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All about conservation, ecology, the environment, climate change, global warming, earth- watch, and new technologies etc.

Monday, November 28, 2011

Greenpeace Russia: One world - two realities

Greenpeace New Zealand



  • One world - two realities

     
    Last week I heard two completely different views of the same thing. One came from a top Swedish government official at a seminar on board the Greenpeace flag ship Rainbow Warrior dedicated to drilling for oil and gas in the Arctic.
    The second view was voiced by an old Nenets woman from the Yamal peninsula at the very top or Russian mainland, an area which over past few decades has become one of the most actively developing gas fields in the world.

    Nenetskvinnor på Yamal-halvön Lena Ek - miljöminister
    Nenets reindeer herders of the Yamal peninsula, whose traditional lifestyle is threatened by encroachment of oil and gas production in the Arctic. Lena Ek - Swedish Environment minister
    At the seminar in the balmy November Stockholm, the Swedish minister of the environment Lena Ek defended the Swedish ambassador to the Arctic Council Gustaf Lind. As befits a top diplomat, Gustaf had to find a polite way to explain to the Greenpeace campaigner and to the leader of the Swedish Greens why the government of Sweden, who holds the Arctic Council presidency at the moment, is not actively using this opportunity to fight against opening up the Arctic to the oil and gas industry that increasingly sees the (formerly) frozen and (relatively) untouched North as nothing more than a resource base. Despite the increasing urgency of the climate crisis that is nowhere more visible then in the Arctic, despite the horrendous record of oil spills and environmental contamination in the Arctic oil fields, the Swedish presidency continues to accept the development of the hydrocarbons fields in the North.
    Right, not much can be said in moral defense of this. But face must be saved, and Lena Ek tried by rolling out the “poor people up there” argument. “It’s important to take responsibility for the people (of the Arctic)”, she said. “The people there should have a decent life”.


    Maybe she should listen to what the “people up there” consider to be a decent life. The Swedish Minister’s namesake Lena Sarteto, a Nenets grandmother interviewed by the Russian journalist seems to think that the life before the “development “ was a hell of a lot better. Lena does not think that being forced away into towns from the traditional habitation areas in order to open up new gas fields underneath the tundra is “decent”. She doesn’t seem to think that the traditional reindeer migration paths getting broken up by roads and pipelines is decent. The children being taken away to boarding schools in towns, part of a conscious effort to urbanize the Nenets – I don’t believe she thinks its decent. And the land itself getting destroyed – Lena doesn’t seem to find much decency in that. She says to the journalist:
    “The fish tastes dead; we feel sick after drinking water out of the lakes; our reindeers get stuck in wire loops or trip over pipes, break their legs and die,”
    No she doesn’t seem too excited about the prospect of development that oil and gas production brings to the “people up there”. The journalist ends her story by an image of Lena praying to an animist idol ““Let Gazprom leave soon, and Yamal become only ours again.”
    So Lena Ek. Please. You may think that Sweden should not take a firm position against oil and gas drilling in the Arctic. You may think it’s too uncomfortable diplomatically. You may think it would be bad for the price of petrol. You may think that it would mean a loss of opportunities for Swedish businessmen. But for the sake of decency, don’t pretend that it’s best for the people of the Arctic. The other Lena, the one living in Yamal, does not agree.

  • Acknowledgements: Dimitri Litvinov
    Chairman of the Board
    Greenpeace Russia
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Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Rainforest Action Network...

Weekly Panther
Rainforest Action Network
Dear Peter,
Wow, it’s been an incredible year and it’s time for us to say thank you.

It’s activists like you that got us to the negotiating table with Disney to get rainforest destruction out of their supply chain. It’s activists like you that pushed President Obama to make the decision to delay (and possibly kill) the Keystone XL pipeline.
Together, as Rainforest Action Network, we have amassed a lot of hard work, skill and passion to fight for thriving forests, the rights of Indigenous frontline communities and a stable climate. It is not easy work. Not even close. But the rewards of success are so great, it is worth every moment.

So to thank you for everything—the emails, phone calls, rally support, financial contributions, direct actions, and all the events you showed up for—we put together this little video.
Thank You Video from RAN
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
For the planet,
Your friends at Rainforest Action Network

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Rainforest Action Network
221 Pine Street, 5th Floor, San Francisco, CA 94104 USA
Phone: (415) 398-4404 Fax: (415) 398-2732

 






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Sunday, November 20, 2011

Pod of dolphins delights Paremata, Wellington, locals...

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B)This pod of dolphins delighted Paremata, Wellington, locals. They had been fishing under the bridges in the Paremata inlet.

This pod attracted crowds of onlookers and prompted locals to make regular visits and even play music to this endangered species of dolphins. There is a close affinity between dolphins and their human friends.

http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/6001169/Paremata-dolphin-pod-draws-crowds

http://www.stuff.co.nz/auckland/local-news/5934650/Rare-dolphin-death-alarms-experts

Planet Green

Ecospree

Anzac Bloggers Unite


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Wednesday, November 16, 2011

Shocking: The video Sealord and the global tuna industry don't want you to see...

Yellowfin tuna are being fished as a replaceme...
Image via Wikipedia
Drum net seiner in Johnstone Strait, British C...
Image via Wikipedia
A tin of Greenseas Tuna.
Image via Wikipedia

 

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Today we've released shocking footage of ocean life dying in gruesome ways at the hands of industrial tuna fishers in the Pacific Ocean. When I first saw it I was outraged by the obscene waste of ocean life shown and I think most New Zealanders will be too.

This is the same destructive fishing method used by the fishing fleets that supply Sealord, New Zealand's biggest canned tuna brand. The widespread use of fish aggregation devices (FADs) with purse seine nets is to blame for high levels of bycatch and even threatens the very future of the fishery itself by catching large numbers of baby tuna. Local tuna brands Pams and Greenseas know this and are phasing out tuna caught this way.

The footage was shot by a New Zealand helicopter pilot turned whistleblower, who undertook aerial reconnaissance for tuna boats in the Pacific in 2009. To protect the pilot from reprisals we've disguised his identity.

It is not for the faint hearted, but here is what many tuna fishing vessels bring up with their catch. This is what fishing on FADs looks like:

Read more and view the video from the whistle-blower's revelations:



http://www.greenpeace.org/new-zealand/en/news/blog/the-video-sealord-and-the-global-tuna-industr/blog/37873/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+gpnzblog+%28Greenpeace+New+Zealand+Weblog%29

Eospree

Planet Green


Kiwipete
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