number of hazy days when visibility fell to below 8 km shot up to 54 in 2007 from 6.6 in 1968.


For every 6.5-km reduction in visibility, there was a corresponding 1.13 percent increase in the number of non-accidental deaths from such causes as heart and respiratory diseases.


These additional deaths worked out to a total of 1,200 per year between 2007 and 2010, the experts told a news conference.


"Loss of visibility is a direct measure of serious harm to health. Loss of visibility kills people," said Anthony Hedley, Honorary Professor at the School of Public Health.

Professor Lam Tai-hing, director of the School of Public Health, said: "The less you can see, the greater the harm. It is very important to believe in your eyes because at the moment, the government is still using outdated air quality objectives.


"Based on that, people are being told today's air quality is good or acceptable when in fact, if you follow the World Health Organization's air quality guidelines, it is very bad indeed."


Poor visibility was due to the concentration of pollutants such as respirable suspended particulates and nitrogen dioxide, Hedley said.

While the amount of particulates in places like Vancouver and Auckland measured between 10 to 12 micrograms per cubic meter of air, Hong Kong had 80 micrograms per cubic meter.

"The higher the pollutant concentrations, the lower the visibility," Hedley said, adding that even short exposure to such pollutants was particularly dangerous for those suffering from underlying heart or lung illnesses.
"Air pollutants increase the stickiness of elements in the blood ... With increased stickiness, blood cells stick together, they form a clot. If you form a clot, you may obstruct a vessel and if the vessel is in the heart or the head, you get a heart attack or a stroke," Hedley said.
"In people who are susceptible, such as those with diabetes, they begin to experience serious degradation to their health, they will become sick and may have a shorter life expectancy."

New climate data shows warming world: WMO

 GENEVA (Reuters) – Last year tied for the hottest year on record, confirming a long-term warming trend which will continue unless greenhouse gas emissions are cut, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) said on Thursday.


The first 10 years of the millennium proved to be the hottest decade since records began in the 19th century, it said.

"The main signal is that the warming trend continues and is being strengthened year after year," WMO Secretary-General Michel Jarraud told a news conference.


"The trend, unfortunately, will continue for a number of years but the amplitude will depend on the amount of greenhouse gases released," the Frenchman added. "It will depend on action taken to minimize the release of greenhouse gases."


Jarraud said the latest data should convince doubters about the growing evidence for man-made climate change. "If they look at it in an unbiased way, it should convince them, or hopefully a few of them, that the skeptical position is untenable."


2010 was also marked by further melting of Arctic ice -- in December its extent was at its lowest on record, the WMO said -- and by extreme weather, including Russia's heatwave and devastating floods in Pakistan.
Rising temperatures, already about 0.8 degree Celsius above pre-industrial times, mean the world will struggle to limit warming to below 2 degrees Celsius, a target agreed by almost 200 nations at U.N. talks last month in Mexico.


Many experts see 2C as a threshold for dangerous climate change, like more heatwaves, droughts, floods and rising seas.


"We have to act very fast and strongly" to limit emissions, said Bob Ward, of the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and Environment at the London School of Economics and Political Science.
He noted that many skeptics say global warming has stopped because of no new records since 1998, when temperatures were boosted by a strong El Nino event that warms the Pacific.

"But they cannot explain away the fact that nine of the 10 warmest years have occurred since 2000," he said.

"Data received by the WMO show no statistically significant difference between global temperatures in 2010,
2005 and 1998," the United Nations body, which compiles its ranking from data provided by British and U.S. agencies, said in a statement.


Data from British institutes on Wednesday showed last year was the world's second warmest behind 1998, while the other two main groups tracking global warming, based in the United States, said 2010 was tied for the hottest on record.


Over the 10 years from 2001 to 2010, global temperatures have averaged 0.45 degrees Celsius (0.83 degrees Fahrenheit) above the 1961-1990 average and are the highest ever recorded for a 10-year period since climate records began, WMO said.

The difference between the three hottest years was less than the margin of uncertainty in comparing the data, according to WMO, whose assessment is based on climate data from land-based weather and climate stations, ships, buoys and satellites.


The fight against global warming suffered a setback in the wake of the financial crisis, slowing funding for renewable energy projects and knocking momentum from international efforts to agree a climate deal to succeed the Kyoto Protocol in 2013.

Japanese carmakers in push for hydrogen vehicles

TOKYO (AFP) - – Japan's top three automakers Toyota, Honda and Nissan have united with Japanese energy firms in a push to commercialise greener hydrogen fuel cell cars and build a network of fuelling stations.

Along with 10 Japanese energy groups including natural gas refiners and distributors, the companies are aiming to build 100 filling stations by 2015 in Tokyo, Nagoya, Osaka and Fukuoka, the companies said in a statement Thursday.

The automakers are making a renewed push behind Fuel Cell Vehicles (FCVs), which covert hydrogen into electricity and emit nothing more harmful than water vapour.

The companies say that the creation of a hydrogen supply infrastructure network is crucial as manufacturers work to reduce the production cost of hydrogen-powered vehicles in order to make them commercially viable.

"Japanese automakers are continuing to drastically reduce the cost of manufacturing such systems and are aiming to launch FCVs in the Japanese market -- mainly in the country's four major metropolitan areas -- in 2015," they said.

"With an aim to significantly reduce the amount of CO2 emitted by the transportation sector, automakers and hydrogen fuel suppliers will work together to expand the introduction of FCVs and develop the hydrogen supply network throughout Japan."

The companies did not say how much they planned to invest in the project.

While all-electric vehicles such as Nissan's Leaf or hybrids like Toyota's Prius have hogged the limelight recently, fuel cells are seen as a more powerful alternative, but expensive production and a lack of a comprehensive fuelling network has been seen as prohibitive.

Toyota, pioneer of hybrids powered by a petrol engine and an electric motor, has said it plans to launch a fuel-cell car by 2015. It is applying its hybrid technology to the vehicles, swapping the petrol engine for a fuel-cell stack.

Honda in 2008 began delivering about 200 FCX Clarity hydrogen-powered cars on lease to customers in the United States, Japan and later in Europe.

Wwater drains from the tailpipe of an hydrogen fuel cell powered vehicle. Toyota, Honda and Nissan have united with Japanese energy firms in a push to commercialise greener hydrogen fuel cell cars and build a network of fuelling stations.

PH gears up for nationwide celebration of “International Year of Forests”

As the Philippines joins the world community on February 2, 2011 in New York City for the launching of 2011 as the “International Year of the Forests” (IYF) by the United Nations, the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) is making sure that the festivities slated are both meaningful to the majority of the Filipino people and especially to the most affected sector by forest ruin – the 25 million Filipino upland dwellers regarded as the country’s “poorest of the poor.”

This, according to DENR Secretary Ramon J.P. Paje, who has called for the national launch of the celebration rites in partnership with some of the leading environment-advocate organizations that represent the country’s diverse ecosystems, such as the University of the Philippine, Los Banos-College of Forestry; Society of Filipino Foresters (SFF); Philippine Wood Producers Association (PWPA); Philippine Tropical Forest Conservation Foundation (PTFC); Yakap Kalikasan; Women’s Initiative for Society, Culture and Environment (WISE); Bantay Kalikasan, Conservation International-Philippines (CI-Philippines); Foundation for Philippine Environment (FPE); World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the United States Agency for International Development (USAID); and the German International Cooperation (GTZ).

“The observance of the International Year of the Forest in the country not only serves as a catalyst for raising global awareness of the urgent need to protect the planet’s fragile forest resources, but more importantly, our festivities should focus on the need for reforestation and reducing gas emissions while supporting people and biodiversity for the primary benefit of Filipinos especially those in the upland areas,” said Paje.

According to Paje, the DENR will spearhead the celebration, as he directed the creation of a “National IYF Steering Committee (NISC),” to be headed by Forest Management Bureau (FMB) Director Neria Andin. Being aware of the importance of the UN declaration, Paje bared that a presidential proclamation declaring 2011 as “the national year of forests” has already been drafted for the signing of President Benigno S. Aquino III, imploring all sectors of Philippine society to act out their important roles in protecting and conserving forest life. Paje stressed that his agency will exploit the forthcoming event “to the hilt” to get the message across to the general public, especially those in urban centers, that “forests, like the infant’s umbillical chord that brings life-giving nutrients from the mother, are inextricably linked to the country’s voyage towards poverty eradication and food security. “The government’s program on convergence among the DENR, Department of Agriculture and Department of Agrarian Reform, will be one of the centerpiece activities of the event to stress this point,” Paje added. The convergence program seeks to reduce poverty, promote security and address climate change. The draft also calls on the 15th Philippine Congress “to facilitate the passage” of the proposed Sustainable Forest Ecosystem Management Act which has been filed for 15 years now. “Passing this proposed law will have ground-breaking impact on the country’s efforts to chart a vibrant future for our forests and the economic fruits that it can give the nation ,” Paje said. He added that a national calendar of events is now undergoing fine tuning to keep the activities attuned to the four themes laid out by the United Nations Forum on Forests, namely: Forests for People, Finance for Forest Dependent Communities, Forests plus: Cross Sectoral and Cross Institutional Approach, and Forests and Green Economies. Paje said giving life to the four themes through the country’s celebration rites of the UN declaration “puts in living colors” the need for forests to remain high on the wider development agenda both on the global and regional scale like the ASEAN and APEC poverty eradication. Paje added that four teams have been formed for each of the four themes and will act as technical working groups for NISC whose overall task is to oversee the implementation of the lined up activities on a national scale. These are the working groups on Forest for People with WWF as head; Finance for Forest Dependent Communities to be headed by PTFCF; Forests plus: Cross Sectoral and Cross Institutional Approach, WISE; and Forests and Green Economies, SFF. “As such, the IYF needed to highlight forests as an important part of development and a crucial link with the many other issues being addressed at the global level,” Paje said.